There is something going on. 

    Before I bring us to Fall 2010, I need to tell you about One-by-One.  In the sleepy Southern town of Sanford, NC a group of mostly white, elderly women had pulled themselves together with a common goal.  Their goal is to improve race-relations in Sanford. 

    A friend, Gary, had invited me to a Mike Wiley’s one-man performance of Tim Tyson’s Blood Done Sign My Name.  I use Tyson’s book in my “Interpersonal Relationships and Race” course to give my students a detailed history of the modern civil rights movement.  Knowing that, and having read Tyson’s book because of me, Gary invited me to this performance.  So, with his wife Nyree, we drove to Sanford and the Temple Theater. 

    Mike Wiley’s performance was amazing. 

    But before he started I came across a very interesting insert in the performance program.  The flyer advertised a group called One-by-One with this statement:

    “To improve race relations, a community forum is being planned to discuss racism, with the hope of sharing, understanding and healing.  The ability to work inside and outside of this community as one people, called to work together for the betterment of all, will result.”

    Also on the flyer were spaces to put your name, telephone number, etc as part of their call that read, “Be One with us! Please complete the sheet and drop it in the box.”

    Very interesting, I thought, and said so to Gary and Nyree.  Having been working on diversity issues for so long, I could see that this group needed some help. After all, you don’t ask people to give you their name so they can contact you about race-relations in the community, without giving a name of a person who is working as part of the group. 

    That Monday, by email, I got in touch with the director of the Temple Theater, who then put me in touch with the two organizers of the One-by-One group.  I gave them a bit of my history and asked if I might be of some help to their race-relation effort.  Both replied with enthusiasm, and asked if I could attend their next meeting.  February 21, 2010 I attended that meeting and have been working with the One-by-One group ever since.

    Something is going on.

    Exemplified by the existence of Sanford’s One-by-One group, what’s going on is that Americans are feeling the press of neo-diversity in their (large and small) communities.  And some are pulling together to try and figure it out, not to stamp it out, but to make it a well functioning part of the mosaic that has always been America.

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