Wayne State 's Melba Boyd, chair of the Department of Africana Studies, commented about the death of civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks. Boyd said Parks is not only a national icon, but a human incarnation of what the Statue of Liberty is supposed to symbolize. \"She\'s one of those profound persons who has managed to not only change the nation but also change the character of the way we think of democracy,\" Boyd said. \"That she\'s not someone engaged in electoral politics in a significant way demonstrates that it has to come from a place much deeper than persons who deal with the processes or the pretense of nationhood, rather from someone who actually put her life out there, and did it with such dignity and did it in a way that was so uncharacteristic of a country that has to make a statement about violence and liberation.\"