The Why in Wakanda
People have had difficulty understanding the Black reaction to the movie Black Panther. They don’t understand why it means so much to Black and Brown people, or why we seem to want so much for a fictional place to be real.
I say it’s very easy to understand the desire to have a real country that was never colonized and its natural development never interfered with by countries assuming they were better than the “savages” and the natural resources theirs to steal.
I’d give the soul of my people to know what life feels like for people never having been colonized or suffering with the stain of slavery.
What type of freedom would I feel?
How light would my soul be?
How would I view the yoke of racism if I lived in a society that had never experienced such a thing?
And how would I seek to help heal those that had suffered this way?
I think about the weight on my soul and the constant rage I feel everyday living in this society and cannot comprehend NOT knowing that dread or feeling that pain. I cannot conceive of a time when I wasn’t keenly aware of my status as a Black person in this country. I stopped calling myself African American during my teen years because it simply didn’t fit. I knew nothing of my African heritage and knowing too much about my slave ancestry I decided Black was more than sufficient to illustrate who I was.
I’ve done the Ancestry.com thing and now know that I am 87% African and still, I consider myself, simply Black. By the way, I’m also 3% Russian, go figure…
Black Panther made me want to explore my African Heritage not only because of its use of the many traditions displayed on the continent, but also because of the power projected by all of those beautiful Black faces. The characters aren’t just characters, but archetypes that young Blacks can aspire too. However, I don’t allow myself to wallow in the fantasy of Wakanda, because it’s not a fantasy. It is a thought experiment that I’d never considered. A place I never thought could be because the crime of colonialism and forced religion has so corrupted nearly every place on this planet, Black and Brown people are forced to look to a fictional kingdom for what true cultural evolution and freedom could look like.
And now that the idea of that possibility is in my head, I will destroy anyone who tries to take the power of that idea away from me.
Away from us.
I have never considered my slave heritage something of which to be ashamed. To me, the shame lies at the feet of the descendants of those who enslaved others. However, I see where that heritage rears itself in ways I didn’t even realize comes from that legacy. There is a void in me, an emptiness that made me nearly cry as I watched Okoye say, “We’re home.” I have never felt that way about the US. I have never felt at home.
Black Panther gave me a “home,” even if it only exists within the confines of my heart.
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