Excited chatter of students and faculty filled Lang Hall Auditorium on a day commemorating a man who fought for the rights of an entire group of oppressed people. That man is Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Danielle Allen gave her keynote address on how his life impacted the Civil Rights movement.      

Nicole Van Otterloo, junior leisure, youth and human services major was excited, not only for the opportunity to hear more about this great man, but also for the chance to hear the keynote speaker. 

“It’s great to have an opportunity to listen to someone so accredited,” Otterloo said. 

University of Northern Iowa President William Ruud pointed out that the keynote speaker, Allen, stood where King stood in 1959 in the same room, at the same podium.

Students in attendance heard an in-depth analysis of King’s motivations and the rippling effects of his actions, which can still be felt today. 

Allen began her speech paying homage to her father and his experiences with racism growing up in the South, moving on to analyze King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail.” Allen highlighted one line in particular from this letter, “Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood.” 

Allen talked of the transformation of worlds, each person’s individual world they live in and of King’s fight for independence just as the founders of this country fought for independence — in solidarity. 

Just as King borrowed from Gandhi in acts of peaceful resistance, so too, did Allen borrow from King in her analysis of independence. However, she didn’t agree with King on all points. 

In one letter, King stated that African Americans are now thriving despite having to overcome 300 years of hardship. Allen felt that this was not true, or at the very least, it is no longer true. African Americans are not thriving and this comes from a lack of equality in power structures. As a result, the existing power structures must be altered to suit equality. 

Allen ended her speech on the powerful note that those of different backgrounds, ethnicities and genders must all come together in order for society to be strong. Ties like these, which bond people different from one another, are called Bridging Ties, and they strengthen any society. By altering, not abolishing power structures with the Bridging Ties, she said, equality is a dream that can be achieved.