LARRY DAVIS gives his parting address during a ceremony at the University of Pittsburgh Cathedral of Learning, Sept. 18. (Photos by Courier photographer J.L. Martello)
by Christian Morrow, Courier Staff Writer
When outgoing University of Pittsburgh Dean of Social Work Emeritus Larry Davis told his wife he planned to give some parting remarks as he stepped away as the founding director of the school’s Center for Race and Social Problems, he told her no one would come.
Well, the sandwiches and seats were all taken a half-hour before his scheduled remarks began. It was standing-room-only, with the overflow crowd watching from the foyer outside the center’s offices on the 20th floor of the Cathedral of Learning.
As Davis would later admit during his remarks, it wasn’t the first time he was wrong. But before that received congratulations on his career and achievements from friends and colleagues past and present, among them Chancellor Emeritus Mark Nordenberg, attorney Glen Mahone, Allegheny County Director of Human Services Marc Cherna, and New Pittsburgh Courier Editor and Publisher Rod Doss.
The center’s interim director, James Huguley, said it was an important day.
“We are here to honor Dr. Davis. He wasn’t able to celebrate at the center because he was still actually directing the center, still working,” he said. “While it’s true he is departing as center director, I don’t want anyone to be fooled into thinking he is parting from this work, or his connection to us, or the school of social work or this university—You can see it in the look in his eyes.”
John Wallace, the center’s senior fellow for research and community engagement, and also pastor at Bible Center Church, said despite his wealth of public speaking experience, he was nervous.
“It’s an honor to be here and to talk a little about my colleague, friend and former boss. I think I was the second hire he made here,” Wallace said. “It’s important for me personally to do this today.”
Wallace said Davis has done something no one in Pittsburgh has been able to do—bring people from the grassroots of social justice together with civic leaders, politicians and academics.
“I would be at his house and I’d see people I know were, like, straight-up criminals—that I knew personally. And then you have the county executive or mayor or chancellor—people they would never meet, all because of his ability to reach down and reach up…his ability to bring together people from so many different spaces and places, classes and races in a city that’s known for its racial division.”
He also said Davis was willing to take risks—such as publishing a controversial book like “Black And Single.”
“That was a risky book, particularly for an academic, but because he was committed to making a difference in the lives of African American people, he was willing to take the shots. That kind of ‘I’m willing to do what I need to do for my people,’ I appreciate that, personally and professionally…Larry Davis, your contributions to have left the world a better and fairer place.”
After the applause died down, Davis thanked everyone for coming and for the admiration. He said rather than a lecture, he wanted to have a conversation—because “I don’t have the answers, you don’t have the answers, so let’s talk.”
“My gut feeling is that, if I’ve done such a great job, why are things still in such a mess?” he asked. “I am now embarrassed at how grossly naïve I was when I began to study it in the 1960s. As a young social psychologist, I believed racism was largely an interpersonal problem.”
Davis said he and others thought that it was something that could be remedied if only diverse people could be brought together and enhance their understanding of each other—then, the racial problems would work themselves out.
“It took me decades to come to the unpleasant fact that it is difficult to get someone to change their mind if it is not in their social or economic interest,” he said. “Racism isn’t a function of negative attitudes or ignorance but rather driven by the desire for advantage.”
Davis said the play, “A Raisin In The Sun,” sums up his changed view. In the play, the mother is chastising the son for wanting to buy a liquor store with the money left by his late father.
“She says, I’m paraphrasing now, ‘Oh, it’s all about money. In my day it was about equality and justice’ and he says, “It was always about money, mama. We just didn’t know it.’”
He said slavery lasted for 246 years.
“It wasn’t like the country had a bad day, or a bad administration,” he said. “The Nazis were only in power for 13 years. For two and a half centuries, everybody bought into this.”
He said his initial premises were wrong, and it took half his career to figure it out.
“It wasn’t a personal problem. It’s about money. ‘It was always about the money, mama.’ It doesn’t mean we can’t solve it, it just means we have to think about it differently,” he said. “We need to change the paradigm a little…This isn’t just an American phenomenon. People will use whatever they can to exploit their neighbors—size, height, marks on their face, tribal languages. It’s done all over the world. It’s disheartening…Whoever is in charge takes advantage of the next guy.”
Davis confirmed Huguley’s assessment that even in retirement he would continue to write and work in the field of race studies.
“I’m not going anywhere,” Davis proclaimed, “because the work still needs to be done.”
Like us at https://www.facebook.com/pages/New-Pittsburgh-Courier/143866755628836?ref=hl
Follow @NewPghCourier on Twitter https://twitter.com/NewPghCourier
About Post Author
