Who was Ella Baker?

Ella Baker stands right next to Dada Amir Haider in the list of people I felt ashamed not knowing before this class. In this blog, I will merely be attempting to understand some of the tenets that Ella Baker stood for, recognizing the limitation of drawing from a single address.

"The right to be men and women, to grow and to develop to the fullest capacity with which He has endowed us".

The first observation you draw from her expression is the reliance on religion as a legitimizing force for her struggle. We have studied both Muslim and Christian expressions for the plight of the African Americans, and while it is a perfectly apt analysis that this stems from the development of the church as an institution for the African American community, while all other institutions (including schools, family) were in shatters, I believe this religious tint had other advantages as well. For one, how could you justify speaking against established laws and norms, if you are not holding on to the crutch of an alternative code of morals and ethics- an established religion. Furthermore, the community, forsaken by the laws of the state, could find an identity still in religion. It’s a haven where they could feel as legitimate beings- individuals- equals. It can also, perhaps, be argued that by claiming that God had granted them rights, and they were merely taken away from them, the Blacks could find motivation- motivation to work towards returning home. They were always human, always individual, and they need to work merely to get that home back.

This idea of always having been complete individuals, links to Ella Baker's ideas on humanism as well. Much like Fanon, she is not talking about a distinct "Black" person that they ought to become. She's instead focusing on developing as humans- men and women, and fighting for their right to grow and develop to the fullest capacity.

"People cannot be free until there is enough work in this land to give everybody a job"

What stuck me the most in Ella Baker’s address was her acute understanding of freedom and justice. She talks not of revenge or hatred or violence (all of which can be understood as legitimate reactions to racism), but of political, economic and psychological freedom. She acknowledges issues of segregation and voting, but also realizes that even when these goals are attained, true freedom would not be achieved unless there is a sense of economic justice to go with it as well. She’s hinting at the issue of wealth distribution, linked directly to racial discrimination, which stands as one of the biggest hurdles to growth for most marginalized communities in the United States to this day. How can you be a free citizen, if you are voting, going to parks, riding busses but will never have the opportunity to earn nearly as much as the white man due to the economic structure? To this end, she emphasizes the need to educate- educate, perhaps, to improve their economic standing, but also educate to be able to see the structural inequalities even when the time comes that they become more subtle and hidden.

“leadership is one of those things, you know, I won’t talk about them too much”

When I think of grass level movements that do not have conventional leadership like Baker would’ve propagated for, I think of the Egyptian Revolution of 2011 and the current Hong Kong protests. I believe what Baker has done is redefine leadership: from a spearhead approach to a facilitator approach. She was initiating, developing, essentially ‘leading’ organizations, and yet, she refused to become the face of the movement or impose her decisions on ‘followers’. A movement is a sum of its members, and if one or two or a certain number of those members help the others logistically to stage the protests, while letting the people have their say, they would still be leaders- just redefined ones.