Dean of Students Kenneth Elmore told members of Boston University’s Black Student Union their leadership has to challenge a generation to have dreams.
“Push back,” he said in a speech. “Defiance is an important part of leadership.”
A crowd of 60 students gathered for a night of speeches, dances, music and spoken word in “Legacy: I Am the Seed of the Free.” The show, held in Morse Auditorium Saturday night, celebrated Black History Month.
The union, known as Umoja, aimed to keep the celebration “short, sweet and simple” with the entertainment it featured, said President Dexter McCoy, a College of Fine Arts sophomore.
“Our mission is to educate as well as celebrate our culture,” McCoy said in an interview with The Daily Free Press.
The acts depicted several eras and movements of black culture, from slavery to the modern day. In between each performance, students quoted prominent historical members of the black community such as Anna J. Cooper, Langston Hughes and Sonia Sanchez.
Metropolitan College student Josh Reynolds and Berklee College senior Amon Robinson sang “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” while Berklee student Melissa Myatt and a band performed “I’ll Take You There” and “Say It Loud.”
College of Communication freshman Taylor Walker, CFA graduate student Stefan Jones and McCoy spoke before students about a number of topics, including the Reconstruction Era.
“We come from a downtrodden and oppressed people,” McCoy said. “What is our struggle? Where is our progress and when are we going to do something about it?”
The show also featured a number of dance and singing groups, including BU dance troupe Afrithms, which covered styles ranging from traditional African dance to music by Nat King Cole to hip-hop, rap, pop and R&B.
College of Arts and Sciences junior Olli Pamplin described the performances as educational and enlightening.
“I like the fact that we get this chance to tell people about what we’re about,” Pamplin said. “I get to learn more about my own people, so I love that.”
Pamplin said she enjoyed COM sophomore Chelsea Roberts’s spoken word performance with Brianna West’s dance accompaniment on the obstacles the Old Testament presented to black people during oppressive periods.
“Everything [Roberts] was saying really hit me, not that I liked hearing about the struggle, but I could relate to it,” Pamplin said.
Eniola Odukale, a CAS junior, said the celebration encouraged continued change and growth in the black community.
“I loved the transition from the Old Testament to the New Testament and what we now need to do today to continue to build, continue to move forward,” Odukale said.
Odukale said the celebration of Black History Month reflected a special commonality black students may have.
“The whole uniting factor is pretty important because if nothing else, we can say that we’re all black,” Odukale said. “We all came from different backgrounds, we have different socioeconomics, but that one common ground we have is being black.”
School of Management sophomore Alexis Redman, treasurer of Umoja, echoed the sentiment of several in attendance.
“I think it’s time for our generation, not just black students at BU, but as our generation as a whole,” she said, “to step up and do a good job of moving forward and giving a better future.”
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