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25th March was “The International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade. The 2023 theme is: “Fighting slavery’s legacy of racism through transformative education.”
We remember the victims of slavery and the transatlantic slave trade. Slavery and the transatlantic slave trade were brutal and inhumane systems built on, and guided by, an unscientific and socially constructed belief in Black inferiority; simply put, European enslavers believed that Africans were not fully human and therefore suited for enslavement.
Sadly, out of this false and misguided notion emerged four hundred years of plunder, gross indignities and unimaginable suffering for Africans and their descendants. Through slavery and the transatlantic slave trade, this false belief in Black inferiority produced a festering boil on the soul of humanity — anti-Black racism.
Today, we have an opportunity to expose the many lies that slavery created about Africa and Africans and to challenge those who continue to coddle slavery’s legacy of racism. We must uproot this legacy by teaching and speaking the truth about slavery and by emptying our minds of the untruths that we have been told and taught in our homes, schools and churches about who we are as African people.
The truth is that slavery and the transatlantic slave trade stole and destroyed lives and futures on the African continent. They also destroyed cultures and found ways to control and colonise the minds of those they enslaved in the Diaspora. Enslavers understood well the importance and strategic value of ripping Africans of their history, culture and spiritual practices
However, despite concerted efforts to strip enslaved Africans of their humanity, and their way of life, the spirit and culture of Africa survived — through resilience and sheer determination; survived—and is surviving — the brutally repressive efforts by those deeply invested in erasing African culture and spirituality, as a way to maintain and control their inhumane and brutal systems of oppression and subjugation. By doing so, they ensured that the lingering legacy of slavery’s racism remained alive and well.
As a result, we continue to witness the rise of global white supremacy and anti-Black racism — evidenced by the senseless murder of George Floyd in the United States and recent treatment of African students and people of African descent in Ukraine.
But there is hope. The exploding global movement for reparative justice is an opportunity for each of us to shed light on ways the legacy of slavery’s racism continues to corrupt and distort how we see ourselves as people of African descent, the ways in which we view the African continent; and, our relationship to African culture and spirituality
For us, descendants of enslaved African people, we must commit ourselves to unlearn the lies we are being taught about who we are as African-descended people and connect the dots on how beliefs about Africa and blackness — false beliefs that undergirded slavery and the transatlantic slave trade — are playing out in our society today, and do the necessary work that will lead us to liberation and true emancipation
So, as we remember the 13 million victims of slavery and the transatlantic slave trade — let us use today to remember the truth of who we are as people of African descent. We must also demand a transformative education curriculum in our schools and other institutions of learning that liberates us from mental slavery and its lingering legacy of racism — a legacy that is rooted in fear, hate and hostility toward Africa and people of African descent.
As Marcus Mosiah Garvey reminded us, “a people without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture, is like a tree without a root.” It is only then — when we’ve developed an accurate knowledge of past history, origin, and culture — that our education will be considered truly transformative.
By Attorney Arley Gill is Chairman of the Grenada National Reparations Committee. (nowgrenada.com)
