FULTON COUNTY, GA (WGCL/CNN) – An Atlanta charter school says it will be providing teachers and students with education on racist imagery amid its investigation into a Black History Month performance during which students held blackface masks.
While reciting the poem “We Wear the Mask” by Paul Laurence Dunbar, second grade students at the Kindezi Old Fourth Ward Charter School held blackface masks in front of their faces at a school performance Thursday night.
"I thought it was damaging. I thought it was dangerous. Here we are in a climate where our youngsters are not only having to deal with military warfare in school, now they're dealing with psychological warfare as well,” said parent Marcus Coleman of the performance.
A video of the performance has since gone viral, with most saying it looks, sounds and feels like a minstrel show, mimicking – and mocking – the black community.
"Theatrical messages are powerful, but when those theatrical messages are woven in the very fabric of the buffoonery and 'coonery' of this country, I do not feel that imagery is powerful,” Coleman said.
Fourth grade student Arianna Nickerson attended the performance but was not bothered by the masks.
"I'm not really offended by it, but I think that it's kind of offending to some people. But it kind of matters on the perspective of people,” she said.
The school released a statement apologizing for the performance and saying it “accepts responsibility for the hurt, anger, frustration and disappointment caused.”
The school says officials are investigating the matter, and students and teachers will be educated on the historical context of the imagery and the history of race and racism in America, respectively.
