Race Relay Initiative Arrives at Santa Monica College

A safe and non-confrontational space to have a candid discussion about racism and how it affects different marginalized communities.

Friday March 31, 2023 performers at the production of Race Relay a play that offered a constructive platform where the audience can have the opportunity to ask questions of the cast members about race related questions and talk about a time in their life where they encountered an uncomfortable racial incident that may have happened to them, someone else or may have done to someone in their life. The Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

Friday March 31, 2023 performers at the production of Race Relay a play that offered a constructive platform where the audience can have the opportunity to ask questions of the cast members about race related questions and talk about a time in their life where they encountered an uncomfortable racial incident that may have happened to them, someone else or may have done to someone in their life. The Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

Friday March 31, 2023 performers at the production of Race Relay a play that offered a constructive platform where the audience can have the opportunity to ask questions of the cast members about race related questions and talk about a time in their life where they encountered an uncomfortable racial incident that may have happened to them, someone else or may have done to someone in their life. The Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

Friday March 31, 2023 from left to right: Brandon Burrell, Brianna Quain, Beau Berglund, Claudis Daniel, Thando Skwatsha, Thando Skwatsha and Tiwana Flovd performing the bus ride scene in the production of Race Relay at the Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

Friday March 31, 2023 from left to right: Thando Skwatsha, Beau Berglund and Brandon Burrell performing the police stop scene in the production of Race Relay at the Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

Friday March 31, 2023 performers at the production of Race Relay a play that offered a constructive platform where the audience can have the opportunity to ask questions of the cast members about race related questions and talk about a time in their life where they encountered an uncomfortable racial incident that may have happened to them, someone else or may have done to someone in their life. The Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

Friday March 31, 2023. Member of the audience member speaking at production of Race Relay at the Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

Friday March 31, 2023. Kathryn E. Jeffery, Ph.D. Superintendent/President of Sant Monica College in Santa Monica, California as a member of the audience participating and enjoying the production of Race Relay at the Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

Friday March 31, 2023 performers at the production of Race Relay a play that offered a constructive platform where the audience can have the opportunity to ask questions of the cast members about race related questions and talk about a time in their life where they encountered an uncomfortable racial incident that may have happened to them, someone else or may have done to someone in their life. The Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

Friday March 31, 2023 Brandon Burrell performer at the production of Race Relay a play that offered a constructive platform where the audience can have the opportunity to ask questions of the cast members about race related questions and talk about a time in their life where they encountered an uncomfortable racial incident that may have happened to them, someone else or may have done to someone in their life. The Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

Friday March 31, 2023 performers at the production of Race Relay a play that offered a constructive platform where the audience can have the opportunity to ask questions of the cast members about race related questions and talk about a time in their life where they encountered an uncomfortable racial incident that may have happened to them, someone else or may have done to someone in their life. The Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

Friday March 31, 2023. Member of the audience and participating in mediation and healing sounds at production of Race Relay at the Center for Media and Design Santa Monica College, Santa Monica, California. (Photo: Kevin Tidmore Corsair Photographer).

The Race Relay Initiative hosted a three-day event at Santa Monica College (SMC) Center for Media and Design (CMD) campus from Thursday, March 30 to Saturday, April 1. Race Relay is a multimedia theatrical event that centers on the idea of having open dialogue about race and discrimination in a non-confrontational manner.

Race Relay Initiative has hosted events throughout the greater Los Angeles County, such as Burbank and Culver City. Each event is distinct and unique for each community where they host the event. And now the event has arrived at Santa Monica College. The event was attended by current and former SMC students and SMC faculty, and was open to the public.

Race Relay was created 17 years ago by Denise Hamilton and her friends. Hamilton, who is a documentary filmmaker, said she used aspects of film and television when she was conceptualizing how the event would work. “I sat in a circle on the floor in my living room and invited friends of all different ethnicities to tell us about a time that race mattered to them,” said Hamilton. “We wrote monologues and then we had actors perform the monologues.”

The group of actors formed a circle in the middle of the room and began to share stories about having faced racial discrimination. The stories ranged from personal stories to anecdotal retellings of somebody else’s story. In one story, a Black woman is on a Greyhound bus that was stopped by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcements (ICE) and being defiant in the racism that was about to be put on display. In another, a Black man was not approved for an apartment tour because he sounded “too black” and yet his non-black friends were all approved for a tour.

“We all have the stories, and they are all different types, they affect us in such a different way,” said actor Suwon Weaver.

Fellow actor Brandon Burrell said he believes that attending Race Relay can help people change their perspectives and habits towards race.

“I feel like it gets to conversations being had, it makes you more aware of things you are doing and the way you are living,” he said. “If someone does something you can call it out and i think that's how it changes people’s lives in the world.”

Participatory activities included playing along with the instruments that were placed on everybody’s seat, and at the end of the event there was an impromptu yoga session with relaxing music for the actors and participants in order to process the emotional weight behind everything that was said and heard.

Ayaka Tabata-Daniel, a former SMC student, said she enjoyed the event and found it very moving to be among a diverse group of people who are sharing intimate stories.

“Coming here, experiencing not just the performance itself, but the participatory activities was so much more than I expected,” said Tabata-Daniel.

SMC student Ee Lin Tsen was brought to tears over how emotionally resonant and powerful the stories being told were.

“It’s important that we have these candid conversations so people can just speak their mind and be honest," said Tsen. “I think everyone has something that they can take away from this because so many different stories are represented here.”

For more information about Race Relay Initiative, click here.