The Living Consequences

Apparently, historically black colleges and universities are being disproportionately affected by the current economic recession, because they tend to have smaller endowments and a higher proportion of students from disadvantaged backgrounds.

Some of these hard-hit institutions include Morris Brown College, Clark Atlanta University, and Spelman College in Atlanta; Stillman College in Tuscaloosa, Ala.; and Tennessee State University in Nashville. Howard University, in Washington, D.C, is the wealthiest of these institutions, but even Howard has recently been forced to devote more funds to scholarships for its students.

It seems to me that two very different conclusions could be drawn from this development.

Click here to read the rest of this entry

This is a tip of the hat to Boubacar Joseph Ndiaye, the long-time curator of the Maison des Esclaves (House of Slaves) in Senegal, who has passed away in Dakar at the age of 86.

Ndiaye, who as a French colonial fought for France in WWII, devoted the last forty years of his life to preserving the memory of the slave trade on Gorée Island.

Hamady Bocoum, director of cultural heritage in Senegal’s culture ministry, said of Ndiaye:

He was the main architect of the defence of the memory of the Atlantic slave trade, the man most fervent and unrelenting against any revisionism.

According to Agence France-Presse, Ndiaye would often say that he intended to speak about the history of the slave trade “all my life.”

His visitors included Nelson Mandela, Pope John Paul II, and Bill Clinton, who famously expressed regret for American participation in the slave trade while visiting Gorée Island.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, in a speech recognizing Black History Month, has told employees at the Justice Department that the U.S. is “a nation of cowards” when it comes to race relations.

Holder, the first black attorney general in the nation’s history, explained that “this nation has still not come to grips with its racial past” and that, if we are to make progress in race relations, “we must feel comfortable enough with one another, and tolerant enough of each other, to have frank conversations about the racial matters that continue to divide us.”

Click here to read the rest of this entry

The New York Post, in its infinite wisdom, ran the cartoon shown here in today’s edition.

The illustration refers to yesterday’s shooting by police in Connecticut of an out-of-control chimpanzee, while the dialogue refers to President Obama’s signature legislative item, the stimulus bill which he signed on the same day.

Click here to read the rest of this entry

In a truly bizarre development, the BBC is reporting that a planned $3.4 billion  “slavery memorial and luxury resort” is scheduled to be built in the former slave port of Badagry, on the Gulf of Guinea in what is now Nigeria.

Evidently the developers want to tap into the multi-billion dollar business of catering to Americans interested in exploring their African heritage.

Currently, these tourists travel primarily to such destinations as Ghana’s historic slave forts, but investors hope to lure millions of tourists with the Badagry Historical Resort’s winning combination of luxury accommodations, a theme park dedicated to the history of the transatlantic slave trade, and a museum dedicated to the music of the  Jackson Five.

Click here to read the rest of this entry

The Associated Press is reporting that the French Conseil d’État (Council of State) has formally acknowledged France’s role in deporting Jews to Nazi death camps during the Holocaust in World War II.

This is a case which is strongly reminiscent of how the U.S. continues to struggle with its own responsibility for American slavery and the slave trade.

Click here to read the rest of this entry

Massachusetts state representative Byron Rushing has re-introduced his slavery-era disclosure law, “An Act Relative to the History of Slavery in the Commonwealth.”

Click here to read the rest of this entry

Jeff Jacoby of the Boston Globe has a column today in which he explores the evidence that following the Civil War and the abolition of slavery, our nation’s long history of racial segregation did not arise naturally. Instead, racial segregation and the elaborate system of Jim Crow laws throughout the nation had to be painstakingly assembled in the face of considerable public opposition or indifference.

Click here to read the rest of this entry

Three days after I spoke in New Bedford on the legacy of slavery, the New Bedford Whaling Museum hosted a screening of Traces of the Trade and a panel discussion on the economics of slavery in Massachusetts, organized by Mass Humanities.

One attendee of this screening, Alan Howard, has written a review of the documentary, which is posted in the film’s discussion forum.

Click here to read the rest of this entry

On Monday, I gave a series of four lectures on slavery and race in New Bedford and Fall River, Mass.

Local newspaper stories about the talks have appeared in the Fall River Herald News (“Descendant of slave trader talks at BCC“) and in the New Bedford Standard-Times (“19th century tycoon’s descendants tell of North’s role in slavery“).

Click here to read the rest of this entry