Who would have thought that what started as a speech in August of 1963 to reach 250,000 viewers, would later become one of the most known and powerful speeches around the world? Last week, a series of events around Chicago honored the legacy of the man who spoke almost 52 years ago, Martin Luther King Jr.

The multilingual program at the University Center for Writing-based Learning at DePaul University (UCWbL) partnered for the first time with DePaul’s Office of Institutional Diversity and Equity’s (OIDE) to put together the “Spotlight on Martin Luther King Jr.”

The event held on Friday, Jan. 23, gathered international and local students and faculty to discuss MLK’s legacy through his globally recognized “I Have a Dream” speech.

While the audio with MLK’s voice played, the room stood completely silent. Once it ended, Sandra Harrison, member of the OIDE who was a child during some of MLK’s leadership years, shared her personal experience towards MLK.

“My most significant memory was when he was assassinated,” Harrison said. “At that moment my mother was afraid about my father going to the barbershop alone, so she sent me with him, but the shocking thing was that once we got there none of the men talked. You could see that the west side of Chicago loved him.”

International students from China, the Middle East and Mexico who attended the event knew very little about the Civil Rights Movement and the struggle many African Americans suffered at that time.

“I’m surprised his legacy reached around the world,” one of the participants, Leslie Triplett-Bracy, said.

OIDE Diversity Program director, Miranda Standberry-Wallace, described the impact of MLK’s legacy and the Civil Rights Movement had on her.

“It was the gutter jobs that people of color were confined to, “Standberry-Wallace said. “So the fact that I’m (working at OIDE) today and see that everybody gets a fair shot, that makes me proud.”

The DuSable Museum of African American History devoted last Monday to MLK with activities and shows to honor his legacy. Despite its small size, more than 1,000 people attended the events, according to President and CEO Robert Blackwell.

MLK was the activist who brought nonviolence to the main stage in dealing with protest, Blackwell said.

“(People) think of (MLK) as a man who fought for freedom, for equality. It permeates all these protests that are going along not only in this country but around the world.”

“The legacy of (the “I Have a Dream”) speech has come to be more about segregation and something specific that was happening at the time,” DePaul associate professor Amor Kohli said.

Some people think the “dream” has been achieved, Kohli said. “But (MLK) is talking about something so much more. (Segregation) had a longer lasting impact, on not only black Americans, but white Americans as well as Americans from other races and ethnicities. This all impacts all of us.”

“I think it’s important to have events like this. Especially for all the international students, who many may have not heard of MLK,” Kate O’Brien from the UCWbL said.” They probably know who a lot of white figures in history are but probably not a lot of women figures or African-American figures. And so this is a way to talk about that and the civil rights movement, (and) how that affected our country then and is still affecting it now.”

Correction: An earlier version of this story cited students from Arabia, it has since been updated to students from the Middle East