Today, I saw an image of Emmett Till's face after his body was found. He
was beaten, shot, and dumped in a river, supposedly after whistling at or
flirting with a white woman. He was 14.
The first time I saw the image was on the way to Greensboro, North
Carolina, in a documentary about sit-ins called “February One." Luckily,
the image remained on the screen for several seconds, allowing me to try to
figure out where Emmett's features were. I couldn't find his eyes or his mouth.
His face was deformed and discolored in crusty blotches, like he had been a
test dummy in a fire. Only his nose enabled me to orient his face in my mind
and figure out where the rest of his features should have been.
The second time I saw the image, hanging on a wall in the International
Civil Rights Center and Museum in Greensboro, I wasn't any more prepared than I
had been during the documentary. Again, Emmett's nose was all I could
comprehend. (In fact, the only way people were able to recognize his body was
by a ring on his hand.) In the picture, he was wearing a white dress shirt; the
picture must have been taken at his funeral. The shirt was so clean compared to
his ruined face. His mom made sure that the funeral was open-casket so that
everyone could see what people, feeling self-righteous and empowered by racism,
had done to him. I was shocked to learn that he was only 14; I even
double-checked with Google while writing this. Online, I found a picture of a
young, round-faced boy who looked nothing like that face I had seen in the
documentary and the museum.
In English class this past semester, I read part of a piece by Ta-Nehisi
Coates. He said some people forget that racism takes the form of the violent
destruction of black bodies. Emmett Till was viciously murdered. I'm starting
to understand a little better what Coates was saying.
Clara Brill-Carlat, Park School
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