The tour also reminds me that although chattel slavery in the United States ended 150 years ago this year with the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, we are not that far removed from slavery.
Kenny Morris, my good friend and fellow leader on the tour, beautifully illustrates this point through his own experience. Kenny is a direct descendent of two of America’s greatest social justice leaders Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington. Both men were born into slavery and both men rose to the highest levels of our society.
Douglass was an author, publisher, statesman, and abolitionist. And Washington was an author, educator, business leader, and college president. When Kenny was a little boy he spent a lot of time with his great grandmother Fanny. Fanny was Douglass’ granddaughter who had played with her famous grandfather when she was a child. “So, when I think about how the hands that touched the great Frederick Douglass also touched me,” Kenny often reflects, “then I realize that we are not that far removed from slavery.” And he’s right.
This week Oxford University Press is re-releasing the book “Slave Culture” on the 25th anniversary of its first publication. The book, written by Dr. P. Sterling Stuckey, a UC Riverside Distinguished Professor Emeritus, noted scholar, historian and one of my former professors, inspired an entire body of research exploring the nature of cultural identity and suggests that the first Black nationalist movement took place on the slave ships during the journey to the Americas as disparate and diverse African nationalities found commonalities in cultural traditions and ceremonies.
With America’s renewed interest in our Antebellum period – reflected in the popularity of films like the Academy Award winning Lincoln and Django Unchained, and the critically acclaimed 12 Years A Slave, Dr. Stuckey’s discussion with contributor Corey Arvin adds a compelling and layered perspective to our understanding of that not so long ago history. The profile is accompanied by the amazing portraiture of our staff portrait photographer Benoit Malphettes.