Bernice Johnson Reagon

Abstract

Claire Peeps: Can recall when you first realized that singing could be a tool in social organizing?

Bernice Johnson Reagon was a college student in Albany, Georgia, when she participated in Albany’s first civil rights march in 1961. Reagon was known as a soloist in her church choir, so it was no surprise when other marchers turned to her to lead them in song. Carried by the moment, she adapted the words of a well-known spiritual and sang, “Over my head, I see freedom in the air.” The song became a favored anthem of the civil rights movement.

Reagon became a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) Freedom Singers, and throughout the sixties she was one of a group of musicians who used music as an organizing tool in the struggle for desegregation and civil rights. In 1973, she founded Sweet Honey in the Rock, an African American women’s a cappella ensemble whose repertoire continues to be characterized by politically and socially progressive ideals. As Reagon says of Sweet Honey, “We plough the path forward with sound.”

Reagon’s own role as a warrior for change has been multifaceted—as activist, singer, composer, scholar and producer. She serves as a Professor of History at American University in Washington, DC, and Curator Emerita at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History. She has published numerous books and articles, and produced the radio series “Wade in the Water: African American Sacred Music Traditions” for National Public Radio and the Smithsonian. The series received the 1994 Peabody Award for Significant and Meritorious Achievement in Broadcasting.

In the following interview, Reagon reflects on four decades of civil rights activism— on the role of the organizer, strategies for sustaining focus and momentum, and making space for the next generation of leadership. She describes how collective action invites people to step across internalized, societal lines, and how “when you cross that line, you’re free.”