Dartmouth will honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s life and work today, capping off a long weekend of events celebrating "Civil Rights for the Twenty-First Century: New Voices of Freedom."
Although King's birthday is not an official holiday in New Hampshire, it is a College holiday.
Afro-American Society President James Hunter '95 said the day is a time to reflect on King's function in the civil rights movement, not on the issues surrounding his death.
"I hope people will focus on his views, opinions, his movement and how it serves to help marginalized citizens in American society," Hunter said.
This evening, students and members of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity will gather in the Cutter-Shabazz Hall to offer thoughts about King's life.
Alpha Phi Alpha is a traditionally black fraternity, of which King was a member while at Morehouse College in Atlanta, Ga.
The event will feature short excerpts from speeches, readings from biographies and poetry from King's life.
"We are trying to copy or reconstruct what it would have been like to listen to King," Hunter said.
Following the event, a candlelight march will depart from Cutter-Shabazz Hall and proceed across the campus, around the Green to finish at Rollins Chapel.
Hunter said the march has two meanings: to commemorate King himself and to reflect on King's own peaceful marches.
The day will end with an service at 7 p.m. in Rollins Chapel that will celebrate the life and achievements of King.
Dean of the Tucker Foundation Reverend James Breeden, Hunter, Student Assembly President Rukmini Sichitiu '95, Acting President James Wright and the Dartmouth College gospel choir will all play a part in the program.
The keynote address of the evening service will be delivered by Byllye Avery, the founding president of National Black Women's Health Project.
"This maybe the beginning of a new era at Dartmouth College in which people become more cognoscente of other religions and cultures and hopefully a move toward diversity," Hunter said.
As part of the celebration yesterday Reverend Yvonne Delke, the executive director of the Community Renewal Society of Chicago, delivered the keynote speech entitled "Communion in God -- Life Together," in a union service at Rollins Chapel.
Also this weekend, Master of Arts and Liberal Studies student Jo Ella Costello performed in a one-woman production of "Ms. Ida B. Wells." The performance portrayed the life of Wells, who led a lifelong movement against the indignities of mankind.
King was born on Jan. 15, 1929 and assassinated in Memphis on April 4, 1968, where he was assisting striking sanitation workers. His birthday was declared a federal holiday in 1983.
