My Can
Claudette Joy Spence (July 23, 2020)
"My Can," a literary piece, speaks to my journey as an immigrant from Jamaica to the USA; my discovery of racism; my journey to cultural identity; my work to address systems of inequity for people of African ancestry; and the joy of living.
It is most affirming to be able to celebrate the life and legacy of my ancestors - those born in Jamaica and those born on the African continent or anywhere in the Diaspora. Often times, we are subtly forced to choose a group of people with whom we will identify. For an immigrant, like me, this presents challenges around loyalty and cultural identification. "My Can" speaks to that.
Having discovered what racism is, the blatant and covert ways in which it shows up, and the ways in which it has been codified in all the systems of USA (and other nations), I have worked in the last 30 years of my professional life doing social justice work. Much of this work has been related to economic justice. When in early 1990’s I served at East Harlem Interfaith we, along with New York University Law School brought suit against the banks that resulted in the change of regulations in New York. The changes opened opportunities for Black peoples living in marginalized communities to have access to credit and capital for business development for mortgages. While this is/was a significant and historic victory towards building financial wealth, in the big scheme of things, it was a Band-Aid.
Later, I went on to work for a housing and community development entity in East Flatbush that leveraged financial opportunities to uplift low- and modest-income residents. We helped them become first time home-owners and we administered loans for repairs to homes while overseeing renovations. These homeowners would not have qualified for a loan from a traditional bank. During my first year with them my team and I improved loan productivity by more than 40% - helping a significantly increased number of homeowners with much needed repair. I worked with native African Americans, Caribbean immigrants, and folks of European descent who were community residents.
One of the pillars of systemic racism is its creation and implementation of divisiveness among people. To the extent they have trained us Africans to distrust each other. This feeds into the native African American’s distrust of immigrant Africans. They have trained us about the worst about African Americans. So even if we identify as African we do not want to identify as “African American” because of the distaste fed to us. My piece, “My Can,” speaks to this and posits an approach to vault racism at that level. In my book “Nurturing The Garden of Joy: Provocative Essays on Relationships” (2015), I speak to who among us will rise to the challenge to help us conquer this divide between Caribbean immigrants and native Black Americans. I would like to believe that I continue to rise to that challenge through my actions and that “My Can” is an avenue for broadening my reach.
As a journalist, writer, educator, and presenter for “Joyful Communications™” sessions, my offerings often speak to addressing oppressive inequities in our relationships and shifting to a more love- and peace-filled approach to living. I think “My Can” delivers.