Visit to the Newseum

January 17, 2009 - Lucy

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Things are starting to get more hectic here in Washington D.C. With the weekend came the crowds and a wave of excitement that has overtaken the city (and the Metro!). It’s unlike anything I’ve ever experienced: vendors at every corner selling Obama shirts, buttons and hats, the National Mall teeming with news crews, and the Metro jam-packed with tourists from all corners of the world.

I realize that I've written a lot about the idea of ‘hope' this week, but as the Inauguration itself approaches, I'd like to make one more observation on this topic.

On Saturday we had our last Seminar group event, a trip to the Newseum, an interactive news and journalism museum that just recently opened in Washington. The museum itself is amazing, it has portions of the Berlin Wall, a tribute to 9/11, and a 4-D theater, to name a few of the attractions.

But what affected me most was an exhibit of Pulitzer Prize winning photos. It was an entire room filled with dozens of famous photographs—pictures from Katrina, the various atrocities occurring in Africa, the Vietnamese girl running from the Napalm attack all moments of immense human suffering. I was overtaken with a visceral sadness and hopelessness, and I stumbled out of the exhibit bewildered by the misery that can exist in the world.

As if on cue, I walked out into the main hall of the Newseum where a 100-foot television screen hangs from the wall and where a huge crowd had gathered to watch Barack Obama give a speech in Baltimore. Everyone stared at the screen, captivated by his words of inspiration and his message of hope. The expression on people's faces was unmistakable: full of anticipation, excitement, and just plain happiness. Initially, I wondered how hope and misery could exist in such close proximity to each other, but then I realized that this is the ‘essence' of humanity. I know I'm not the first person to realize this, or the most eloquent, but it was a very important moment for me in understanding the phenomenon of Barack Obama.

When Archbishop Desmond Tutu visited Wheelock College last year, he introduced the idea us to of ubuntu, a South African philosophy that speaks of human interconnectedness and interdependence. In the past year, I've read and talked about ubuntu endlessly, as part of Wheelock's Ubuntu in the Works Programs. But after this experience I have new understanding of ubuntu, the meaning of community, and how the President-Elect has inspired us to remember our common goals and shared dreams. Ultimately, it is through ubuntu, and our interactions with other people, and our effort to make their lives and our own lives better, that hope exists. President Obama may be our symbol of hope, but it is in our own community and relationships that hope thrives.

Lucy

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