This year, the Oak Park Aging in Communities Commission is sponsoring a celebration of Ageism Awareness Day on Friday, Oct. 9, at the 19th Century Club, 178 Forest Ave. in Oak Park. The program features Raymond Jetson, founder and author of Aging While Black.
Jetson’s keynote will be followed by a panel discussion featuring members of the Oak Park Aging in Communities Commission.
Aging While Black is subtitled “A Radical Reimagining of Aging and Race in America.” Jetson argues that aging in America is not a race-neutral experience. He dismantles toxic narratives about Black aging and offers a transformative vision rooted in community strength, digital empowerment, and intergenerational connection. He says, “Too often, we frame aging as loss of relevance, vitality, and connection. I see it as a season of leadership and reflection, a time to use what we’ve learned to guide those coming behind us.”
That’s conscious aging — that we can become more intentional about how we understand and experience the aging process. Conscious aging invites us to question the assumptions we have inherited about growing older and to recognize aging not simply as something that happens to us, but as an opportunity for continued growth, meaning, contribution, reflection and connection.
Aging While Black asks us to look honestly at and appreciate Black elders, to move beyond advocacy for Black elders toward activism and participation by Black elders — positioning them as leaders and co-creators of policies and solutions that affect their lives.
Jetson’s book comprises three major ideas: Recalibrating the Village (rebuilding the communal networks that once anchored Black communities), Embracing Innovation and Rapid Change (meeting elders where technology and society are moving), and Leaning into Sankofa. That last one caught my attention because of the recent opening of the Sankofa Village Wellness Center in our neighboring West Garfield Park community, a project supported by New Mt. Pilgrim Missionary Baptist Church, Rush Medical Center and 10 other partners.
Sankofa is a concept rooted in Akan tradition, often represented by the idea of looking backward in order to move forward. The past isn’t simply something we leave behind as we age. The past contains knowledge that can help us build the future. Indeed, we cannot build the future if we fail to honestly embrace and learn from our past. Older people aren’t just recipients of history, we are living repositories of it.
My wife Dorie reminded me of the curb-cut effect, named after the small ramps built into sidewalks at intersections, that were fought for in the 1970s by disability rights activists so wheelchair users could cross streets without being stranded at a 6-inch wall of concrete. Once cities started building them, it became obvious the ramps helped almost everyone: parents pushing strollers, delivery workers with hand trucks, travelers dragging wheeled luggage, cyclists, elderly people with unsteady balance, kids on skateboards. A fix built for a minority turned out to smooth the path for the majority too. The curb-cut effect tells us that when we remove barriers for those who face them most directly, it works better for everyone.
As rising sea levels affect all the ships, equity does not require some people to lose so that others can gain. This is not a zero-sum equation. Lifting people who have been held back lifts the whole community.
It means looking beyond individual acts of prejudice and examining the environments in which people live and work. It means asking better questions: Who has access? Who is being heard? Who is being overlooked? Whose experience is treated as the norm? What assumptions are influencing our decisions? And what can we change?
When we build systems that recognize the dignity, wisdom, agency and needs of people who have historically been overlooked and denied, we learn how to build better systems for everyone. Progress is not a competition over whose struggles matter most. One person’s experience does not have to invalidate another person’s experience. We can acknowledge that different people face different barriers while still recognizing our shared humanity.
The question is not whether we age, but how we will design our longer lives — and whether we will create communities where all people of every age will continue to contribute, learn, lead, connect and thrive.
Aging While Black by Raymond Jetson is available at the Book Loft, 1047 Lake St.
I hope to see you at the Ageism Awareness Day celebration on Friday, Oct. 9, food provided, admission free, doors open at 6 p.m.