Brittney Griner
WNBA champion and NCAA champion Brittney Griner has been held in a Russian jail since Feb. 17. The two-time Olympic gold medalist was jailed after cannabis oil was found in her luggage upon her arrival at a Moscow airport en route to join her team, UMMC Ekaterinburg. She plays in Russia during the WNBA off-season.
In July, Griner pleaded guilty to carrying cannabis oil in her luggage, noting there was no intent to break Russian law. She said she had rushed in packing, accidentally placing the vape cartridges in her bag.
A collective of nearly 1,200 intergenerational, intersectional Black women leaders across the U.S. sent a letter to President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris asking them to ramp up efforts to free Griner from detainment. More than a dozen of the signers are women either in academia or involved with research on issues impacting women of color. Diverse: Issues in Higher Education reached out to inquire how they viewed Griner’s story and how they think it will be part of Black history going forward.
“Brittney Griner was so vocal on social media and in her behaviors on the court and how she showed up as a player, as a celebrity, and in her personal life when it came to matters around social justice and social injustice,” said Dr. Leatra Tate, a professor at Erie County Community College of PA and a Black feminist scholar. “From a domestic policy standpoint here in the U.S., we’re perceiving the inaction of our presidential administration in comparison to that. When you think about how this plays out in scholarly discourse, how are we ignoring what this person stood for and how are we seeing such inaction?”
Dr. LaNail R. Plummer, a psychologist and CEO and founder of Onyx Therapy Group, said she would like to see an influx of both scholarly and mass media pieces that address the implications of multiple identities.
