Two beautiful, poised, unapologetically intellectual women, having a discussion about the importance of the language of freedom, especially for the black girlies. Two women who share a similar cultural context, just a few generations apart, reflecting on the experience of once being an East African girlie (Kenyan to be precise), having to navigate identity as they traverse through geographies that want to define who they are in rigid boxes. This is a conversation about black girlies, and the constant juxtaposition when talking about, experiencing and imagining freedom as youth.
Black girls all over the world are affected by the same system, just in varying degrees and proximity to whiteness. Whiteness here being that authoritarian system which is capitalistic, imperialistic, exploitative and domineering.
That reminds them that they are going to grow up to be Black women, who need to fight the same structures that were built hundreds of years ago: Slavery, colonialism, and everything in between… and the same system has the audacity to call her “young girl”, “girlchild”, as if girl does not signify the fact that she is young… amongst other juxtapositions like the adultification and infantalisation of black women.
She wore purple with a brown coat, and that reminds me of the book and later the film “The Color Purple”. It embodies the vibe of resilience and cultural pride that permeated our discussion. The purple felt like a visual metaphor for the conversation itself – bold, unapologetic, and carrying its own weight in a world that often tries to diminish such expressions. Dr. Ohito’s physical presence and her words seemed to embody this same energy of claiming space without apology.
Dr. Ohito has her way with words. There’s a riddle in Kiswahili that goes “ Likitoka halirudi , neno” . Once it’s out it can not come back, words…
It brings an interesting meaning to what words are and how important language is in our fabric of reality. How we identify ourselves, what we choose to subscribe to. And why not use that to engineer a world for the black girlies, especially in academia. The overarching theme was about the language of freedom and the leeway to use that language to compose a reality, even while recognizing that in the system, you lie at the intersection of all the isms.
She has a rich way of building pictures with language, such that you are immersed in that reality through her elegant voice… and the joy of taking time and freely composing a world for girls which allows them to explore what freedom means in their particular context, and being allowed to unapologetically express themselves, and explore avenues in pedagogical spaces. She reminded me of a lost art we practiced as students in primary schools: composing. Using different language forms, metaphors, vivid description, personification, similes, you name it. To compose a reality, whether experienced or imagined…
–Holiness Kerandi ‘26