On a personal note,
it was my honor to know and regularly learn from Dr. Njeri Jackson,
who served as VCU’s Special Assistant to the Provost for Diversity and passed
away all too soon in 2010. I had dialogued with the former Chair of VCU’s
Department of African American Studies for years by the time she wrote me this
particular note following a multicultural concert I’d co-presented at VCU
Music, for which I had applied successfully for co-funding from VCU Libraries,
Multicultural Affairs, English, African American Studies, Activities Programming
Board, and the Provost’s Office for Diversity along with VCU Jazz Studies.
The concert had
featured the music of VCU Music faculty member Darryl Harper, the visual
art of Sonya Clarkand Salem Mekuria,
and poetry by Terence Culleton and Langston Hughes and had prompted Jackson to write me the next day: “Tony, you are just remarkable.
Your vision and energy, your commitment to music and education for social
justice (that is what you do, you know) remind me that we can make a
difference. I was thinking last night that I need to figure out how to insure
that this office always has at least $1000 worth of funding for your black
history month activities...I’m going to work on that. It was a magical evening...con
simpatica, njeri.”
Though I had hosted
and presented diverse events for decades, including those focusing on the
African American experience, her phrase “(that is what you do, you know)” made
me realize I had not known, I had not until that day recognized in myself
the two-word mission “social justice” that I had already been following and
leading for decades. I am grateful to her for pointing out the obvious to me,
allowing me to formalize my artistic and educational commitment to social
justice.
