Black History Embodied
In a month where we emphasize the celebration of African-American heritage and Black culture, I am thinking a lot about how dogs have been used to terrorize Black people. I have flashes in my mind of Black folks trying to live while police dogs lurch, bite, and terrify. There is a history of dogs hunting those who dared to escape and declare their humanity within a system that only perceived them as property. That kind of fear reverberates through bodies of offspring and communities for generations to come.
Trauma specialist and psychotherapist, Resmaa Menaken writes, “Our bodies have a form of knowledge that is different from our cognitive brains. This knowledge is typically experienced as a felt sense of constriction or expansion, pain or ease, energy or numbness. Often this knowledge is stored in our bodies as wordless stories about what is safe and what is dangerous.”*
FLIGHT! My sympathetic nervous system tells me to run in the other direction. And I am mad. Each step requires that I tell my body to inhale, take a step, exhale, and keep my eyes on that invisible fence to make sure it’s working. Praying that the “gentle static correction”* is enough to prevent them from pursuit. This reflection is a story about the many reasons that I am angry about this reality.
We were drawn by a lovely house, a spacious yard, and the tall pines that create a peninsula around our home. For the most part, the surrounding landscape is pleasant and the people are too. The homeowner’s association fees are pricey, but we enjoy the landscape and amenities.
I have grown tired of amending my running route instead of enjoying the full loop of our neighborhood. There are three deterrents–two bullmastiffs and a third black dog with a similar build. If it were just me then I might work on dealing with my fear, but there are many neighbors who will not walk past the ferocious trifecta that charge, bark, and intimidate. An invisible fence creates a distance of about 5-10 feet between the dogs and passersby (depending on how far the latter walks on the opposite side of the road). There are signs that announce: “No Trespassing *Service Dogs*” and “Dogs monitored by Invisible Fence and have Full Range of Yard.” The invisible fence does not prevent visible fear.
During our first month here, the power went out or the batteries were drained on the collars, and the dogs were found in a neighbor’s yard. One day while I was out on a run, I encountered new neighbors walking with trepidation to retrieve the bikes that their two elementary girls left behind when they encountered the dogs and decided to run home instead. The time that I was in a convertible whose battery died in front of that yard, I prayed and trembled as the the guard dogs growled and roared a few feet away.
For years this has been a reality, how could they not know?
I have traveled to remote places around the world alone. I have ascended heights that may cause many people dread. Yet, the fierce and ferocious barks pull me to a place that is beyond reality and feels like a horror movie. The fact that there has been the norm for years tells me that I am unwelcomed–my body fears it, my heart knows it, and I keep running in the opposite direction.
What does it mean to walk with fear in a world where I am called to walk with freedom?
When I walk past the big house, I breathe deeply. I tell my body to breathe and to not shudder at the barks. I feel the generations of panic and harm. I have only walked past with my friend who is not afraid.
Although the guard dogs creating terror feels unsettling. The truth is that I run through forests in a land that is complex. In spaces where an attack could be a death blow. I refuse to teach my body to minimize danger. Why should I force comfort with what my body logically surmises that it should be alarmed by?
Bullmastiffs came about in the 1860s in England as guard dogs for large estates. They derived from breeding bulldogs and mastiffs; and resulted in a muscular, territorial, and speedy breed that effectively protected the property of landowners.
In “What Lies Behind that ‘No Trespass’ Sign,” Brian Sawers writes about other events taking place in the 1860s.
Seemingly unchastened by the outcome of the Civil War, South Carolina joined Mississippi in reenacting antebellum Black Codes in late 1865. These laws required Black people to call their employers "Master" and empowered employers to whip their workers. In addition, to leave the plantation, Black people needed a pass from their employer, who was almost always also their landlord…
…By the end of 1866, new trespass statutes had been enacted across the South, all purportedly race-neutral, several very harsh…Realizing that trespass laws had survived where Black Codes had been suppressed, the South Carolina legislature criminalized trespass late that year. By the next year, landowners were prosecuting a person who entered their land to visit a sick relative. Because most Black South Carolinians lived on the land they worked, which was owned by white South Carolinians, their employer-landlord effectively controlled whom they could see.
Although much has changed since 1866, there is history and de facto laws that still mark the land in which we live. There are privileges, rules, and boundaries that are often unfair and racist. I pause, pivot, and remain pissed. I inhale. I exhale. I keep my eyes on the invisible. As I run, I feel Black history in my body.
“The body is where we live. It’s where we fear, hope, and react. It’s where we constrict and relax. And what the body most cares about are safety and survival. When something happens to the body that is too much, too fast, or too soon and we don't get enough safety or regard it overwhelms the body and can create trauma.”* -Resmaa Menakem
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Image: Charles Moore/Masters via Getty Images, “Police using dogs to attack civil rights demonstrators, Birmingham, Alabama, 1963,” Princeton University Art Museum. Courtesy of International Center of Photography. The LIFE Magazine Collection, 2005.
*Resmaa Menakem, ”White Supremacy As A Trauma Response”, Medium, (April 14, 2018).
**Invisible Fence’s description of the consequences of getting close to a designated boundary as: “When your pet’s Computer Collar Receiver crosses into the signal field, it first provides an audible warning tone, then provides a gentle static correction that reminds him he’s reached the limits of his boundary. The level of correction is customized to your pet, ensuring it stays at the right level. It’s a completely safe and effective way to reinforce your pet’s training.”
