Exploring Black history through trivia and clothing
By Madison Lewis
During rounds of Black History Month-themed bingo and trivia, muffled whispers and the sound of shushing echoed through the NJM Room, followed by triumphant yells of excitement, accompanied by applause.
The Making Connections Program hosted an event called Black History Month Celebration: Dress to Honor, where students elected to dress as Black historical figures like Serena and Venus Williams, Malcolm X and Little Richard.
According to Director of MCP Kyle Houser, the program is designed to ensure student success in science courses “by providing some resources, some financial support, and some academic support.”
Houser also mentioned that he helps coordinate events to “create a community, especially for people in science, but also just more broadly amongst the university.”
At the beginning of the event, students swarmed the substantial selection of delicacies, perched along the right side of the room. There was macaroni and cheese, fried chicken and collard greens, accompanied by soda and Hawaiian Punch. Attendees opted to grab seconds as they completed the crosswords scattered around the table.
The competition started to heat up when bingo was mentioned, especially with attendees hearing that they would receive a prize for winning.
One bingo card was passed out to each table, all with descriptions of Black historical figures. Throughout the game, the host would call out names for the players to match to the descriptions on their boards.
The victorious team received bags full of assorted candies, including Fun Dip, Laffy Taffy and Skittles.
Next on the agenda was trivia. Each table was given a whiteboard to write down their answers, and each group of questions was separated into categories like sports or music.
When the answers eluded some students, they would shout out hilariously incorrect answers.
At one point, the question posted on the screen was, “Who was the first Black quarterback to win a Super Bowl?” While some attendees strategically raised their answer boards and rushed to hide them from other players, one student yelled, “Kendrick Lamar,” which was met with audible laughter and questioning comments.
The real answer was Doug Williams for the Washington Commanders, formerly known as the Washington Redskins, in 1988.
Student Director of MCP and senior health science major Camilla Williams highlighted the importance of rejoicing in Black history in interactive and entertaining ways, all while dressed as American basketball player Jared McCain.
“It’s Black History Month, and we just think that it’s important to give Black people that … stage that we need for our history to be learned, and to bring students together as well, to just learn,” she said.
Dressed as Robert Beck, best known as Iceberg Slim, a writer famous for his memoir and fiction novels, was freshman health science major Calvin Barchue.
Barchue is also involved in MCP and elaborated on why it was important to learn about Black culture in February and beyond the commemorative month.
“This month celebrates everything that Black people went through to get to where we are today,” he said. “We’re more free than we ever were, even though we’re still fighting for change. So I think it’s more important … to know about how far we came.”
