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I was at the Smithsonian for twenty years, and I’m still at the Smithsonian as a curator emeritus, and I still plan to figure out what that means for me at this point in my life

Bernice Johnson Reagon

The Smithsonian Festival of American Folklife, actually, was an effort to put something on the mall in Washington so American tourists could walk through America, and in their minds everything on the mall would be American
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Actually Country Festival Something
I came out of the Civil Rights Movement, and I had a different kind of focus than most people who have just the academic background as their primary training experience
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Focus People Rights
Personally I discovered that you could go through the academy as a young scholar, come out, and almost immediately have an impact on the academic environment.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Academic Environment Impact
I was at the Smithsonian for twenty years, and I’m still at the Smithsonian as a curator emeritus, and I still plan to figure out what that means for me at this point in my life
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Mean Twenties Years
And I used to think that proof that I had religion was whether I knew how to sing all of the songs.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Proof Song Thinking
Life’s challenges are not supposed to paralyze you, they’re supposed to help you discover who you are.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Business Motivational Stay Strong
In fact when Sweet Honey was ten years old it was too big for me to run, and I knew it, but I ran it for another thirteen years because I couldn’t convince other people to really do it. And this year, I’m not running it.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Running Sweet Years
Today whenever women gather together it is not necessarily nurturing. It is coalition building. And if you feel the strain, you may be doing some good work.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

May Together Work
It makes sense that whatever the topic is, it’s more compelling if you can provide the audience with a range of perspectives, and you can cross disciplines. And you don’t have to control what people take out of it.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Discipline People Perspective
I learned that if you bring black people together, you bring them together with a song. To this day, I don’t understand how people think they can bring anybody together without a song.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

People Song Thinking Understand
I went to a church where you could not sing out loud in the service until you had been saved.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Church Loud Saved
If you’re in a coalition and you’re comfortable, you know it’s not a broad enough coalition.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Broad Coalition Enough
If, in moving through your life, you find yourself lost, go back to the last place where you knew who you were, and what you were doing, and start from there.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Finding Lasts Moving Yourself
I just don’t think one person has that much to contribute to any subject
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Persons Subject Thinking
I think the Civil Rights Movement changed that trajectory for me. The first thing I did was leave school. I was suspended for my participation in Movement demonstrations in my hometown, December, 1961
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Rights School Thinking
Most people come out of their Ph.D. experience trying to prove themselves, trying to get ahead, trying to get published. You’re scared everybody else is going to do your research and get your topic.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

People Research Trying
I started graduate school in 1971, I started working at the Smithsonian in the festival in 1972. I went full-time at the Smithsonian in 1974. And I got my doctorate in 1975.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Festivals Graduates School
If I had been at a University I don’t think I would have been able to have the experience I had in my Smithsonian work. I don’t think I have been as successful
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Able Successful Thinking
Coming up in the African-American culture, we were taught that we belonged to the universe and society was wrong in the way it dealt with us. We had to learn to express and affirm values not from the winning position.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Country Culture Winning
At the same time all this was happening, there was a folk song revival movement goingon, so the commercial music industry was actually changed by the Civil Rights Movement.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Commercial Music Rights Song
Mothering/nurturing is a vital force and process establishing relationships throughout the universe.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Establishing Force Process Relationship
The first job I had with the Smithsonian was as a field researcher among African American communities in Southwest Louisiana and Arkansas for the festival.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Community Country Jobs Researcher
If every moment is sacred and if you are amazed and in awe most of the time when you find yourself breathing and not crazy, then you are in a state of constant thankfulness, worship and humility.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Breathing Crazy Humility
Well, the first time I ran into the term religion, people were asking whether you had any. You know, some people had religion and some people didn’t have religion
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Asking Firsts People
What would you be like if you had white hair and had not given up your principles? It might be wise as you deal with coalition efforts to think about the possibilities of going for fifty years.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Hair Thinking Wise
The Civil Rights Movement also reaffirmed me as a singer. It taught me that singing was not entertainment, it was something else.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Movement Rights Singing
When I started graduate school I was interested in the culture of the Civil Rights Movement.
BERNICE JOHNSON REAGON

Culture Rights School