Jamil Smith
She definitely seemed to view the struggle of Black people here as part of a more global struggle. You wrote later in the book that, “Like many Black internationalists before and after her, Hamer refused to divorce developments taking place in the United States from global movements abroad.” How did she integrate her thinking and her action with others who were working for justice abroad?
Keisha Blain
So, one of the things that I talk about in the book is that Hamer takes a trip toward the end of September 1964, along with several activists in SNCC, to the African continent. She travels specifically to Guinea, and this was, I argue, a transformative moment for her. It was a moment where she began to really understand that the challenges that Black people were facing in the United States could not be divorced from the challenges that Black people were enduring in other parts of the globe, and even more broadly, that people of color, other marginalized groups, were facing globally.
I think when Hamer returned to the United States after that trip, she just started making those connections, and you could see it in her speeches. So, for example, she would talk about what was happening in Mississippi. She would condemn white supremacy in Mississippi and then she would draw a connection to the Congo. She would talk about the way that all of these other countries were trying to limit Black people’s autonomy, and even though she recognized that Mississippi was not the Congo, she saw the connections and, in doing so, she saw the importance of forming solidarities.
She saw the importance of these transnational networks, and she was really, I think, open to collaborating with all kinds of people as long they were committed to the cause. And there’s a moment in her life where she just openly says, “Listen. I’m no longer really fighting for civil rights. I’m fighting for human rights.”
Jamil Smith
That brings me to that quote that seems to have inspired your book title, which is, of course, “We have a long fight and this fight is not mine alone. But you are not free, whether you are white or black, until I am free.” And that not just encapsulates the universality of justice and accountability here in the States but abroad.
Keisha Blain
We are often talking about our lives as somewhat disconnected. Right? And this is true whenever we talk about racism, as an example. I’m always struck by conversations about racism that quickly turn into these personal narratives and then someone will say, “Well, I haven’t experienced that.” Or, “You know, that doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t believe it because no police officer has stopped me and asked me those questions.”
What Hamer did, and why it’s so powerful, even in the current moment to reflect on, is she said, “Listen. It’s not just about you. We have to think in the collective way. We’re all members of the American polity.” That means that if someone is hurting, it does affect you. If someone is in chains, you are not free, even if you think you are. Right?