Middle Passage Ceremonies and Port Markers Project (MPCPMP)
Remembering Ancestors
“On all matters affecting slaves, concessions to the South was the price to be paid if there was to be any union at all.” Negro President by Gary Wills, Houghton Mifflin Company (2003) The power of slavery shaped how this nation operated from its inception. Founding fathers of the United States of America by negotiating a compromise in the Constitutional Convention that each slave would count as 3/5 of a Read More
In the British Virginia Colony during the summer of 1619, two events took place within weeks of each other that would shape the United States of America in profoundly contradictory ways. One event was the initial legislative assembly of Englishmen meeting in Jamestowne from July 30 to August 4. The other event was the arrival at Point Comfort of a Dutch slaver during the third week in August, when according Read More
Audio/Visual: “First Time I Saw Big Water” Composed and produced by Bernice Johnson Reagon, performed by Bernice Johnson Reagon and Toshi Reagon for the PBS-WGBH film series Africans in America, Executive Producer, Orlando Bagwell “Betye Saar, National Visionary”: National Visionary Leadership Project: African American History. The video consists of ten interviews in which Ms. Saar personally relates her artistry, family background, professional experiences and influences during a life time dedicated Read More
During the past several weeks, board members of the Middle Passage Ceremonies and Port Markers Project have found themselves frequently in conversations with people who suggest that we sustain a more formal educational component, something beyond this blog. One comment was that the United States in particular does not value history or anything in the past. Our people were described as more comfortable in the present or headed into the Read More
As social networks and news media have spread the story of the killing of Trayvon Martin in Florida, people around the world react with disbelief and outrage. For those of us who are Black in this nation there is outrage, but very little disbelief. This incident is far too real, far too familiar. Just weeks after the shooting of this seventeen year-old, we stated in a previous post, Terminology (March Read More
Recently there has been an attempt to “soften” history as the story of African slavery is broadly re-told and shared. If left unchecked the transatlantic slave trade, at least in Texas, will be known as the ‘triangular trade.” Abraham Lincoln will have freed servants rather than slaves. We say, “Stop It!” Soft pedaling does not provide an accurate description of the facts. We find it offensive to rely on one Read More
Months ago we published a post: Brown Trucks that reflected upon heightened awareness. The idea is that once someone becomes aware of something, evidence of it occurs more frequently. And so it is with the analogy of enslavement and imprisonment. Both restrict freedom, enable oppression and often are accompanied by dehumanization. In the United States of America, however, the elements of race, crime and punishment take peculiar twists and turns Read More
Through conditioning and experience, especially after age 35, African Americans, almost to a person, understand the United States from a different perspective than other Americans. W.E.B. Du Bois described it as living in two worlds, having two voices. In The Souls of Black Folk, Du Bois said that African Americans were neither African nor American, but both. That has held true throughout the history of the United States. For example, Black Read More
Have we been sold a bill of goods throughout US history? From affirmative action to one-man-one-vote, to waging war to make the world safe for democracy, and then examining the creation of the Electoral College, and the ideals set forth in the Declaration of Independence are there not some contradictions between national rhetoric and the historical record? More aggressive critics wonder whether citizens have been “hoodwinked, flimflammed, or bamboozled” when Read More