IU community remembers Rosa Parks

It might have been more than 50 years since Rosa Parks first stepped onto the American political landscape, but local students, professors and leaders say her legacy will continue for years to come. \nParks, who is widely credited with helping propel the civil rights movement forward by refusing to give up her seat to a white man on a Montgomery, Ala., bus in 1955, died in Detroit Monday at the age of 92. \n"Rosa Parks was a very likable, congenial, middle-class, fair, educated woman who until her death inspired all of us," said Alvin Chambliss, a visiting professor in the School of Education and the Department of African American and African Diaspora Studies. Chambliss is considered one of the last original civil rights attorneys alive today. \nHe said the courage and selflessness of Parks' actions, which prompted a 381-day bus boycott, along with leadership shown by Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr., among others, helped define his current goals.\n"Rosa Parks and others ... they died and they gave their life that (the) white supremacist would be defeated," he said. "I'm going to give the rest of my life trying to reinvent American democracy." \nOyibo Afoaku, the director of the Neal-Marshall Black Cultural Center at IU, said Rosa Parks' message of equality has helped eliminate many injustices, although she said there is still a need for improvement today. Specifically, she said poverty, as well as the continuing problems of age, sex and racial discrimination, directly collide with Parks' hope for a unified America. \n"Rosa Parks means equality for all, justice for all, one America for everyone, respect for each other and democracy itself," she said. "We can never achieve a perfect or utopian society. But we can still make some progress."\nAfoaku said students have a vested interest in learning about Parks because some of their own ancestors and parents were subjected to the discrimination Parks tried to eliminate, like those who were forced to stand in the back of churches or avoid certain restaurants. \nValerie Grim, chair of the department of African American and African Diaspora Studies, said her hometown, in racially-segregated Sunflower County, Miss., helped her better understand the difficulties that come with defying societal norms. Rosa Parks, she said, is more than an icon, but a social institution. \n"Rosa Parks taught me that the price of liberty is worth paying," she said. "Her passing provides an opportunity for women around the world to stand up and say, 'I can't take this anymore.'" \nFor students, Parks' passing is both sad and motivational. \n"To have a hero among people is outstanding. We're losing members of that seemingly elite group of people who gained us so many rights," said Courtney Williams, president of IU's Black Student Union. "It should inspire people to remember that as long as you have the cause and passion to do what you want to do, you can start anything"