Juneteenth discussion highlights current state of Black America
11th June 2018 · 0 Comments
By Ryan Whirty
Contributing Writer
The protests, debates and culture clashes that swept much of the country last year over the existence and removal of Confederate monuments from public spaces — including the often bitter exchanges here in New Orleans – revealed America’s ongoing inability or downright unwillingness to confront, accept and deal with the legacy of slavery in the nation’s history.
But with the arrival of this year’s Juneteenth — the day, June 19, that commemorates the freeing of slaves held in southeastern Texas at the close of the Civil War — organizers of a special conversation program offered by the Newcomb Art Museum at Tulane University are hoping to help bridge the divides that slavery continues to widen in our society. 
On June 19 at 6 p.m., the museum will host a special version of Uncommon Exchanges, a continuing discussion series featuring the unlikely but compelling pairings of Tulane and other regional experts. Filmmaker and visual artist Brandan “Bmike” Odums will sit down with Dr. Rosanne Adderley, associate professor of African Diaspora History at Tulane University, to have a dialogue about such complex subjects as what freedom looks like for American Black citizens today, the value of imagery and material culture in spurring liberation, the continuing prevalence of slavery in American popular culture, the psychology of space and other vital topics.
The discussion will be moderated by Dr. Denise Frazier, assistant director of the New Orleans Center for the Gulf South.
Adderley said one of the purposes of the event is to lay bare the country’s reticence to recognize how integral slavery has been to American tradition and identity. We know slavery existed and was bad, she said, but to a large extent we have little concept of what it actually meant, involved and caused.
“Many Americans don’t really have a sense of how central slavery is to this country’s history,” she said. “No one wants to face that. Slavery goes to the very core of so much of our nation, its economy, its political life.
“It’s not just a part of our history,” she added. “It’s central to what we are.”
Adderley said that the lingering legacy engenerated and germinated by slavery has, in a way, created such a painful rift in the psychological makeup of America and many of its citizens that the very idea of confronting that horror is often frightening. Instead of trivializing, explaining away or making excuses for racial bondage, we need to brace up, take a deep breath, and stare down what continues to haunt us to a paralyzing degree.
“For the majority of the population, and especially the white population,” Adderley said, “confronting slavery is very destabilizing, and we don’t have a culture that can help them out [as they face it]. We don’t have enough models to what it means to face our history in a positive and productive way.”
When the notion of patriotism and national pride is entered into our national psychology, she said, the situation becomes even more stark. When placing slavery into the context of Americans’ self-image and beliefs about who we are and what we represent as a society, the reality can be a tumultuous shock to the system.
“People aren’t sure what to think and do about [slavery],” Adderley said. “It’s natural to love one’s country and think that it’s good. But the narrative that America’s history has always been good is inaccurate.”
That Juneteenth — the day symbolizing the end of an institution that subjugated and terrorized millions of people for well over 200 years – has yet to become a national holiday is painfully emblematic of our society’s unwillingness to confront slavery’s full impact and meaning.
“The fact that we refuse to celebrate [slavery’s] end is symbolic of how much we ignore it,” Adderley said.
“Commemoration as an admission is a first step,” she added.
The Juneteenth discussion at Newcomb Art Museum is taking place in partnership with A Studio in the Woods, The ByWater Institute at Tulane University and the New Orleans Center for the Gulf South.
The discussion will take place from 6-7:15 p.m. at the Freeman Auditorium in the Newcomb Art Museum at Woldenberg Art Center, located on Tulane University’s uptown campus. The program is free and open to the public, with a reception to follow.
This article originally published in the June 11, 2018 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
