The Other Black Girl |Zakiya Dalila Harris | NPT
Season 6 Episode 15 | 2m 30sVideo has Closed Captions
Author Zakiya Dalila Harris talks with J.T. Ellison about her book THE OTHER BLACK GIRL.
"With everything happening, my hope is that people will understand the duress that Black people go through day by day trying to function and still do a good job and still be present….Those things take a toll on your social health, your mental health, and also they pass down generation to generation."
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
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A Word on Words is a local public television program presented by WNPT
The Other Black Girl |Zakiya Dalila Harris | NPT
Season 6 Episode 15 | 2m 30sVideo has Closed Captions
"With everything happening, my hope is that people will understand the duress that Black people go through day by day trying to function and still do a good job and still be present….Those things take a toll on your social health, your mental health, and also they pass down generation to generation."
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
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Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorship(typewriter tapping) (typewriter dinging) (contemplative music) - I'm Zakiya Dalila Harris and this is "The Other Black Girl."
Nella Rogers, who was a young editorial assistant who has been the only black person working there for about two years or so, So she was really excited when Hazel, another young black woman who was from Harlem, comes and starts working in the cubicle next to hers.
She thinks that they'll be able to kind of bond over the microaggressions, bond over black hair, be friends, have another person that she doesn't code switch with.
She can just be herself, but a series of very strange things start to happen in the office.
And Nella begins to wonder if Hazel is friend or foe.
- Can you talk about how you use hair and haircare as a metaphor?
- I mean, hair was really important to me.
I experienced my own kind of racial awakening when I was living in New York for the first time, cut my hair off at a Dominican barber shop after being so tired of having relaxed hair.
Nella goes through a similar situation.
I just wanted to really explore how hair can be a connection, a connective tissue for black women but also it can possibly break us apart as well.
- So is Hazel the villain in this story?
- I get that question a lot and no, she's not the villain.
Hazel has a very complicated view on things but Hazel's complicated view comes from a larger, wider problem that is systemic.
It goes beyond publishing and into this country itself.
So, I'm hoping that people will get Hazel, still feel for Nella, but just have a lot more empathy for both of them.
- For more of our conversation, visit our website awordonwords.org and keep reading!
(typewriter dinging) What is the most important takeaway?
- [Zakiya] My hope is that people will understand just the duress that black people go through day by day, trying to function and still do a good job and still be present.
My hope is that people will see this and think more about that and also how we can make that not be the case, right?
Like how can we make not just publishing more diverse, but how can we make media more diverse?
How can we make the educational system more diverse?
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A Word on Words is a local public television program presented by WNPT