On Monday, April 24, 2017, the School of Arts and Sciences hosted Carmen Perez, co-chair of the January 2017 Women’s March on Washington, as the keynote speaker to the School’s annual Student Research Day. Social Studies Education major Joni Christel welcomed more than a hundred students, faculty, and administrators to Perez’s inspirational talk, and President Butts introduced Ms. Perez as a committed and effective movement builder. Dr. Butts told the crowd of Time Magazine’s recognition of Ms. Perez as among 2017’s “100 most influential people.”
Ms. Perez identified the roots of her activism in her early life in Oxnard, California, a small, gang-ridden, agricultural city one hour north of Los Angeles. Her sister was the victim of gun violence, and her death led Perez to college, and ultimately to initiate innovative non-violence work and youth leadership development programs—particularly by seeking out the voices and concerns of those who have been incarcerated. In 2008 she joined famed civil rights activist Harry Belafonte in his organization, The Gathering for Justice, which brings policy makers, community activists, academics and those who have been incarcerated together in conversation that seeks to address mass incarceration and its disproportionate racial inequities.
The Women’s March began with a single Facebook announcement—but ultimately drew over five million people—and was organized to assert women’s quest for justice in the 21st century. Perez described for Research Day attendees the March’s “Unity Principles,” which included the belief that women’s rights are human rights—the march sought to include Black women, Native women, poor women, immigrant women, disabled women, Muslim women, lesbian queer and trans women to fight for a society that leaves them “free and able to care for and nurture their families, however they are formed, in safe and healthy environments free from structural impediments.”
The March leaders’ vision included a commitment to immigrant rights, environmental justice, disability rights, civil rights, workers rights, along with LGBTQIA rights, reproductive justice and ending violence. Ms. Perez explained some of the conflicts over building an inclusive, intersectional movement, and she shared the March’s successes in inspiring what many call the “largest mass protest in U.S. history,” with participants from across the globe—in more than 100 locations including Paris, Kenya, London, Mexico City, Dublin, Jakarta, Dar es Salaam, Seoul, and New Zealand.
Ms. Perez’s message to the Old Westbury community is that no one has to become an activist overnight—that anyone can take the step to become involved to work for justice—whether it is visiting an imprisoned mother, using one’s artistic skills, or reaching out to other community members.
Photo caption: Perez (center) listens to School of Arts and Sciences student present her research project.