2. Africans weren't just "one people." They didn't have one language, shared traditions and histories amongst the entire continent.
People transported across the ocean were split up to be with people they couldn't communicate with.
Families and kinship groups torn apart
People transported across the ocean were split up to be with people they couldn't communicate with.
Families and kinship groups torn apart
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THEN, they were slowly forced to stop using their language and learn the language of their enslavers.
Second generation Africans were introduced to a world where they had no history
those who learned; those who read; they were dangerous. And a threat to the entire system.
Nat Turner learned to read before he attempted to burn it all down. Denmark Vessey was learned. Frederick Douglass broke the whole system down after learning to read
Reading became a capital offense after Nat Turner. Just having a book in your hand could get you killed.
Read Douglass's "Narrative" & see how he describes life after learning
What was the FIRST thing formerly enslaved people wanted to do?
Read.
Mark Peake taught newly freed people under an oak tree in Hampton, Viriginia, in the midst of a war.
Black civil war soldiers were taught to read before they went to battlefield.
Kids and up to elderly persons sat in the same room and learned the same lessons.
HBCUs soon came about as a result
White persons discouraged Black people from getting educated. Made them discontent. Wanting more out of life.
Read "Of the Coming of John" in Souls of Black Folk. Chapter 13