Unlearning the Divide

In this episode of Sankofa Sessions, Kofi Annan leads a thought-provoking conversation with Dr. Yawende Austin, Professor Bobby, SegeBami, and Bill McGee in Unlearning the Divide. Together, they take a hard look at the systems, stories, and lived experiences that have shaped division across communities in the African diaspora and beyond. This isn’t surface-level talk—it's an honest, necessary dialogue about how separation is learned, internalized, and reinforced over time.

Each panelist brings a unique perspective, challenging assumptions and offering insight into what it really takes to move toward unity, understanding, and collective progress. This conversation pushes viewers to rethink what they’ve been taught and consider how we actively unlearn division in our own lives and communities.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:21

Implement high impact strategies over the past twenty years. Her work spans global institutions, including the International Rescue Committee, the United Nations Development Program, and the International Maritime Organization. She previously served as a special advisor to Virginia Governor Ralph Northam in the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, and later as Chief Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Advisor for seven mindsets, impacting over 5 million students and educators. In 2015, her organization pioneered emergency education for displaced children of Boko Haram in Nigeria. And her model has been featured in the United Nations General Assembly and in 10 and international climate forums. Please give it up for Dr. Yuan Day Alston. Told you she was impressive. And to her right is Professor Bobby. So Professor Bobby is a longtime resident of Petersburg and a proud member of the class of 1978. He earned an associate's degree from Portland Community College in 2008 before continuing his academic journey at Virginia State University, where he obtained a Bachelor's of Arts in History in 2010 and a Master of Arts in History in 2013. His graduate thesis focused on Hannibal Hamlin, reflecting his deep interest in American history and overlooked narratives. As a writer and historian, Beverly has contributed to expanding historical preservation perspectives through his work. He is the author of American, His Story, An All Black Perspective, a published book that exposes history through the lens often underrepresented in mainstream narratives. Beverly is committed to education and storytelling, highlights his education, his dedication to preserving and sharing history in a way that informs, challenges, and inspires his community. Give it up for Professor Bob. Alright, and to his right is Sage Bombing. Sage Bom Sage Bombing's Bombing. She Gate Bombing's my apologies. Is an emergent Afro beats artist and a musician whose sound blends infectious grooves of global of global soul, creating music that moves both body and spirit. Based in the United States, yet rooted in African influence by way of Lagos Nigeria. He represents a new wave of artists redefining Afro sound on a world stage, a worldwide stage. Through his versatile uh styles, Sage Bami.

unknown 3:20

Shage.

SPEAKER_00 3:22

Shage.

SPEAKER_02 3:23

Shage.

SPEAKER_00 3:24

Shage. Shagebami. Okay, I got it now. Shage Bami explores themes of love, romance, and self-belief, crafting songs that resonate across cultures and experiences. His growing catalog reflects not only his passion but also his deep commitment to evolving his art, his artistry, and connecting authenticity with listeners. In addition to work as a recording artist, Seiji Bami. Sege Bami. Oh my goodness. I don't know why it's kicking my butt. She Kebami is an experienced musical instructor, sharing his knowledge and inspiring the next generation of creatives. His music has also been featured in several cultural curated playlists, expanding his reach and solidifying his presence within the global Afro-beat scene. Give it up. Or shake it, Bobby. Alright. I'll get it right by the end of the program. Alright. And last but not least is Mr. Bill McGee. Bill is an educated musician, producer, engineer, or ordained minister, and civil rights leader whose five decades careers bridges music, education, and social justice. A product of an HBCU creative tradition, he began his musical journey at Morris Brown College as a founding member of Heliphenelia. Did I get that right? Heliphenalia. The group that evolved into the chart-topping band Brick. He later led Trussell, the Virginia State University-born funk ensemble behind the hit Love Injection and served as Evelyn Champagne King's first touring and recording backup band. As a recording artist and studio musician, McGee contributed to landmark projects with the Sugar Hill Bang, Grandmaster Flash, and The Furious Five. The sequence, the OJs, Paddy LaBelle, and the Stylistics, cementing his place among the early archetypes of hip-hop and modern RB. His influence extends deeply into education, where he served as a Richmond Public Schools band director and helped shape future Grammy-winning artists, including D'Angelo, Harold Liddy Jr., and Mad Skills. He later taught at Elizabeth City State University, Morehouse College, and Virginia State University. Beyond music and education, Mickey is a committed advocate for justice. He serves as a president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, SELC, in his region and is active with organizations including the NAACP, Richmond Crusade for Voters, the Recording Academy, the Black Leadership Council of Richmond, and ordained minister and community leader. He continues to impact lives through service, leadership, and mentorship. Please give it up for Mill McGee and this entire panel. All right. So, first question. So when you hear the word the term unlearning the divide, what divide are we really talking about? And so, in your words, what do you think of when you hear that?

SPEAKER_02 7:05

You would have to start off with a tough question. When I first saw that title, Unlearning the Divide, in my mind and my heart, I thought it really meant reconnecting with spirit, where we all come from. I think that we've become such a lost community. And it's not by accident, it's by design. We can trace the dismantling of our connection to Africa, the source of everything, of all mankind, of our gifts of intelligence and creativity, all descends from the continent. And uh just as we see so many contemporary efforts to dismantle DEI and anti-racism, just as we see the destruction of now not having gender studies and African American studies, there's nothing accidental, it's very intentional, which means that each one of us have to come together and remind each other how very important it should be an alternative learning where we come from. There's no doubt in my mind that I have had the courage and the vision to accomplish all that I have. It is not from me, it's from where I come from. I have a cousin who came from Maryland to visit me who's 25 years old, graduated from Spelman University, Spelman College, rather, I'm sorry, three years ago, got her MBA two years ago, she stepped into my house, she saw a room full of African Amasques from all of the countries that I've traveled to, and she said, That's of the devil immediately. We come from the same bloodline. I love her with all my heart. Her father and I are of a similar generation. He's just 60 years old. I'm just a few years younger than her. We stepped into the slave quarters that's attached to my home in Petersburg, built in 1830. And she said there's something evil here, and it feels spooky and not right. And when I told her that I was hosting a dinner with a dear colleague tomorrow night, and she expressed her fear of no one's going to be talking about spirits and conjuring spirits and any voodoo or anything, she said, No, we will be honoring the ancestors. She said, That's not of God. We have become so confused and disconnected from whence we come. And as much as I reclaiming the power that has been stolen from us.

SPEAKER_00 10:00

Anyone want to go?

SPEAKER_05 10:07

Yes, I feel that we have two divides. We have one from the motherland, which is the El Kibaline, and the other one we have here in America. The disconnect that we have with the motherland is many of us have an insanity that that's our enemy, not recognizing our enemy is right here with us. So when we come to America, as Brother Malcolm said, you have two types of people. I'm saying it in a nice way, y'all should know where I'm going with this. He said, one is in the house and one is in the field. The majority of us today is, we are no longer in the house. The house is burned down. We're just standing on the foundation ignorantly, still hollering about we're African Americans and citizens of this nation. The one in the field is still there, just wishing that the whole foundation continue to eradicate to where there's nothing. So we have to understand, in order to understand our problems of today, as that word Sankofa says, we must return to our past to find out what we have as solutions. Most of us, right here, most of us that we know don't know our history. The most important part of discipline is history. Nothing comes before that. If you don't know that, you don't know anything. Now I'm gonna start with this right here. Sister Katina is sitting out there. I met Sister Katina about four years ago. Uh, brother Bruce Richardson, he connected us together. Uh, they want to know about the history of Juneteenth. I promise you, the majority of you sitting in front of me don't have a clue about Juneteenth. You don't. We're reading one sentence, which is the first sentence. The first sentence, but you have a sentence two, a sentence three, and a sentence four. I'm not gonna tell you what it says because I want you to read it. I'm gonna tell you what it is. I'm gonna hand the mic over to him. This thing that you call Juneteenth, this event that took place, it did take place June 19th, 1865. General order number three. Look it up, read it. General Gordon Granger. He's the one who presented it down in Galveston, Texas to our people. We were free with the first sentence. Now go back and read sentence two, three, and four.

SPEAKER_06 12:25

So, as for me, you know, I'm kind of new, you know, in the country and everything. But what I've seen so far is disconnection. I always try as much, I've walked, I've worked in few places, you know. People ask me a lot of questions. You know, I always try to educate everyone as much as I can, whether you're black or white or anything. I always tell them that don't think this is the best place in the world. You just need to try and get a passport and just try and visit Africa. There's nothing here that we don't have. Some people walk up to me, how did you learn to speak English so good like that? You know, I'll be like, first of all, I'm a ham educator, but basically, I wouldn't that you put that in that stuff. So I'll be like, I have a bachelor's degree in business uh management and entrepreneur and a mass communication diploma in mass communication. I'll be like, and also I'm a music instructor for good 16 years, which back in Lagos I I work with expatriates. So I have students from American International School, Beauty International School, French International School. Most of the expatriates are the ones I work with. I don't even work with Nigerians, you know, for good 16 years of my life. So I always try to educate people, like you just need to try. As a most especially the black people, be like, you can't be black and not just go to Africa for both people. You just need to try. If you go over there, it will change your life. There was a woman with my colleague at work. She saw me two days ago. She said, I've been looking for you, I've been looking for you. I said, What? You know, you told me to try and get a passport and go to Africa. Me and my daughter, my daughter is planning now. Now my daughter is moved, she's from military, then she's resigning from military now, try to retire. She got my passport now. I need to go there because I can't forget every time the last time I met you that you're telling me to go. I said, if you go there, your life will never be the same. That's all. I just feel it's more of a disconnection. People we just need to try. Like she was saying about uh niece or whatever, saying voodoo. I'm from the same place. Let me not lie to you. A lot of people just lie about a lot of things, and they know some a lot of people don't even know most of the things they read, most of the things they see are all lies and propagandas. Thank you.

SPEAKER_04 15:21

Thank you. Um, I'm gonna try to address something uh that every one of the other panelists have said. I teach at Virginia State University, and I teach uh a music appreciation class, and I start the class off by having my students focus on Africa and the beginning of humanity, and I ask them to picture themselves looking over the savannah and seeing the mountains and the hills and the snow-capped mountains and the animals, and smelling the air that has not been tainted by civilization, and feeling the spirit of God. And I asked him, I said, Can you put yourself back 5,000 years in Africa before man had screwed up this world, and just look at it the beauty and the majesty of all what it is, and understand that this is where you come from, and that there's a spirit of that living God there. You can call him whatever you want to, you can add a name to it, you can add a religion to it, but black people are spiritual people. We believe in God, or we believe in the Creator. There is no way that all of this came from one little cell out of a volcano. Some intelligent being, whatever name you want to give it, gave us life and gave us the beauty of Africa, and from Africa, all humanity, all music, everything came from Africa. And they can't deny that because they they look at the DNA and they know that Eve came from Africa. Is we don't teach that history. We don't white people don't teach their children that everything came from Africa. They try their best to create Mesopotamia and Iran and Noah's Ark landed over in uh Iran or somewhere. They try their best to create another creation, but all the scientists and all of us know that it all started in Mother Africa. And then we decided we were gonna mess it up. So I teach that, but I teach the one thing I ask children to do, young people to do, is seek the truth. I spoke to an organization the other day, uh multidisciplinary that were Hindu, they were uh Jewish people, they were Muslim people, all of these people there, and they asked, how can we bridge this divide? And I said, seek the truth, study, don't be afraid of finding out some things. Um when I talk to Christians, I ask them, what do you know about Islam? What do you know about Muslims? What do you know about Ishmael? Do you know the history of who is Ishmael? You know, and so there's a lot of truth out there that we're not we're not dealing with. And I, like the brother said, 1865. I asked my students, I said, when was the emancipation proclamation? Raise your hand. Right? Nobody. I said, when was the Juneteenth? In Galveston, Texas? Raise your hand. Nobody. If we're gonna change anything, we're gonna have to start teaching history to ourselves and our children.

SPEAKER_00 19:22

Thank you, thank you. Um, I have a kind of a two-part question. So, where do you see the divide affecting us the most? If you could pinpoint, and then also the part two to that is who do you think benefits from this divide? Anyone want to take a first half?

SPEAKER_05 19:46

Say the first one again. So, who benefits the most? That's that's easy. White America. Let's just keep it real. Uh, why do they benefit the most? Well, their wealth is not their wealth, that's our wealth. How many people out there know that we had a bank? Did y'all know we had a bank? We had a bank, it was called the Freeman's Bank. What happened to our assets? Well, President Lincoln and Andrew Johnson, they put the white slave owner in charge of our bank. They stole all of our money. No one went to prison. All they're spending right now and today is ours. It's not not a penny of that belongs to them. That's all ours. And one of the things that we need to do as a people is stop feeling sorry for everyone else for what they don't have. They didn't build this country. Our ancestors built this country. If you're talking about anyone in this country, the first group you need to talk about is the group right here. You need to do a redress. As a matter of fact, I'm gonna end this first one by saying this. Did y'all know that one week before September 11th, the biggest news event that was taking place on this planet was taking place in Durban, South Africa? They were talking about reparations. Strange. Seven days later, the World Trade Center came down and we forgot all about it. Or the second part, brother. Oh, where is the impact the most? Correct? For us to the people. I see the impact the most with our children. I'm gonna tell you why. Right now, our children are in a place, and I work in education. They're in a place I can't even begin to explain to you. It's horrible. It's horrible. So the ancestors used to say when you close your eyes, you can close your eyes with a smile upon your face because the next generation is ready to move forward. No, we have to close our eyes today with a sad face. They're not ready. And it's our fault. My generation, the baby boomer coming forward. It's our fault. We've been too busy doing nothing. And while we're busy doing nothing, the children are in the street wild. And then you're saying, as a mother or so-called Father Day, don't talk to my child, don't put your hands on my child. Next thing you know, your child laying in the street. That's your fault, my fault, and the generations in between. And I stop with that.

SPEAKER_02 22:19

Thank you for that. Because I had to take some time to digest that one. Because I think my first question would be: where are we not impacted by the divide? There are so many personal scenarios I can tell you. I know I'm directly impacted by the divide. Back to when I had a heart attack 13 years ago. And I remember being seen by the first doctor, a white woman, who said I had one of two choices. Either to be on blood pressure medication for the rest of my life, which I had witnessed too many of my people in my community popping like candy. And sometimes we need it. Sometimes we need medication. But the health community is not going to tell you alternative, holistic ways to heal your body. They're making money off of you popping pills, which are gonna also start to erode other organs in your body, and then you are forever inextricably linked to a healthcare system that's making money off of your illness. One. What's option number two? Option number two is you have heart surgery. Okay, what does that look like? She explained. And in the end, she told me, Well, why don't you take some time to think about it and get back to me? It was about a five-minute assessment. To which I said, That's all. It's my life, we're talking about. She said, Well, it's your body. You go away and come back to me and let me know what you want me to do. I said, What would you do? It's your body. I said, Okay, thank you. I walked away and say, I ain't never coming back to her again. And I proceeded to seek counsel from one, two, three, four, five, nine different cardiologists until I got to an African-American cardiologist who looked at my paperwork and he said, You didn't have a borderline heart attack, you had a heart attack. And you tell them that the chief of cardiac thoracic surgery said, if you don't have that surgery, you will die. So I had it. From that point forward, I'll say of many examples I could give, I have never seen a white doctor again. I'm not saying that good white and other racially diverse doctors don't do good work. I am saying that in every room that I ever walked in with my serious health care conditions, the only people that truly cared about my black tail were those from the diaspora. They told me the truth, whether I liked it or not, provided me the solutions, and I know that's why I'm here today. I would furthermore say there's so many other examples from an attempted assault that I survived at my own home in Petersburg by a young black masked man who had clearly no intention that was good, and that I have to continue to live in fear in a city where we at one point housed over 100,000 enslaved Africans, and that my brothers can't watch me walk down the street and say there's a vulnerable sister who I should protect instead of seeking ways to take advantage of me. When I heard that brother speak in court for the last for the first time, I could have hugged him and smacked him at the same time. He was brilliant. And it took 18 months of being on trial because he didn't succeed in raping or killing me, for me to fight a system to convince them that my black body was worth fighting for, that I told him at the end, do better. But it took 18 months for me to even have an opportunity for my voice to be heard as someone whose life could have been taken out, to say to another young black brother who could have taken me out, you're brilliant, and you are amazing, do better. We are impacted in absolutely every system: healthcare, the penile system, the workplace, where now my sisters, who I'm advising in one of the top cancer research centers in this country, ask me when I teach every day, why don't you talk about DEI? And I have to say to them, as someone whose work is rooted in ethnic diversity, equity, justice, and inclusion, it now behooves me not to speak of DEI so that we can do the important work. But when I'm talking to you about shared power in my curriculum, I'm talking to you. When I talk to you about leadership and how it lives in every single one of us because of where we come from, I'm talking to you. When I'm talking to you about equity and representation in this organization, excuse me, and how critical diverse voices are to advancing health care, I am talking to you. But I have been unfortunately forced in this administration to not speak my truth in spaces where they are needed most. But I still speak it in a way that makes me a target in corporate America. Because anytime we speak the truth, as Bill McGee has spoken, we're a target. I will say in closing, what I just said to a colleague the other day is that I know I'm being attacked by my own colleagues in this institution who are not of the diaspora because I'm speaking the truth, and I have said, let them attack me. Because if I am no longer to be in this space, I have spoken my truth and I've opened doors for others. And when you know yourself and when you know where you come from, you're not afraid of being attacked. Because I said I have God in Africa on my side, so continue as you will. That's why I'm here.

SPEAKER_00 28:57

Thank you so much. Um, we're a little short on time. Um, so what I'm gonna do is ask one last question, and if you want to if you want to yeah, um tack on to the past the previous question, you can as well. Um, so if the for the people listening, if they wanted to um unlearn the the divide and take some steps in their personalized, what would you recommend? What what advice would you give them?

SPEAKER_04 29:26

Well, I'd recommend that you go down to resist booksellers on Sycamore Street, 231, or I think it's 200 block uh Sycamore Street, and and sit there and look at all the truth staring you in your face. Because I went in the other day and and I walked out a hundred dollars uh broker because there was so much. There was the W. B. Du Bois book. There were, I mean, there's so many books there. There was a book about the history of Petersburg that I had never seen. And there was a book, I mean, there's so many books there. People, and if you can't do that, take your butt to the Luck Public Library. But the bottom line is you, and not most of you all who are here, that's always the problem. Those of you who are here are educated about Africa, about the diaspora, and about the origin of this country. But many of your children are not. All right, I had custody of my five grandchildren due to substance abuse, and at 65 something years old, I took five grandchildren custody. And I taught them about Kwanzaa, and we made videotapes, and then I taught them about 1619, and I and we went down to 16 to uh point comfort on the anniversary of six on the 400th anniversary of 1619. We took I took them to Jamestown so that they could see all the lies. And you know, it is our job to educate our children, people, and like the brother said, we have fallen down on that job. So if there's anything you want to do, educate yourself and educate your children.

SPEAKER_06 31:25

Like Sa said, basically, like from where I'm from, let's say charity begins at home. From what I've seen so far, it starts from the house. No matter how young, even the parents are, it starts from the house. Even you yourself getting those books, even if it's just one or two, as you are teaching your child, you to your learning from it, you'll be motivated, you'll be inspired to want to do more. Because on the outside, nobody is really, really, really, really good to teach your child. They might go to school and get other information, but it begins from the house, from home. So if you see a child on the outside, you know the kind of house they're coming from. That's the way we see, that's the way I was brought up, that's the way it was from Nigeria that I was brought up. And it's not really, you know, sometimes my wife will say, for instance, I substitute a place ever. I started working there and I see how some of the kids behave and everything. You know, so my wife was like, there's some things you know that you can do, some things you can't say. I was like, I'm sorry, it's the way I'm going to say it that matters. But I can't open my eyes and see a spoiled child and not say anything. It's not gonna work for me. I'd rather not teach or go there anymore. You know, I started little by little, you know, see some young kids are very rude, you know, they they can't even greet you good morning. Some women say, hey, I'll be so pained because you can't do that in Africa. It's just so who is older than you? You know, so I started from there, little by little started talking to them, you know, call them around, just say some things to them, and it started to change. You know, the other day, one of my colleagues was like, I didn't know you substitute in my child school. I was like, Okay, yeah. And she was like, My daughter would say, I miss Mr. Okay, where did Mr. Okade go to? Because I changed job already. You know, where is Mr. Okay? I've not seen him. Then the mother asked, Where do you know him? I said, Yeah, he's just a teacher in my school. He comes around, I like him, he talks to us, and you know, so not everyone would do that. I meet a lot of teachers there who've been there for 10 years and everything. They don't do anything because it's not their children. You know, so it all begins from home. Like I said, they always say that thing to us growing up in Nigeria, charity begins at home. You say, remember the child of who you are. So before you even step out of the house, you hear that thing every time. So stepping out of the house, you have to compose yourself, know how to respect and deal with people on the outside. So it all begins from the house. Yeah, thank you.

SPEAKER_05 34:37

Very quickly, um, follow behind Mr. McGee. I'm an alumni at Virginia State University, love Virginia State University. But right now, Virginia State University and most of the HBCUs are an embarrassment. I'm just gonna say it publicly. Right now, the current history department chair is a white man. Before him, it was a white man, before him, it was a black woman, before him was a white man. Now let me tell you why I'm sharing this publicly. Because when the HBCU was founded, and anyone out here that goes to an HBCU should know this, there were two core subjects, agriculture and our history. It's not being taught. It's not being taught. Mr. McGee's right here just said it's not being taught. So the generation right now is in a lot of trouble. They're in a lot of trouble. You have no idea the trouble that they're in. So if we want to get our children the next generation straight, we do need to start teaching them at home, but first we have to put the right information in our heads. I agree 100%. We should go to the black bookstore, resist. Me and the brother Demetrius, very cool. But here's the problem. How are you gonna go there? You don't know which books to read. You need to start with someone that can tell you how to take the baby steps to start taking an adult step. That's the historian. So from now on, this is what I'm gonna say, and I'm gonna end right here. From this day forward, anyone comes talking to you about history, politely stop them and ask them one question. Are you a historian? They tell you no, walk away. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 36:16

I I would have to agree with my brother about the fact that this work really and truly starts at home. It is only because my mother and stepfather at a very early age bought me books about Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth. They gave me a blueprint of who I could become if I chose. There's no way I would have thought this little girl who spent most of her time in a closet because of trauma, and she was just afraid of her own shadow, and I write poems and songs and didn't fully know myself as a child. There's no way I could have grown up to think I could build a village in Africa with Boko Haram conflict survivors, or save human trafficking victims, or work with child soldiers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo who are forced to murder just to eat, if I hadn't had a blueprint of what was possible. And so now, as I my family is now down to the last three living elders, after the death of the preceding elder, I said no more. I started working on writing our history book of my family and have traced our family back now nine generations. Do the work. Nobody's gonna do it for you. We are guilty of waiting for somebody else to fix our problems. But the suffering and pain that I see the younger generations in my family going through, I said, I'm not waiting. Something went wrong in our story. I need someone to know that after those of us who still have a little bit of common sense left, I need future generations beyond us to know that we descended from greatness. And only I can do that. So I'll say in closing, for me, the story really began with music. And I'd like to end with just a little piece of a tune if I could. Yeah. Because Bill McGee reminded me, as I too have sometimes forgotten part of who I am, because I am connected so deeply to our history through music, that um I am a poor pilgrim of sorrow.

SPEAKER_01 39:12

I've come through this great land, but I've heard of a sea called a heaven, and I've started to make a heaven sometimes and rivers sometimes I don't know a way to roll, but I've heard of a city called a heaven, and I've started to make a heaven. That's where our story really began.

SPEAKER_00 40:22

Wow, wow, wow. Um, wow. Thank you all, thank you for that. We got a little bonus uh treat, extra treat a lot today, on top of all the the amazing knowledge that was dropped here today. Thank you, Dr. Yuenme, Dr. Professor Bami, Shake Shage Shaggy Bami, and uh uh Bill McGee. Thank you all so much. Please give them all a round of a hand, a round of applause. This concludes this portion of the program. We're gonna get back into some music and some stuff like that. Um, but thank you all again. Um,