BRTW Salutes Surya Bonaly and Ruby Dee

Hello! We’ve decided to switch up the format this week. Instead of getting an episode a day we’ve decided to post on Tuesdays and Thursdays. It’s less often, but you’ll get a double episode twice a week! Additionally we’re cancelling our Tipsy Black History series on the 22nd and 23rd, but Sheyenne’s piece, Summoned is still on so don’t forget to catch that! We’ll get back to you soon about another show we have coming up in March.

 

When researching for this week’s BHM hero, I was torn on who to cover- We decided to switch to a bi-weekly format in order t o avoid burnout, which meant I could only gush about a few more awesome black people. It was hard to choose, but there was one woman I knew I had to make sure I covered- especially during the first full week of the Olympics: the powerhouse figure skater Surya Bonaly.

 

Bonaly was born on December 15th, 1973. The circumstances of her birth are shrouded in mystery, as her white adoptive parents, Georges and Suzanne Bonaly, told conflicting stories about Surya’s origins. While she was born in Nice, France to a mother originally from  Reunion, which is a French-colonized island off the coast of Madagascar, the Bonaly’s told the press for years that their daughter was actually born on the island, as she and an early skating coach thought it made her sound more “exotic”. Bonaly’s parents also changed her name from Claudine to Surya, from the Hindu word for “Sun”. This is possibly in homage to the South Indian immigrant population on Reunion.

 

Young Bonaly was a whiz at gymnastics. Her mother taught her tumbling from a young age, and the little girl soon competed in junior meets throughout France. A fateful  visit to the skating rink changed all that, and soon Surya was trading in her tumbling mats and hand chalk for cold, hard, ice and a pair of skates.

 

If you’re able to watch videos of Surya Bonaly in action, please do it. She’s a nine time French national champion, five time European champion, and three time world silver medalist for a reason. She is incredibly powerful, skating with ease and gusto and a fierceness. There’s something of a tornado in her. Or a rocket.

 

However, despite her well-documented skill and talent, many ice skating fans contend that Bonaly’s skating scores were plagued by racism. Frankly, it’s not too surprising–she’s a dark skinned black woman, obviously muscular and curvy, and fond of complex athletic feats. Contrast that to the Japanese skater Yuka Sato, who beat Bonaly at the 1994 World Championships. Sato was more of a traditional female figure skater- willowy, light skinned, with fewer athletic jumps but with more graceful choreography. Her style was different, her look was different, and that caused plenty of friction with the judges. She placed second, right behind Sato at the championships after a tie-breaking decision from the judges. In protest, Bonaly took off her silver medal and refused to stand on the platform during the awards ceremony. She was booed by the crowd in response.

 

But the one move that caused her the most controversy, was her backflip. She was, at the time, the only known female figure skater to successfully perform the illegal move. But Bonaly’s backflip was different- she would combine the backflip with a mid-air split, landing on one foot. While there had been three known male skaters to complete backflips, none of them did it on one foot like her.

 

She first showed off this move at the 1998 Olympics in Nagano, Japan. Due to an injury, Bonaly fell during her planned routine, and chose to backflip during her free skate. The crowd went wild, but she was punished for this move by the judges, who deducted points from her routine, and did not medal. She retired from amateur competition after this event, and but went on to tour with the Champions on Ice skating show, as well as several appearances both in Russian skating shows and American TV’s Will and Grace.

She is currently a U.S. citizen, and coaches other ice skaters in Minnesota.

BRTW gives a one-foot-backflip high five to Surya Bonaly for her athletic prowess, but most importantly, her bravery and conviction to her art.

Ruby Dee transcript coming soon!