(The Speech team socializing with members of the audience before the performance started)
This past Friday, the Bradley University speech team held its second annual Black History Showcase to celebrate black history month. The event featured a wide variety of performances including drama and poetry interpretation, an impromptu speech, and an after dinner speech. All of which focused on black history and racism that still exists in our world today.
The more serious speeches were focused on the recent events concerning the Michael Brown shooting in Ferguson including one particular performance dedicated to indicating the social theory applied to the situation. The speech detailed every single step the Ferguson police took after the initial shooting took place and the reaction that caused for the community. Deep and well sourced insight helped to give the audience an even deeper sense of knowledge in an event that through a constant stream of news have learned so much about. The timeline followed was from the initial shooting to the trial of officer Darren Wilson, featuring a few of the key points in between. Click to see timeline of events discussed in the social theory speech.
Dramatic performances highlighted the fear black men face when answering to police and how discrimination plays a role in the police force. The story told was about a man telling his young nephew that the police were right and to be trusted, but despite saying this he felt uncertainty about the fact. Also described was a story about a black Harvard student who was picked up and questioned by police when trying to lock his bike up. This performance gave a sense of the fear and unjustness that people go through every day just because of their background or the color of their skin.
The final performance of the night was an after dinner speech, which is a comedic speech with a purpose and trying to justify a point. Jerome Gregory led this performance by stating the way to end the “war on racism” was for him to build an underground railroad for white people to escape to Canada. The comedy perfectly mixed with the strong subject matter of the speech, which dealt with the “war on racism.” The jokes got the full room of students and community members laughing and engaged throughout and helped enforce the point that Gregory was trying to make.
Bradley’s second annual Black History Showcase did not only focus on the acts of racism that have occurred over the recent months but also briefly celebrated those who went on to triumph. Of those mentioned was the success of Muhammad Ali and the powerful actions of Rosa Parks.
“We need to talk about racism,” Gregory said during his speech. Despite having the final speech of the night, this quote seemed to carry over the entire night. Bradley’s speech team wanted to shed light on recent events ranging from Trayvon Martin to Michael Brown. Through a variety of performances dealing from comedic to dramatic speeches, which brought the presenter to tears, the point the Bradley Speech team wanted to make came across clearly. Racism is still very much a problem in society and is something that should not be ignored.