Highlander 75th Anniversary
By: Bobby Mitchell
Over Labor Day weekend there was a celebration of the 75th anniversary of the Highlander Center in the hills outside Knoxville TN. The Highlander uses popular education, a form of learning based on people sharing their experiences, to address large problems in ourselves and society at large. They have contributions in many major political movements, including the Southern labor movements of the 1930s, the Civil Rights Movement of the 1940s-60s, and the Appalachian people's movements of the 1970s-80s.The mornings were full of songs of struggle and fiery speeches about past successes in the civil rights movement, labor organizing in the south and the fight Appalachian people have gone through for self-determination.
A few of us folks working for justice here in southern West Virginia attended the anniversary looking to share experiences, strategize and build on the growing movement of folks fighting for safe living conditions and a healthy environment currently being compromised by corporate interest in large scale resource exploitation. We found much more than a typical conference, this was a major cross generational, multi-issue approached celebration to social change. The causes of so much oppression faced by people today are traced back to connected themes of people’s struggle and despair linked to problems of those in power making decisions that affect our everyday lives; why is it the farm worker, the coal miner and the folks living in the housing project are all faced with similar problems of not having access to resources and being continually abused by toxification of their home place and living in harm’s way, these being perceived as acceptable abuses.
A main theme emphasized at the event was to just hear and be heard; so many folks with stories about grassroots battles and political struggles where so much has originated from the meetings and strategy sessions coming from this research center in eastern Tennessee. The solutions are coming right from the people.
A few sessions were focused on the injustice mountaintop removal is doing to the region by dissolving the framework for people to still have the ability to live in the mountains and or even have a choice to keep the traditions alive that are so quickly dismissed for exploiting the land and its people. Building community and learning how the process of regaining control of our lives are the kind of programs that threaten outside control, so these meetings work to create more democratic leadership locally.
I look to the school as a point of inspiration when I recall the work that has come out of the research from Highlander in the 1980’s and 90’s providing much effort into landownership surveys to uncover patterns of poverty in areas dominantly owned by land companies with non-local interests. As result of some of the programs through the years, resources have become available to rural communities by way of trainings in grassroot campaigns and leadership development. Appalachian people have often felt the burden of disenfranchisement and an unresponsive state government in the face of much abuse of businesses and out of state interests controlling economies and local power structures.
There is something powerful about sitting on the hills outside Highlander and feeling the winds of change engulf you, thinking about the quote by Sempta Clark that says “I know I am not weaving my life’s pattern alone only, one of the threads do I hold in my hands. The other ends go so many ways linking my life with others.”