Candlelight Vigil Marks Anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr’s Birth
Members of the Yale SOM community gathered on January 15 for a discussion and a candlelight vigil to mark the anniversary of the birth of civil rights leader Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
D’Andre Carr ’16, one of the organizers of the event, said that the gathering was intended to remember King and his historic role, and also to acknowledge and protest ongoing injustice in our society.
The context is that we’re in a critical point in our nation’s history. [This year has seen] a lot of conversations that the school and various organizations like the Black Business Alliance hosted around police brutality and Ferguson and the larger sociopolitcal implications it has on business and law and a variety of different disciplines. That’s what ignited the conversation around hosting an MLK Day of Service in the spirit of acknowledging the contributions that he made to society, the commemoration of his legacy, and, obviously his very influential role in the civil rights movements. I see the vigil as very symbolic of the spirit of civil protest that Dr. King always articulated. It was always his armament in facing the racism, sexism—all the “isms”—that this country faced 50 years ago.