We are Black professors.
We are daughters, sons, brothers, sisters, cousins, nieces, nephews, godchildren, grandfathers, grandmothers, fathers and mothers.
We’re writing to tell you we see you and hear you.
We know the stories of dolls hanging by nooses, n—– written on dry erase boards and walls, stories of n—– said casually at parties by White students too drunk to know their own names but who know their place well enough to know nothing will happen if they call you out your name, stories of n—– said stone sober, stories of them calling you n—– using every other word except what they really mean to call you, stories of you having to explain your experience in classrooms — your language, your dress, your hair, your music, your skin — yourself, of you having to fight for all of us in classrooms where you are often the only one or one of a few, stories of you choosing silence as a matter of survival.
Sometimes we’re in those classrooms with you.
We know there is always more that people don’t see or hear or want to know, but we see you. We hear you.
