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When Melissa Harris-Perry questioned whether a divided nation could build Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.s vision of a beloved community, she told the Kent State University audience that she didnt have an answer.

Instead, the Maya Angelou Presidential Chair at Wake Forest University, television host, author and political commentator said this:"My goal is to raise the question to provide a framework for how you think about that question and then we, collectively will over time decide what the answer is."

On Friday, Harris-Perry was the keynote speaker of the universitys annual Martin Luther King Jr. celebration, which started on Monday with a day of service, followed by Wednesdays conversation with Women of Color Collective and founder of Lifted in Love founder Cleotea Mack and a Friday morning symposium on race, access and learning.

Her speech also came on the heels of the universitys announcement of several awards including the Diversity Trailblazer Award (Alfreda Brown, Kent State vice president for diversity, equity and inclusion), Beverly J. Warren Unity Award for Diversity (Fashion Schools NYC Studio), and the Rozell Duncan Student Diversity Award (Ph.D. candidate Pacifique Niyonzima and Latinx in Theatre). President Todd Diacon also announced that the Trailblazer award will now be known as the Alfreda Brown Award. The award and the renaming were both a surprise for Brown.

"Youve heard of Dr. Kings philosophy of servant leadership. A lot like to pretend theyre service leaders but if they tell you they are, then theyre definitely not. Heres how I know: when the award is announced and its obvious to everyone else in the room and Dr. Browns reaction wasWhat? It got me, and then to know that the award will be named for you, because we are so invisible in our institutions," Harris-Perry said.

In answering Kings question, Harris-Perry first broke down the question, starting with"Are we a divided nation?" According to the research she cited, yes. There is a division in trust between citizens and the nation and between Republicans and Democrats and there is a racial and economic divide, she said.

"Part of what happens when were divided by class, race, and partisanship and I didnt even touch on residency or citizenship or speaking English as a first language or being born in a body that matches our identity is that it can feel so overwhelming that it feels unprecedented. Its not."

She highlighted the shock some felt after the 2016 presidential election, despite the fact that George Zimmerman was acquitted for killing Trayvon Martin, and the outrage some expressed after families were separated at the border, despite Americas history of separating enslaved peoples families at birth. She also emphasized kindergartener Ruby Bridges being escorted by federal marshals into the all-white William Frantz elementary School in 1960, Elizabeth Eckford of the Little Rock Nine walking by herself into Little Rock Central High School in 1957 as adults screamed at her, and the 1965 murders of Southern Christian Leadership Conference member the Rev. James Reeb and Civil Rights activist Viola Liuzzo.

"What I know is you have to reject the lie that this is the first time. Its rude to people that lived at a harder moment. It can be a really bad time, a really tough and divided time, an existential time, but dont feel sorry for yourself," Harris-Perry said.

"One of the things that will help us over our divide is for us to remember all of the bad guys are not on one side and all the good guys are not on the other side. We are complicit and engaged in plenty of evil all together. This is what the letter from the Birmingham Jail was. It was not a letter to his enemies. It was to his friends, a letter to the clergy, and it was there that [King] told us Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. So what is this beloved community, this thing that is not about affectionate love but really some intense love? It is first about recognition and to even be seen accurately because when you sayBeloved Community, it is often ugly."

She said it is also about robust and impolite disagreements and knowing that there are consequences for those disagreements, and about democratic optimism that is both informed and aspirational, and added that creating that beloved community must be done with courage, curiosity, creativity and a collective effort. In discussing the collective effort, Harris-Perry cited double dutch jump roping, noting that it requires at least three people who must all work together and get on rhythm and most often has an audience.

"If you try to build a beloved community, the consequences are real.We like to think of King as though the movement was nonviolent. Not only was it not nonviolent, the purpose was to provoke violence. You can tell me everything about Birmingham. You know why? Because it was violent. But if I say, Tell me about Albany, you dont know. Albany failed because there was no violence. Dr. King was nonviolent in his tactics in order to produce the violence that demonstrated the evil of inequality. It didnt work without violence. No violence, no beloved community. It was forged in violence. They murdered Dr. King, James Reeb, Viola, four little girls in their Sunday school. The movement was bloody, brutal, violent, and it revealed who we were so that we could potentially, maybe, in some way, find a way to double dutch together."

Reporter Krista S. Kano can be reached at 330-541-9416, kkano@recordpub.comor on Twitter @KristaKanoRCedu.

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Harris-Perry featured as keynote speaker at KSUs Martin Luther King celebration - Record-Courier