Passages to Dreams: Radical Imagination on Campus in Trump’s America

My passions grew from the rubble of broken dreams. My life as a graduate student, activist, academic advisor, and community worker has been framed by the (re)building of futures that had been suppressed by my institution’s failures. I came of age in the world of digital and campus activism, and I “found myself ” through activist work. Could I have predicted the fear, anxiety, and collective despair that a Trump presidency would cause? Maybe. But activists—our work, our emotional, physical labor, is all done in the hope that a Trump presidency would not come to pass. We hope that we reach enough people, gather enough “allies,” and lose enough of ourselves to at least make such a dramatic display of white supremacy impossible. Yet, here we are.

The university, at its best is a place for ideas. Not the racist, “free-exchange-of-ideas” kind of ideas—no. It is supposed to be the place where ideas are challenged, confirmed, and placed into the context of a specific discipline. It is no mistake that creative dreamers find solace in the university setting. It is the ability to imagine greater—to engage in research toward new possibilities—that entices dreamers to enter academia. It’s also, of course, the promise of education to be a gateway to opportunity. The Trump administration has deeply affected my ability to imagine a better world and my motivation to make that world a reality. This has also been the case for many of my colleagues, community partners, and students. In a Trump administration, the ability to dream has been severely damaged. The damage is not irreparable, but must be mended by creatives who refuse to let their imaginations be crushed under the weight of a political administration.

I don’t remember who I was before I was an activist. Maybe my preactivist self is no one special, no one worth struggling to remember. The past four years have taken me through more intellectual pruning than all the years before. I entered my institution as a graduate student, naïve and adventurous. I was hoping to expand the senior project that had consumed my last two semesters as an undergrad. I quickly realized that my interests in twentieth-century African American literature were missing something—an intellectual context that hadn’t presented itself yet.

My studies took a back seat to my campus work for many reasons. First, activism was more interesting. I would be dishonest if I didn’t start with this as the foundational reason why my academics suffered. Second, I missed critical connections between my academics and activism. I knew so little about graduate education. I couldn’t conceive of my campus work making practical connections to what I was learning in class. Finally, imposter syndrome is real. I felt so inadequate, so unprepared. I was convinced that activism was a much better use of my energy, rather than engaging in the futile mission of pursuing my education. Think about that—I was so insecure in my academic abilities that I thought total eradication of inequitable education systems was more plausible than writing a publishable essay or crafting a coherent thought in front of a professor. Everyone knew more. Everyone knew better. And one day, everyone would see that I had crawled my way through an undergraduate degree and that I had no business pursing anything more. I wish I could say I’m over those feelings of inadequacy, but I’m not. I don’t know if I ever will be. For now, I mask them in just enough humor to be perceived as healthy humility.

Dreamers often arise as leaders, as was the case during my time as a graduate student activist. As I said earlier, most activists work in the hope that a Trump presidency will be impossible. My work as a student activist preceded the election of Trump, but this background is necessary context for the ways in which the Trump administration has affected my current desire to maintain my activist participation. I was part of an organization that, like...