WEBVTT

00:00:07.730 --> 00:00:12.410
Since elementary school,
words have always turned me on -

00:00:12.410 --> 00:00:14.050
the affectionate sound of

NOTE Paragraph

00:00:14.050 --> 00:00:16.160
"move one more again,
and I'm gonna pop you,"

00:00:16.160 --> 00:00:17.770
while getting my hair braided;

00:00:17.770 --> 00:00:21.780
the sultry way
that "ladies love cool jams"

00:00:21.780 --> 00:00:25.390
rolls off the tongue when his music
is introduced on the radio;

00:00:25.390 --> 00:00:30.740
the inspirational lessons detailing
the literary devices of onomatopoeia

00:00:30.740 --> 00:00:33.640
and synecdoche in high school.

00:00:33.640 --> 00:00:38.430
For 29 years, words
have been my very best friend.

00:00:39.500 --> 00:00:44.850
Since elementary school,
words have always ostracized me -

00:00:44.850 --> 00:00:51.160
the envious eyes of my non-black friends
as my black friends and I used jeers

00:00:51.160 --> 00:00:56.290
and culturally insensitive slurs
to express our love for one another;

00:00:56.870 --> 00:01:00.060
the covert corners I found a home in

00:01:00.060 --> 00:01:03.320
as I chose poetry writing
over lunch room gossip

00:01:03.320 --> 00:01:06.190
for most of my educational career;

00:01:07.430 --> 00:01:13.160
the demanding obligation I felt
to withhold my feelings and questions

00:01:13.160 --> 00:01:16.830
out of fear that my white colleagues
and white teachers

00:01:16.830 --> 00:01:19.520
would misinterpret my intention;

00:01:20.200 --> 00:01:23.530
the inevitable nature
of hearing the "N" word

00:01:23.530 --> 00:01:28.130
in almost every single space
I've ever encountered,

00:01:28.390 --> 00:01:31.420
regardless of the race of its occupants.

00:01:32.050 --> 00:01:37.110
For 29 years, words have
been my most archenemy.

00:01:37.110 --> 00:01:39.030
The problem is clear.

00:01:39.030 --> 00:01:42.840
As a society, we take
language for granted.

00:01:42.840 --> 00:01:47.070
The reason why this problem
persists is even more crystal.

00:01:47.070 --> 00:01:49.060
People are really stupid.

00:01:49.185 --> 00:01:50.605
(Laughter)

00:01:50.910 --> 00:01:56.810
We assume, naively, that wealth
is best measured by bills and coins,

00:01:56.810 --> 00:02:00.820
also assuming that any other form
of currency is inferior,

00:02:00.820 --> 00:02:03.000
and thus, secondary.

00:02:03.270 --> 00:02:06.630
Kofi Annan, a great Guinean diplomat,

00:02:06.630 --> 00:02:11.370
once said that education is the
great equalizer of our time.

00:02:11.370 --> 00:02:13.260
Now, again, Kofi is brilliant.

00:02:13.260 --> 00:02:15.570
He's amazing, so no shade to him.

00:02:15.570 --> 00:02:19.020
But with this one, Kofi was wrong.

00:02:19.020 --> 00:02:23.310
Words are more of a lever
than education will ever be.

00:02:23.310 --> 00:02:28.260
We just don't give words a chance
to do their thing often enough.

00:02:28.440 --> 00:02:32.830
Travel with me on a three-anecdote
journey through my adulthood,

00:02:32.830 --> 00:02:34.680
and you'll soon agree.

00:02:36.100 --> 00:02:39.000
I've been discovering, rediscovering,

00:02:39.000 --> 00:02:44.280
and re-rediscovering myself
for as long as I can possibly remember.

00:02:44.820 --> 00:02:49.200
One of the most powerful moments
on my journey to self discovery

00:02:49.200 --> 00:02:55.360
dates back to 2016 when I was forced
to reconnect with language.

00:02:56.140 --> 00:02:58.050
I remember the first half of my 20s

00:02:58.050 --> 00:03:02.020
being characterized
by a very fast-paced lifestyle.

00:03:02.020 --> 00:03:05.800
I had just recently moved to Boston
from my hometown of Cincinnati, Ohio.

00:03:05.800 --> 00:03:08.070
And I was very proud of the way

00:03:08.070 --> 00:03:12.700
that I fearlessly and brazenly
navigated the world,

00:03:12.900 --> 00:03:16.660
until I found out
I was two months pregnant.

00:03:16.660 --> 00:03:20.580
Life had a very funny way
of telling me to slow down.

00:03:21.240 --> 00:03:23.110
I was distraught.

00:03:24.140 --> 00:03:27.850
I remember announcing my pregnancy
to everybody I cared about

00:03:27.850 --> 00:03:31.620
with a text message
that said, "I have bad news."

00:03:31.640 --> 00:03:33.200
And that was that.

00:03:33.200 --> 00:03:36.320
My ex-boyfriend at the time,
my child's father,

00:03:36.320 --> 00:03:37.940
responded very graciously.

00:03:37.940 --> 00:03:39.620
He was very supportive.

00:03:39.620 --> 00:03:43.970
So my bad news turned into just news.

00:03:43.970 --> 00:03:46.880
And then when my grandma
offered some positive words,

00:03:46.880 --> 00:03:48.740
I was like, OK, now, we have good news.

00:03:48.740 --> 00:03:49.880
So I was excited.

00:03:49.880 --> 00:03:51.130
I now had good news.

00:03:51.130 --> 00:03:54.190
It was a good thing
that I was having a baby.

00:03:54.830 --> 00:03:58.340
I remember when we found out
the birth of Amir, my son -

00:03:58.340 --> 00:04:01.020
I'm sorry, the gender of Amir, my son,

00:04:01.020 --> 00:04:04.160
and we were so excited
that we immediately went shopping.

00:04:04.160 --> 00:04:08.300
We sifted through so many
sale and clearance racks,

00:04:08.300 --> 00:04:11.470
as many as the green line
could take us to.

00:04:13.030 --> 00:04:16.720
At six months, Amir stopped kicking.

00:04:16.720 --> 00:04:20.829
He didn't live beyond
his six months in my womb.

00:04:21.709 --> 00:04:23.120
I cried.

00:04:23.920 --> 00:04:25.830
For days, I cried.

00:04:26.050 --> 00:04:30.400
For days that turned into weeks, I cried.

00:04:30.400 --> 00:04:34.060
For weeks that turned
into months, I cried.

00:04:34.060 --> 00:04:37.060
For months that have now
turned into three years,

00:04:37.060 --> 00:04:40.140
I still find myself crying sometimes.

00:04:40.140 --> 00:04:43.440
Of course, all of the very
loving people in my life

00:04:43.440 --> 00:04:48.090
use their words to try
to dry my tears and soothe me.

00:04:48.090 --> 00:04:52.230
So I got a lot of "I'm so sorry, Ashley,"

00:04:52.480 --> 00:04:57.730
and some well-meaning, 
"He's in a better place now, Ashley."

00:04:57.730 --> 00:05:01.215
You know, the kind of words
we use to soothe people

00:05:01.215 --> 00:05:03.080
because we don't know what else to say,

00:05:03.080 --> 00:05:06.280
even though we know that our words
probably aren't working.

00:05:07.210 --> 00:05:14.100
It wasn't until I met my therapist
that recovery actually felt possible.

00:05:15.160 --> 00:05:18.760
My therapist said, "It's OK to cry.

00:05:18.760 --> 00:05:20.890
It's OK to grieve.

00:05:20.890 --> 00:05:24.520
It's even OK to criticize the way

00:05:24.520 --> 00:05:28.550
that other people give you permission
to do those things."

00:05:29.420 --> 00:05:34.940
And so within weeks,
I suddenly stopped crying.

00:05:35.650 --> 00:05:37.490
I don't know why.

00:05:38.610 --> 00:05:41.970
Fast forward to 2017.

00:05:41.970 --> 00:05:45.900
So as was stated, I'm an educator,
something I'm very proud of.

00:05:45.900 --> 00:05:50.220
And I started my educational
identity, if you will,

00:05:50.220 --> 00:05:53.410
with the Charlie Sposato
Graduate School of Education,

00:05:53.410 --> 00:05:55.570
which is a teacher residency program

00:05:55.570 --> 00:05:58.640
that's housed through Match,
a charter network.

00:05:58.640 --> 00:06:03.110
Specifically, I worked at Match
High School in Brighton for five years.

00:06:03.620 --> 00:06:06.240
I often give back to the graduate program

00:06:06.240 --> 00:06:08.550
because I feel like
they did so much for me.

00:06:08.550 --> 00:06:13.580
And one notable way that I give back
is by speaking on their panels every year.

00:06:13.600 --> 00:06:17.390
At my most recent talk, I remember
being asked a question

00:06:17.390 --> 00:06:23.280
about the way that my identity
informs my practice as an educator.

00:06:23.280 --> 00:06:24.930
Now, anybody who knows me


00:06:24.930 --> 00:06:27.480
knows that I was very excited
about that question

00:06:27.480 --> 00:06:32.170
because anything related to race,
identity, affirmation, culture,

00:06:32.170 --> 00:06:33.560
that's my jam.

00:06:33.560 --> 00:06:34.990
That's my topic.

00:06:34.990 --> 00:06:38.820
So my excitement came clear in my answers.

00:06:38.820 --> 00:06:42.330
I started by reflecting on the tension

00:06:42.330 --> 00:06:48.120
that I often feel as a black woman
educating black kids.

00:06:48.120 --> 00:06:49.790
Ironic, right?

00:06:50.450 --> 00:06:53.900
I talked about how I'm often conflicted

00:06:53.900 --> 00:06:59.030
because even though I share the identity
with a lot of my students,

00:06:59.030 --> 00:07:03.140
I work in a space - or at that time,
especially, I worked in a space -

00:07:03.140 --> 00:07:05.060
that was very white-dominated.

00:07:05.060 --> 00:07:08.920
So I felt like I had to
constrict who I really was.

00:07:09.880 --> 00:07:13.750
I talked about how my hoop
earrings are a statement.

00:07:13.750 --> 00:07:19.470
I talked about how my then-much more
intricate nail designs are a statement.

00:07:19.470 --> 00:07:23.510
And I even talked about the fact
that people's typical reaction

00:07:23.510 --> 00:07:26.820
to my tattooed aesthetic
is a statement too,

00:07:26.820 --> 00:07:28.620
just of a different kind.

00:07:28.620 --> 00:07:30.210
I talked about a lot.

00:07:30.640 --> 00:07:34.690
And I culminated my talking
by saying something like,

00:07:34.690 --> 00:07:39.370
"It's a black woman thing, though,"
with a sort of dismissive pride.

00:07:40.440 --> 00:07:45.770
In response, an eager white
resident raised her hand.

00:07:45.770 --> 00:07:49.370
And she said, "It's actually
not just a black girl thing.

00:07:49.370 --> 00:07:51.740
I've experienced that too."

00:07:51.740 --> 00:07:55.640
And she proceeded to project
her privilege and her story

00:07:55.640 --> 00:07:57.350
onto my narrative.

00:07:57.350 --> 00:07:59.400
Now, although I didn't appreciate that,

00:07:59.400 --> 00:08:02.510
I responded in a way
that I don't think was rude.

00:08:02.510 --> 00:08:06.170
And I said, "So sure, yes.

00:08:06.170 --> 00:08:12.230
Womanhood in patriarchal
America is one thing, indeed.

00:08:12.230 --> 00:08:17.510
However, black womanhood
in white patriarchal America

00:08:17.510 --> 00:08:19.400
is an entirely different thing."

00:08:19.400 --> 00:08:24.040
And it's something that, namely,
she had no right to speak on.

00:08:24.890 --> 00:08:28.650
In response to the words
that I offered to the white woman's words,

00:08:28.650 --> 00:08:31.490
I got a lot of praise from people.

00:08:31.490 --> 00:08:34.640
My most favorite praise
was from one of my students

00:08:34.640 --> 00:08:36.520
who accompanied me on the panel.

00:08:36.520 --> 00:08:38.210
Let's call her Maya.

00:08:38.210 --> 00:08:43.880
And Maya said, "Yes, Davis,"
and she hugged me, very tightly.

00:08:43.880 --> 00:08:47.610
Maya hugged me tighter
than anybody had ever hugged me before.

00:08:48.420 --> 00:08:51.730
I still don't fully understand why.

00:08:52.770 --> 00:08:56.790
Fast forward to October 2018.

00:08:56.790 --> 00:08:59.400
So I am a principle fellow this year,

00:08:59.400 --> 00:09:02.070
which is fancy verbiage for saying

00:09:02.070 --> 00:09:06.690
that I'm an underpaid assistant principal
studying to be a principal.

00:09:07.900 --> 00:09:10.890
I work at a beautifully
intimate elementary school.

00:09:10.890 --> 00:09:15.000
It's a kindergarten through third grade 
school, the Shaw, in Mattapan.

00:09:15.010 --> 00:09:20.250
And we serve a school
full of beautiful students of color.

00:09:20.250 --> 00:09:25.080
30% of our student body,
about, identifies as Latinx.

00:09:25.080 --> 00:09:30.140
Notice that I chose to use the word
Latinx as opposed to Hispanic.

00:09:30.150 --> 00:09:33.540
One of the things that
I'm most proud of about my school

00:09:33.540 --> 00:09:35.060
and about Boston alike,

00:09:35.060 --> 00:09:36.090
and one of the things

00:09:36.090 --> 00:09:39.480
that is actually convincing me
to continue to endure the cold,

00:09:39.480 --> 00:09:44.760
is the fact that Boston
is so linguistically diverse.

00:09:44.760 --> 00:09:47.730
Many of my students
speak English, of course,

00:09:47.730 --> 00:09:51.030
but they don't speak English
as their primary language.

00:09:51.030 --> 00:09:54.640
And they're multilingual
in ways that I wish that I were.

00:09:54.640 --> 00:09:58.500
So that's something
that I am incredibly proud of.

00:09:58.500 --> 00:10:02.730
However, on the day
that this story revolves around,

00:10:02.730 --> 00:10:04.610
I was very unproud.

00:10:05.690 --> 00:10:09.380
So one of my students,
who identifies as Latinx, a girl -

00:10:09.380 --> 00:10:12.350
let's call her Taj - is a second grader.

00:10:12.350 --> 00:10:14.410
And she's amazing.

00:10:14.510 --> 00:10:17.530
Now, all of my students are amazing;
I don't have any favorites.

00:10:17.530 --> 00:10:20.120
But the thing that makes Taj most amazing

00:10:20.120 --> 00:10:24.070
is that no matter
who's around, she's the same.

00:10:24.070 --> 00:10:25.850
And she's in second grade.

00:10:25.850 --> 00:10:28.070
So I wanted to share that with her mother.

00:10:28.070 --> 00:10:31.010
And I sort of practiced
in my head what I was going to say

00:10:31.010 --> 00:10:33.320
because as you guys know,
I really like words.

00:10:33.320 --> 00:10:39.550
So I would say something like,
in class, Taj answers questions like this.

00:10:39.560 --> 00:10:44.410
And then when we're in cheerleading,
Taj shows leadership like this.

00:10:44.420 --> 00:10:48.170
And when she thinks
nobody's watching and she's by herself,

00:10:48.170 --> 00:10:49.790
Taj does this -

00:10:49.790 --> 00:10:53.630
because I really wanted to capture
for Ms. Garcia, Taj's mother,

00:10:53.630 --> 00:10:57.860
the full beauty of Taj's personality.

00:10:57.860 --> 00:11:00.960
So when my rehearsing
in my head sort of ended,

00:11:00.960 --> 00:11:03.980
I went on to playground dismissal duty.

00:11:03.980 --> 00:11:06.143
Of course, I was
paying attention to everybody

00:11:06.143 --> 00:11:09.210
and making sure that everybody
went home with the right person.

00:11:09.240 --> 00:11:13.190
But I was really just looking
for Ms. Garcia, Taj's mom.

00:11:13.190 --> 00:11:16.940
When I saw her approaching,
I waved very frantically,

00:11:16.940 --> 00:11:19.070
like a kid in a candy store almost.

00:11:19.070 --> 00:11:21.500
And I sort of rushed over to her.


00:11:21.500 --> 00:11:22.947
I just started talking.

00:11:22.947 --> 00:11:25.850
We didn't even greet each other,
I just started talking.

00:11:25.850 --> 00:11:27.920
And then in the middle of my talking,

00:11:27.920 --> 00:11:32.400
she interrupted me,
and said, "Hola, Ms. Davis."

00:11:32.400 --> 00:11:33.990
And I froze.

00:11:34.930 --> 00:11:37.330
It wasn't until then that I realized

00:11:37.330 --> 00:11:40.910
that my "perfectly rehearsed"
English speech

00:11:40.910 --> 00:11:44.010
wouldn't resonate with Taj's mom.

00:11:44.010 --> 00:11:46.300
I was embarrassed.

00:11:46.300 --> 00:11:52.720
Taj, in her brilliant innocence,
jumped in and began translating.

00:11:52.720 --> 00:11:56.500
She would turn to me
and ask me a question in English,

00:11:56.500 --> 00:12:01.250
and then she'd resort back to her mother
and answer that question in Spanish

00:12:01.250 --> 00:12:03.520
with grace and immediacy.

00:12:06.430 --> 00:12:11.510
Ms. Garcia, Taj's mom, said,
"Gracias, Miss Davis," and began crying.

00:12:11.530 --> 00:12:13.920
And all I could do was smile.

00:12:15.080 --> 00:12:20.010
In reflection, I realized
that another thing that makes Taj special

00:12:20.010 --> 00:12:24.060
is not the fact that she speaks English.

00:12:24.060 --> 00:12:27.930
It's also not the fact
that she speaks Spanish.

00:12:27.930 --> 00:12:32.180
But it's that, in that moment,
she knew very astutely

00:12:32.180 --> 00:12:38.360
which language she needed
to unite us all - the language of love.

00:12:38.970 --> 00:12:41.500
I now understand why.

00:12:42.730 --> 00:12:44.030
I chose these three stories

00:12:44.030 --> 00:12:49.180
because each of them highlights
the theme that semantics matter.

00:12:49.180 --> 00:12:52.990
The way you say things,
the why behind your saying of things,

00:12:52.990 --> 00:12:57.700
and the impact of those
said things carry weight.

00:12:57.700 --> 00:13:01.930
You are your you-est you
because of the words you choose

00:13:01.930 --> 00:13:04.570
and because of the words you don't.

00:13:04.570 --> 00:13:08.600
Your words are your power
and your words make you resilient.

00:13:08.600 --> 00:13:12.800
The question, then, is not about
whether or not you have access

00:13:12.800 --> 00:13:14.840
to the resiliency of words.

00:13:14.840 --> 00:13:19.330
The question instead should be
about your relationship with words.

00:13:20.030 --> 00:13:22.850
Are you like the members of team Amir,

00:13:22.850 --> 00:13:25.670
simply repeating words
and phrases over and over,

00:13:25.670 --> 00:13:29.480
because you don't know what else to say
regardless of how they make people feel,

00:13:29.480 --> 00:13:32.270
just because somebody
repeated them to you?

00:13:32.860 --> 00:13:35.950
Or are you like the naive resident,

00:13:35.950 --> 00:13:38.510
negating the words in other people's words

00:13:38.510 --> 00:13:43.000
out of a selfish desire
to project your own words onto them?

00:13:43.820 --> 00:13:47.120
Or perhaps, maybe you're like Taj,

00:13:47.120 --> 00:13:49.770
affirming the word currency in others

00:13:49.770 --> 00:13:54.010
regardless of race,
status, bias, or creed?

00:13:56.210 --> 00:14:01.280
Since birth, our words
have defined and fed us:

00:14:01.280 --> 00:14:04.240
the shady way we say "Good morning!"

00:14:04.240 --> 00:14:07.190
with more cheer to our boss
in promotion meetings

00:14:07.190 --> 00:14:08.590
than we do to the people

00:14:08.590 --> 00:14:12.040
who serve us coffee
at Dunkin' Donuts every morning;

00:14:12.820 --> 00:14:17.360
the flirtatious way we lead
a new friend into our lives

00:14:17.360 --> 00:14:22.590
by detailing certain traits
about ourself and omitting others

00:14:22.590 --> 00:14:25.410
because it's only the first date;

00:14:27.050 --> 00:14:30.960
the fact that, as a child,
I read a dictionary religiously -

00:14:30.960 --> 00:14:32.570
I studied it;

00:14:32.570 --> 00:14:35.240
and the fact that now, as an adult,

00:14:35.240 --> 00:14:37.710
I have a protected list of words

00:14:37.710 --> 00:14:40.700
that I'm collecting
in the back of my planner;

00:14:42.050 --> 00:14:46.240
the fact that most people of color
have to rehearse and rewrite

00:14:46.240 --> 00:14:50.120
what they want to say
in their head at least three times

00:14:50.120 --> 00:14:53.750
before raising their hand
to offer those words aloud

00:14:53.750 --> 00:14:57.920
in a setting that white America
would consider "professional."

00:14:58.990 --> 00:15:04.460
Our entire lives, words have equalized us
and made us resilient.

00:15:05.450 --> 00:15:07.170
Words matter.

00:15:07.830 --> 00:15:09.440
Let them.

00:15:10.290 --> 00:15:13.010
If you take nothing else
away from this talk,

00:15:13.010 --> 00:15:15.240
I urge you to reflect -

00:15:15.680 --> 00:15:17.760
word work is deeply personal.

00:15:17.760 --> 00:15:18.920
It's very private.

00:15:18.920 --> 00:15:25.290
So find a way to ask yourself:
What is my relationship like with words?

00:15:25.290 --> 00:15:28.910
Use that answer to coach
yourself into improvement

00:15:28.910 --> 00:15:31.490
and ultimately into resilience.

00:15:31.490 --> 00:15:33.270
You got this.

00:15:33.270 --> 00:15:36.070
And if you don't,
you'll always have words.

00:15:36.070 --> 00:15:37.070
Thank you.

00:15:37.070 --> 00:15:38.200
(Applause)