Question from a white librarian:

[intheflow]

My coworkers are working on a Juneteenth book display. They want to include books on the MLK, Jr. Civil Rights era. I feel strongly that it's not appropriate, as that happened 100 years after Juneteenth. To me, this holiday is about emancipation and Reconstruction. My coworkers insist that including more modern civil rights movements underscores the lack of progress in racial equity.

We are all white, though I have a deep background in antiracism work going back 35 years. Conflating all eras of Civil rights feels like a kind of white-washing of Black history, or maybe it's more like flattening Black history into a single narrative. I mean, I know it's all the same struggle and also know that movements have different eras that need to be respected to fully understand history (and thus, our current situation). What say you, hive mind?

Thanks in advance,
itf