A person’s voice is central to their identity. Any form of artistic expression, in writing, film, and language as a whole is a form of voice. As not only a vessel of expression to communicate emotions, thoughts, and feelings, but a manifestation of the internal, a voice articulates a person’s internal consciousness, the substance of their selfhood, and the things which shape their lived experience. Their perspective, if you will. A voice is the means by which abstract solitary experiences of thought and feeling are encoded and transported to the external spaces of interpersonal interaction and public discourse within a larger community. And because it is these experiences which form the basis of a person’s selfhood, a voice, as the external representative of this internal experience, is inherent and inextricable from identity. Centered in the life’s work of Toni Cade Bambara, a person’s voice and opportunities of expression are essential to an awakening of self regard, and the cultivation of a dynamic community receptive and responsive to injustice.
Toni Cade Bambara was an influential black feminist author, filmmaker, teacher, and social activist known for her role in uplifting and empowering black communities. She, herself, preferred the title of ‘cultural worker’ and encouraged the use of writing, film, and art as practical tools to unlock and explore questions of identity in order to fuel individual power and a steadiness of self concept. She dedicated her life to creating spaces for people to examine their identity and find comfort and confidence in their own voice. To Bambara, the individual person is imbued with an unshakeable, indisputable worth by the fact that they are the captain of their own singular experience.
A person should not be discounted or dismissed for voicing their experience for any reason, and especially not for a socially constructed reason such as racism, classism, or sexism. She understood that every person is witness to a unique version of a shared human history, resulting from their individual identity. Community, she believed, is a necessary product of its people; we live in the context of those around us, while simultaneously shaping that very same contextualizing experience. Community should be a living and breathing space of inclusivity and tolerance for a collection of diverse perspectives, not an inaccessible entity of exclusion that categorically denies respect, consideration, and esteem to certain groups of people.
Bambara held it to be true that to live is to be part of something that is bigger than the individual unit of identity; it is to be a part of a society of diverse humans that coexist as they themselves uniquely navigate life. The lives of every person coalesce to define human existence, intertwined like pieces of a puzzle to create a bigger picture. The integrity of the shared human experience, the strength of community, is dependent upon the recognition and appreciation of each puzzle piece—unique identity. And because she recognized that identity is tethered to the human experience so closely, and that a person’s voice is representative of that, she felt it necessary for every voice to have the opportunity to communicate openly and freely without catering to any standard that would force conformity or filter genuine experience—genuine identity.
To Bambara, it was necessary to sponsor people’s trust in their own voice so that they could present their experience with the same raw sense of realness by which they live through it. By empowering voices to transcend constraints of race, class, and gender with unique, unfiltered expressions rather than adherence to a single standard, she challenged the inaccessibility of esteem for marginalized and minority groups. Bambara did the cultural work of supporting those overlooked and underrecognized voices with a distinct purpose of spurring action. The artistic record of diverse accounts of personal experience which she promoted built dynamic communities that responded to and reflected the dynamic nature of people. Revolution, a confrontation of oppression, was made irresistible by her organization of the individual puzzle pieces of identity into a common movement centered on her famous questions: Who are you? And what’s the plan?
Toni Cade Bambara might have passed away in 1995, but her words and her legacy live on with the same steadfast urgency to empower, organize, and take action. Living in a world where voices are silenced and stymied by structures of oppression, Bambara’s cultural work continues to have an important place. It is true that we live individually, together. And, in accordance with that truth we must welcome expressions of identity, celebrate diverse experiences, and applaud the collection of culture as it strengthens community.
So let me ask you, as an individual in possession of a unique voice: Who are you? And what’s your plan?