These two quotations sprang to mind for Bragg's as she contemplated the implications of COVID-19 racial unrest and transformation because the quotes speak to some of her own varying responses to the events of spring and early summer 2020 Hughes and Walker implicitly address issues of Black self-conception, Black imagination, and the historical function of Black music, each of which is a thread in her consideration of the immediate future The conclusions she draw reflect a synthesis of many aspects of her experience She has engaged in much therapeutic talk with friends, most of whom are black academics She has responded to queries from former students about what she makes of all of this Armed with more nuanced understandings of the negative impacts of current practices and new visions of the future we can work to extend the collective enterprise that has brought us to this unique moment in history
We are our own monuments, and we can be theirs, too