Into ‘My Body is a Monument’

<p>In recent weeks, the debate over monuments, street names and other relics of the Confederacy has intensified. A statue of Jefferson Davis was pulled down in Richmond, Virginia. In Louisville, Kentucky, a monument depicting a Confederate officer was removed from the city square. And on Tuesday, Mississippi decided to remove the Confederate symbol from the state flag.</p><p>There are those who argue that tearing these statues down erases our history. And others who say they must come down if we hope to create meaningful systemic change.</p><p>Caroline Randall Williams is a poet and writer in residence at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. And in a recent New York Times opinion piece she makes a different argument for why these monuments must come down.</p><p>“My body is a monument,” she writes. “My skin is a monument.”</p><p>Host Trymaine Lee talks with Caroline Randall Williams about the sexual violence that has left a legacy of the Confederacy in her blood, and about why it’s time for the monuments to come down.</p><p>For a transcript, please visit <a href="https://www.msnbc.com/intoamerica" target="_blank">https://www.msnbc.com/intoamerica</a>.</p><p><strong>Further Reading and Viewing:</strong></p><ul><li><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/26/opinion/confederate-monuments-racism.html" target="_blank">You Want a Confederate Monument? My Body Is a Confederate Monument</a></li><li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msIDM8MyGqg" target="_blank">Stone Ghosts In The South: Confederate Monuments And America's Battle With Itself | NBC News</a></li><li><a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/virginia-has-most-confederate-memorials-country-might-change-n1227756" target="_blank">Virginia has the most Confederate memorials in the country, but that might change</a></li></ul>