Bondage does not sit well with me. There is an apparent separation between one who is free and one who possess freedom. Freedom is when one is in the position of free dominion, able to prevail in victory.
We’ve just arrived to the Cape Coast slave castle. I waited; I wanted everyone to head off the bus before me. Our bus guide mentioned various facts, something about a gift shop and the cost for cameras.
My hands are shaking as I write this. I can visualize scenes of Sankofa [tourist gathering without remembrance or understanding]. Cameras out, meant to capture present images of a castle that held numerous Africans of various forms. Yet it seems as though these photos are meant to recapture the past and we’ve become the modern-day captors. We will return to the comforts of our day-to-day with full SD memory card and empty understanding.
Just this Friday I spoke with the mother of my friend Philip [a senior at Penn], who resides near the University of Ghana. During a wonderful sit down session a their home, she and I discussed the ramifications of misunderstanding notions of privilege. Within the region of Legon there are “pockets of slums” she described, areas of disadvantage, products of individuals tempered perspectives that can conformably overlook issues of poverty. Similarly, our historical vision on issues of enslavement nearly parallels a nearsighted individual with lenseless glasses, but believing he or she has changed their initial perceptions. Some of we visiting the castle today will just return from Ghana looking good for our friends, looking like humanitarians and community servants with a nice pair of glasses. Nevertheless, these optical lenses remain deceiving. Reality check please.
When my eyes read the bold words CELL, initially intended for goods such as tobacco or gold, it appears to transform and read SELL. Storage for human goods, bodies became soul food, some devoured by seas and others snared by summer sun and harvested crops. People products divorced from place.
A meaningful quote from our guide within the castle: “chains and cells are evidence of resistance.” Blockages are only needed when powerful force approaches from the opposite side. I knelt in the corners and could smell the stench of history. It was real. As in it was a reality that cannot be excused or dismissed.
There comes a time when history is read of heard or spoken. And in these moments there remains a states of greater understanding, yet disadvantage. If the history be glorious, then we are disadvantaged by out lack of participation. If the history be tragic, then we are disadvantaged by our misunderstanding. How do you come to terms with a history that produced your present day?
One must think that if the history were entirely ugly, only what is vile could come of it. Yet here are we; offspring of victors and alive to bare witness to their strength. All could not have been so dark and all could not have been lost or our present would be nonexistent. This means that our lives speak out of the depths of male or female dungeons in Cape Coast or Elmina. To the cries that they billow our lives must answer; an echo, as produced within a cave due to the corresponding voice.
Let us not use our knowledge of the past as a tinkling cymbal as of 1 Corinthian 13. Be mindful, there are two different times a cymbal can used: the improper time and the proper time. At the wrong time the cymbal is a noisemaker, a distraction, or both. At the proper time the cymbal brings attention to the presiding cords but does not take away from the diligence of the piece. When our knowledge of past and present wrong treatment becomes a cymbal, only intending to make noise, we have taking away from the substance of the live production. In this specific, case the live production is represented by the goal of transferring all peoples from bondage to a place of freedom.
There is a similar condition in the “veil” notion that WEB DuBois establishes in the introduction of his text “Soul of Black Folk.” DuBois describes the veil as curtain that rested between Black disadvantage and White privilege. The inaccessibility of White privilege by DuBois’ opinion was facilitated by the racial dissention, which he symbolized with the image of a heavy impenetrable veil. Part of white privilege rested in the imbalanced, Social Darwinist notion that white skin meant greater intelligence, greater strength and overall superiority.
To date we understand we are not as lost in the truth of knowledge as our former generations, but many of us have become lost in purpose and uses of knowledge itself. This misunderstanding is partly why Blacks can relish the basketball court and place less value on academic fieldwork. We have prevailed more so than most in basketball and have at times used this sport as a declaration of Black superiority. Similarly, in other areas where Blacks, Whites, Americans [or whomsoever] have sought and even seek to proclaim their race, class, culture [or whatsoever] as a source of privilege, we have reinstated hierarchies that will only walk us backwards.
Knowledge is not for vengeance sake, however, but to rid ourselves of consistency that would return us to the wiles of our past. Let our former ways be our former ways. There is a time and a place for everything, even the tinkling cymbals. Be mindful of your time and find your place, then you will be free from bondage and even at a place to free others. There you will find victory.
We’ve just arrived to the Cape Coast slave castle. I waited; I wanted everyone to head off the bus before me. Our bus guide mentioned various facts, something about a gift shop and the cost for cameras.
My hands are shaking as I write this. I can visualize scenes of Sankofa [tourist gathering without remembrance or understanding]. Cameras out, meant to capture present images of a castle that held numerous Africans of various forms. Yet it seems as though these photos are meant to recapture the past and we’ve become the modern-day captors. We will return to the comforts of our day-to-day with full SD memory card and empty understanding.
Just this Friday I spoke with the mother of my friend Philip [a senior at Penn], who resides near the University of Ghana. During a wonderful sit down session a their home, she and I discussed the ramifications of misunderstanding notions of privilege. Within the region of Legon there are “pockets of slums” she described, areas of disadvantage, products of individuals tempered perspectives that can conformably overlook issues of poverty. Similarly, our historical vision on issues of enslavement nearly parallels a nearsighted individual with lenseless glasses, but believing he or she has changed their initial perceptions. Some of we visiting the castle today will just return from Ghana looking good for our friends, looking like humanitarians and community servants with a nice pair of glasses. Nevertheless, these optical lenses remain deceiving. Reality check please.
When my eyes read the bold words CELL, initially intended for goods such as tobacco or gold, it appears to transform and read SELL. Storage for human goods, bodies became soul food, some devoured by seas and others snared by summer sun and harvested crops. People products divorced from place.
A meaningful quote from our guide within the castle: “chains and cells are evidence of resistance.” Blockages are only needed when powerful force approaches from the opposite side. I knelt in the corners and could smell the stench of history. It was real. As in it was a reality that cannot be excused or dismissed.
There comes a time when history is read of heard or spoken. And in these moments there remains a states of greater understanding, yet disadvantage. If the history be glorious, then we are disadvantaged by out lack of participation. If the history be tragic, then we are disadvantaged by our misunderstanding. How do you come to terms with a history that produced your present day?
One must think that if the history were entirely ugly, only what is vile could come of it. Yet here are we; offspring of victors and alive to bare witness to their strength. All could not have been so dark and all could not have been lost or our present would be nonexistent. This means that our lives speak out of the depths of male or female dungeons in Cape Coast or Elmina. To the cries that they billow our lives must answer; an echo, as produced within a cave due to the corresponding voice.
Let us not use our knowledge of the past as a tinkling cymbal as of 1 Corinthian 13. Be mindful, there are two different times a cymbal can used: the improper time and the proper time. At the wrong time the cymbal is a noisemaker, a distraction, or both. At the proper time the cymbal brings attention to the presiding cords but does not take away from the diligence of the piece. When our knowledge of past and present wrong treatment becomes a cymbal, only intending to make noise, we have taking away from the substance of the live production. In this specific, case the live production is represented by the goal of transferring all peoples from bondage to a place of freedom.
There is a similar condition in the “veil” notion that WEB DuBois establishes in the introduction of his text “Soul of Black Folk.” DuBois describes the veil as curtain that rested between Black disadvantage and White privilege. The inaccessibility of White privilege by DuBois’ opinion was facilitated by the racial dissention, which he symbolized with the image of a heavy impenetrable veil. Part of white privilege rested in the imbalanced, Social Darwinist notion that white skin meant greater intelligence, greater strength and overall superiority.
To date we understand we are not as lost in the truth of knowledge as our former generations, but many of us have become lost in purpose and uses of knowledge itself. This misunderstanding is partly why Blacks can relish the basketball court and place less value on academic fieldwork. We have prevailed more so than most in basketball and have at times used this sport as a declaration of Black superiority. Similarly, in other areas where Blacks, Whites, Americans [or whomsoever] have sought and even seek to proclaim their race, class, culture [or whatsoever] as a source of privilege, we have reinstated hierarchies that will only walk us backwards.
Knowledge is not for vengeance sake, however, but to rid ourselves of consistency that would return us to the wiles of our past. Let our former ways be our former ways. There is a time and a place for everything, even the tinkling cymbals. Be mindful of your time and find your place, then you will be free from bondage and even at a place to free others. There you will find victory.
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