By Premilla Nadasen
"Mississippi Semester" students from Barnard College in New York City with Professor Premilla Nasaden visit with MLICCI Staff in Biloxi, MS.
Since Donald Trump’s election, we have witnessed widespread and highly visible public protest in response to recently instituted draconian policies. The Movement for Black Lives, women’s marches, sanctuary cities, airport pickets, strikes by service workers, and a grassroots Democratic Party resurgence are uplifting a new generation of inspiring leaders. Although such demonstrations are not new, they have taken on a renewed intensity in this current political climate.
Alongside these high-profile protests is a different kind of under-the-radar politics: grassroots activists are developing models of resistance grounded in relationship building. It is led by people in local communities—sometimes in the heart of “Trump country”—with few state supports and little means to survive. Having endured decades of devastating cutbacks in social programs and the implementation of an array of carceral and other punitive policies, they are working together to collectively weave their own safety net and, in the process, offering an alternative vision of change. This kind of radical engagement often doesn’t get the attention it deserves. Social movements have always been characterized by both spectacular demonstrations and day-to-day organizing. Although historians and journalists highlight the “big moments,” the day-to-day work, which cultivates leadership in ordinary people and lays the groundwork for mass protest, leads to meaningful and lasting change.
My students and I got an up-close look at some of the grassroots organizing through a course I taught at Barnard College called “Mississippi Semester.” We partnered with a low-income advocacy group in Biloxi, the Mississippi Low-Income Child Care Initiative (MLICCI), spent a week traveling around the state, and came away with an appreciation for the transformative politics practiced by local residents. Perhaps most surprising, the grassroots organizing was not all located in the blue bubble of Jackson. We witnessed powerful examples in places like Biloxi and the Delta, often considered more conservative areas of the state.
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