Against Discouragement

Commentary: In 1963, Spelman College fired the author because of his civil rights activities. This year, he was invited back to give the commencement speech.
By Howard Zinn
May 24, 2005
Introduction by Tom Engelhardt

It's a beautiful day in May. The sun is streaming down; the birds are on their migration paths north; the first day lilies are just breaking into bloom -- and students are gathering for their graduation ceremonies on an afternoon when everything seems just right in a world where so much seems so wrong. These are the students who began their college lives within weeks, possibly days, even hours of that moment when, on September 11, 2001, the first hijacked plane hit the north tower of the World Trade Center. Certainly they -- above all classes of recent times -- have the right to peer into a murky future and wonder, with a certain trepidation, what's in store for them. Through no fault of their own, they have earned the right to discouragement, even perhaps despair.

And yet, as our commencement speaker steps to the podium, that sun is shining brightly enough to imagine the world begun anew -- and don't we all, these students at the end of their college careers and the rest of us, don't we all have the right to graduate, all those of us who, whatever our ages, come from the class of 9/11?

So all of you, settle into your chairs, take off your hats, feel the comforting heat of that sun beating down, and consider the words of Howard Zinn as he urges the students of Spelman College, not to be discouraged, not to despair, but to enter the world with their heads held high, imagining what each of them might do for him or herself -- and for the rest of us.
Against DiscouragementBy Howard Zinn

[In 1963, historian Howard Zinn was fired from Spelman College, where he was chair of the History Department, because of his civil rights activities. This year, he was invited back to give the commencement address. Here is the text of that speech, given on May 15, 2005.]

I am deeply honored to be invited back to Spelman after forty-two years. I would like to thank the faculty and trustees who voted to invite me, and especially your president, Dr. Beverly Tatum. And it is a special privilege to be here with Diahann Carroll and Virginia Davis Floyd.

But this is your day -- the students graduating today. It's a happy day for you and your families. I know you have your own hopes for the future, so it may be a little presumptuous for me to tell you what hopes I have for you, but they are exactly the same ones that I have for my grandchildren.>>>continued

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