Main Content
Somebody’s History
is our history, American history.
It is many things: a play and a performance. Spoken-word chronicling race in America. Stand-up comedy that helps remove barriers and stigma from our shame. Stories that connect us. A framework for our people, all of our people, to honestly and humbly confront American’s original sin: racism and all its offspring.
About the Creator and Performer
Written and performed by Amy Selikoff, a 13-year veteran social studies teacher in Orange County.
Photo credit: JP SotoA lifelong geography nerd, Amy majored in history and journalism at the University of Florida. After a summer internship, she fell in love with teaching kids, left journalism, and pursued a Masters in secondary education. She has taught middle school social studies for the past 13 years in Orange County. Read more...
Our Stories about Race
Being a Latin American without an accent makes it difficult to pin point my ethnicity. A group of people I was serving asked my nationality. I returned with American. They let me know brown people can’t be American.
Hopewell Eleanor Brown
When I was a kid, I was around a lot of poor racists, but I’m grown up and my circles have changed. Or better yet, my circles have evolved. I’m still around racists but the face of hatred is no longer a skinhead neo-Nazi or a poor, bearded Southerner waving a Confederate flag.
Sojourner Langston Freedman
I was with my grandpa in the post office. We were in front of a white man about my grandpa's age. The clerk called next, and grandpa would not move. The two men just looked at each other and did a silent shuffle until the white man was in front of us. First time I felt rage.
Tenacious Harriet Taylor
My Indian boyfriend is always saying he's black as sort of a joke, but I guess just meaning not white. We were at a nerd convention and he started to ask this black guy, "as a man of color..." and I drunkenly yelled "HE THINKS HE'S BLACK".
Verity Medgar Cook
Kids used to call me, "SLANT EYES" or "Chink". The thing is, I wasn't Japanese, Chinese, Korean, or any other culture from the Far East. I was born in Costa Rica, with Spanish, French and native American heritage. The latter is where I inherited the look. People assume.
Sojourner Denmark Freedman
In college, I volunteered for a few weeks with an inner city kids camp. One of the tweens asked me, "Girl, you mixed?" I was so embarrassed because I had been trying to fit in with how I spoke. But this girl rightly called me out for pandering with a terrible accent.
Bravery Angela Taylor
I remember standing at the bus stop in middle school, a boy yelled at me “you’re just a piece of burnt toast!” I was too naïve to know exactly what he meant. All these years later, I still imagine different “come backs” I could have use if I’d realized he was trying to insult me.
Hopewell Ida Taylor
In 6th grade, two girls near me were talking. One said to the other, "All white girls are bitches!" The other girl noticed me and said in my direction, "Well, not all white girls." I felt amazing pride at being a white girl, but not a bitch.
Courageous Eleanor Smith
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