Episode 1: Introducing Decoding Black

Letecia Rose: Hi everyone, welcome to the first episode of Decoding Black. This is an opportunity for us to engage in amazing topics about what it means to be Black and what the Black experience is like.

Chris Taylor: And this is gonna be a rollercoaster, folks. We’re gonna have lots of different topics over the next three episodes, it’s gonna be fantastic. You’re gonna learn a lot. I’m gonna learn a lot. Letecia, I think you might learn a lot.

Letecia Rose: I definitely will.

Podcast Intro: We have defined Decoding Black in terms of having the ability to destabilize, deconstruct, and disrupt systems of oppression, the negative narratives of Black folk rooted in anti-Black racism and the history of anti-Black racism in the Western world, and other systems of oppression across the globe.

Chris Taylor: So my name is Christopher Taylor, but actually my name is Dr. Christopher Stuart Taylor. I have a PhD in Immigration History and Black Canadian history. I teach at the University of Waterloo, specifically in Black history. Also looking at the historical systems of oppression and how those interplay in our current society. I also work in other avenues as an anti-Black racism and anti-racism professional, but that's just one aspect of my nine to five Black identity. In reality, I am a cisgender heterosexual Black male and I live in this Blackness of being unapologetically Black. What does that mean? That means that I am not afraid to express my Blackness, which we'll be talking about throughout these episodes. I'm not afraid to walk in spaces that are not defined for people that look like Letecia and I. These are spaces that we have seen and that had been created and cultivated in this society, Canada, North America and globally that does not want Black people to be a part of. So these are the spaces that I walk in and I navigate these systems of power.

Letecia Rose: So my name is Letecia Rose. I am a Black, cisgendered, heterosexual able-bodied woman. I would also probably add "mother" because my kids would probably add that to it. I think all the pieces that you speak about goes into what I actually do. I work specifically in racialized, marginalized communities and see the impact of all the things that you just mentioned and how it shows up, not just in how youth specifically show up in recreational spaces, how they show up in education spaces, but also how they show up in workspaces. So these pieces end up being so important to talk about because I work with young people every day. A little bit about me. I work for Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment, specifically within their corporate responsibility team. We work with young people who are facing barriers and we use sports as a tool to impact those barriers. Outside of there, I do a lot of work around diversity, equity, inclusion for organizations, helping them see how they can use them as tools to better impact their work, but also how they work with each other. So everything you spoke about is really important, but I think the piece that is really meaningful for me is that humanizing, this idea of Blackness because specifically for the young people I work with, a lot of them feel de-humanized.

Chris Taylor: And so we're here really to talk about Black identity. And the thing that we really need to think about in these conversations that we'll be having, what does this mean? What does this mean to be Black? What is that?

Letecia Rose: Well, it's interesting that you ask what it means to be Black, as I'm sure our listeners have maybe questioned that for themselves. For me, Black is at the root of everything I do, but I've had the privilege of being able to work in spaces that embrace that, not everyone is as fortunate to be in spaces where your identity and your Blackness and how you see yourself as being important or at the core of what you do. So for me it's very important. It's very top of mind. It's very personal.

Chris Taylor: And for me, when I look at this conversation on Black identity, it really roots us first of all in this idea of identity. Like what is it? We're really looking in the space of positionality, we're looking in the space of power. Identities are fluid. We talk about space, you can be one thing in one space and something different in another space. It really has been rooted in context. So we're in this podcast now, there is a context that we have to our identity, let alone our Black identity. And it comes down, too, in terms of our perspective; how we see the world. And we have a lot of conversations about this in terms of your I, capital I versus your eye, E-Y-E, and when it comes to identity, my “I”, the individual is how I see the world and how I navigate through this world, but my E-Y-E is how I perceive things. So the "I" versus the "eye". And we really need to root this conversation in our identities, how we see and how we are perceived. And so my question is why are we talking about this right now? What's the big deal that we need to talk about this right now?

Letecia Rose: I think from a community standpoint, we see that employment is a huge issue, unemployment is huge. There's. I think, specifically as it comes to youth, there's like 83,000 young people who are out of a job and with that, most of them, the large majority of them are Black youth. They are seeing and receiving, and are entering in spaces where they are discriminated based on how they look, their names, how they show up in spaces. You're speaking "too Black", or saying too much slang. So all these pieces then play a role in how they're being marginalized. I think the other piece is then what are the ripple effects of this? Then how's it show up in, you talked about how we see ourselves, but then also how we treat each other. And I think if I don't know who I am, how do I then interact with who you are? But I think another piece that we kind of glossed over is when we identify ourselves, we didn't talk about where we're from and our location being so important. So someone who's Black from Brampton might be different than your experience growing up in Scarborough. I grew up in that community.

Chris Taylor: Hey, I'm from the west end.

Letecia Rose: Yeah, well we might have a little thing there.

Chris Taylor: I'm sorry, I’m sorry.

Letecia Rose: But when I look at my Blackness, it's very rooted in that location of growing up in Scarborough and what that means. But it's also rooted in my parents, they are from Jamaica. They came here in the 60s and 70s and that's also a part of my identity. I also, right now I live, no longer in Scarborough, but in Ajax. I always like to get people to think about when we look at issues specifically within metropolitan areas as Toronto, that if you're living outside of Toronto, we might be looking at it differently. And I'm also a ride or die Canadian. But seeing conflict with that because in how all the policies and the institutions, they don't necessarily reflect me and my Blackness.

Chris Taylor: And I like how you're positioning this to decode your Blackness, to decode the Blacks and decode the Black identity.

Letecia Rose: See what you did there.

Chris Taylor: And one of the pieces when we look at identity is understanding it in context and to situate, what you're speaking of the ride or die being Canadian, the ride or die of talking about having that Jamaican ancestry. We also need to root this conversation in the international decade of people of African descent.

Letecia Rose: And what's that?

Chris Taylor: That's being recognized by the United Nations globally, this is a decade, 10 years, 2015 to 2024 to recognize the push and the exploits in the histories of Black people globally. And so that has been recognized by the Canadian government, that's been recognized by the city of Toronto. This has been recognized in these spaces, so it's really interesting when you talk about your identities, about your parents coming from Jamaica in the 60s, we're looking at a big push in the 60s and the 70s but one thing we really need to put some context to is that, we're here to disrupt and destabilize these narratives of Black folk and deconstruct this negativity that's been created, this erasure of Black people from Canadian history, but Black people have been here in this country since the early 1600s. There has been this fallacy that Black folk just quote unquote "got here". But that's only recognizing that this country has had a policy, particularly since 1906 and 1910 to exclude Black people, and as a policy something called climate discrimination where this country had something within the Immigration Act that said we can bar Black people from coming to this country because it's too cold. Imagine that because it's too cold. So then we pushed through 1962, we have the official de-racialization of the Canadian Immigration Policy, and then 1967 where we have this point system. So now it's much more equal for Black folk and quote unquote "non-white" folk to come to this country. And my parents came through that too, coming from Barbados. But the problem that we have is that we don't learn that history, but the point of decoding this podcast and decoding these conversations is to open up this conversation to listeners to understand that we have always been here. It's just we were told one thing and not the other. So in these spaces then, knowing that there's this negativity that's being created about Black folk, what does this idea of Blackness mean to you?

Letecia Rose: I think it means different things at different times, but I also think it means different things in different spaces. Let me elaborate. I think when I'm at home, when I'm with my family, when I'm with those I care about I am who I am. Is that the same as when I go into a corporate setting? Does that change? Should it change? And I think it speaks to a lot of the things that you talked about and especially this idea of that negativity. When we described ourselves, Black was that first thing that I said, but if I'm on the phone with someone, do I want to put that out first and foremost? Not sure. I constantly have to think about do I put that part of me first? And I think that's something that we, and I think even listeners can identify with.

Chris Taylor: And I think that's a big thing that we need to decode the why white people don't need to think about this. We need to decode and disrupt and destabilize and deconstruct these power dynamics that us as Black folk, we need to think about our Blackness, but others don't. And we need to start understanding that this history of Black quote unquote in Blackness is rooted in our history of enslavement, is rooted in our dehumanization to justify the unjustifiable, to justify the fact that you and I, our ancestors were property. We were beaten, killed, maimed. So they needed to create, when I say they, the powers that be needed to create an ideology and an identity of Blackness to justify that it's okay to do this. And the only way to do that was to classify us as Black folk as property. And so enslavement ended in British colonies and Canada in 1834, and we think that was a long time ago. But if we really think about it in human history, that was two and a half seconds ago. And so these are things that we're trying to decode and disrupt and destabilize right now and move forward. So looking on this conversation in terms of Blackness and Black identity, Letecia, where do you think we'll be going in our conversations on this podcast?

Letecia Rose: I think this opportunity is a profound one. More so because these are the conversations that are happening at kitchen tables, on car rides, on the bus. But I don't think it's happening on this type of platform. And I think even how you're breaking it down, I don't think this is happening. So I think why this podcast is so important, it's giving us that space to decode, to deconstruct, but then also what do we do with all this information and how is this information now having an impact on us and what can we do about it? Is there something we can do about it? So I think this is the perfect space and opportunity to have these sometimes difficult conversations, but I think most absolutely necessary conversations that we're already having. And hopefully it gives listeners the curiosity to think about themselves, think about how they're rooted, think about what's happening in and around them and the ripple effects that it's having.

Chris Taylor: And I agree 100% that we're in this space too, as you mentioned, to decode and show and kind of highlight where we are and really show the fluidity and the differences and the diversity of our Black voices. And this is a space as a window to allow folks to listen and understand and to join a conversation at hashtag Decoding Black that we can participate in this conversation as we move forward. So we're really in this space to push and move. We want you to first come with an open mind. We want you to get to a space of discomfort because learning happens on the edge of discomfort. We want you to reserve the right to change your mind. We want you to be in a space to question everything that you have learned or not learned. And now to unlearn what you think you know about Black folk, we want you to listen to this conversation, follow the hashtag, go to the library, look at books, go online, watch movies, speak to your colleagues, learn about their lived experiences that we can now inform a conversation that is rooted in a space that we can move forward as a collective to improve the outcomes for Black folk, not just in this country, but across the globe.