Sept 9: Guest Lecturer To Discuss Reparation
The 9th Annual Dr Kenneth E. Robinson/Cyril Outerbridge Packwood Memorial Lecture sponsored by the Department of Community and Cultural Affairs will be held on Tuesday, September 9.
The guest lecturer is Dr Verene Shepherd, Professor of Social History and Gender Development Studies at the University of West Indies, and her lecture is entitled “Reparation, Psychological Rehabilitation and Pedagogical Strategies.”
Dr. Shepherd, a social historian, has been teaching courses on gender, slavery and migration and their human rights application at the University of West Indies in Jamaica since 1988.
Dr. Shepherd stated, “Cyril Packwood’s and Kenneth Robinson’s work provide evidence of the intellectual tradition in the Caribbean. Above all, they counter the old canon of Bermuda’s history which denied the indigenous peoples and the Africans place and substance. But such denial has left a lasting legacy on the psyche of a people; a people denied a true sense of their history.
“Yet, as Nelson Mandela has said: ‘it is always important to look at your History; you can’t really be proud of yourself if you don’t know your history’. Therefore, the issue of reparation for Caribbean slavery and native genocide should resonate with Bermudians as it does with all affected by colonialism.”
Her doctoral dissertation from the University of Cambridge, now a published book, focused on the enslavement and exploitation of people of African descent in Jamaica. Dr Shepherd is a member of the United Nations Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent and a member of the International Women’s Federation.
Bermuda Society of Arts is the venue for the lecture that begins at 6 p.m. Tickets are $10 and available from the Department of Community and Cultural Affairs 292-1681 or for more information visit www.communityandculture.bm
Before she gets on a plane & brings her version of hate here, she might want to do a little research & discover how few were brought here against their will prior to 1834 & how many arrived here after the abolition of slavery on their own free will & on their own dime.
I know, I know, this does not fit the popular playbook. Too bad.
May be jumping the gun to assume she’s bringing messages of hate, TD.
Remember, her body of work is the Caribbean and related regions as a whole. Maybe Bermuda’s situation merits a unique place in the discussion, but we won’t know until we hear the lecture itself.
Hate?? Really??. I mean Really Triangle. Its a lecture to coincide with the annual event.. Mercy
More hate the white man crap to our children…
you will never lose racism this way,it will simply fuel
hatred on both sides
@Triangle Drifter, how would you know? You were there to take the minutes on the meetings when everyone arrived! such an idiot!
“Above all, they counter the old canon of Bermuda’s history which denied the indigenous peoples and the Africans place and substance.”
Pray tell…who were these indiginous people?
I thought I was the only one that caught that bit. Perhaps it was all the hogs and cahows.
Maybe you need to attend to elighten yourself. How is teaching history (as ugly as it was for a certain group) hate? Are the Jews spewing hate when they teach of their genocide? I think you need to take a good hard look in the mirror and ask are you a part of the problem or the solution?!
Why doesn’t she put her focus on eliminating this :
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/10/17/this-map-shows-where-the-worlds-30-million-slaves-live-there-are-60000-in-the-u-s/
http://www.antislavery.org/english/slavery_today/
“Above all, they counter the old canon of Bermuda’s history which denied the indigenous peoples and the Africans place and substance. ”
Indigenous peoples of Bermuda?
Indigenous definition
riginating or occurring naturally in a particular place
Someone has been making stuff up.
WE don’t know that this is just another hate rally. What if she in all her studies on the topic has discovered some workable solution.
LOL note I said workable.
Wonder how relevant to Bermuda this will be.
I’m sure it’s more convenient for you (and judging by the number of “likes” for you comment, at least 22 other people) if Bermudians, particularly black Bermudians just buried that little inconvenient piece of our history (and indeed our present).
But alas, it is precisely because of attitudes like yours which seek to negate black history, that the story must be told.
What happened happened, and nobody is proud of it. It is still happening today, to me that is much more of a concern.
Was what we learn from all the history of any value if we sit by and let it continue??????
When is it ever a good time to talk and discuss Black history without it always being labeled as spewing hate? What does it look like, sound like? Someone please tell me, especially the white folks. What should the format look like? Just like the many white people that tell us to get over it and move on, I can say the same thing. Get over the fact that it’s an ugly history that needs to be told, just like other ugly periods of history. It solves nothing to push it aside hence the tensions continue. It’s HISTORY like it or not and yes it’s very ugly and uncomfortable to learn. We are forced in school, both black and white students, to learn British and American history which has very ugly periods but we can’t learn this aspect of history because it’s too uncomfortable? Also many blacks get uncomfortable because it makes whites uncomfortable. We all must have the courage to face it head on in order to understand and heal and have dialogue without all the defensive and offensive comments.
Tell me white people. What are you afraid of learning the history? If you try hard enough, you might finally understand and get it, like many others who had the courage to try it.
you are guessing when you say white people,you have NO idea whether anyone is white or black,red or yellow or any other colour on this world that leaves a comment on the Internet!
I’m not afraid of history as long as it is complete and properly told. Blaming white people for all slavery is an incomplete version of events. Blaming all white people for what a few people did is vastly inaccurate.
But it’s easier to make sweeping generalisations. Let’s see what route she takes.
Perhaps, it’s that time and time again, the story of slavery in the Western world (the Americas, Caribbean and Bermuda particularly) is grossly misrepresented with many key points omitted to fit the propaganda of the message that’s trying to be sold – it’s almost never unbiased and always divisive in its overall message. Further, more times than not, any “talk” of it, only perpetuates the mentality of the white man is why anyone that doesn’t look like him can’t achieve success.
But I definitely do plan to be in attendance, because I might be and do hope I’m wrong. And I’m mulatto in case you needed to know.
Slavery is not unique to white people it is a thing that is still going on today in Africa…Honestly….the people that sell black people are and were black…..look at those girls kidnapped recently…those so and so’s are threatening to sell them…..in this day and age!…go there…right now this very effing moment and tel the captors slavery is illegal!Demand reparations while your at it…sub culture is always taken advantage of…you see this with educated and un educated desparity in you need a trash collector desperately but he isn’t recieving recompence comperable to that of an educated peer….dopey fxxxxxs are always going to be used like a tool.It is in all different cultures and colors did you see the last Mohecan? indians enslaved indians and sold them as trackers….life is precious and freedom absolutly the same…but when you approach me and say I owe you something…my only response to you will be why….I don’t know you….who are you …and why should I give you anything?you and I?we are equals…and as such you want something?you go out and work for it just like me!
Am I right or wrong?
Although slavery is no longer legal anywhere in the world,human trafficking remains an international problem and an estimated 29.8 million persons are living in illegal slavery today. Once we deal with THIS problem ,then we’ll talk about yours..fair??
Hola seniora…eeef ju wuate soomthings ,maybe ju chood work for eet…then maybey ju weel know thee value of eet!
Occuring naturally? is this the same as imaculate conception?
…..without boogidy boogidy?I doebleedat!
How many people would show up if Dr Shepherd has information on how one can prosper and gain wealth from 400 years of free labour? I know I’d be interested… It won’t be her fault if only one race of people show up but I’d be surprised if she had an equal mixed audience never the less..
Wow its apparent that some are afraid of history!!
No wonder we don’t get along !
To spew unsubstantiated negative theories of this is and other topics is why we can’t get along !
Or are they creatures of habit ?
Afraid of history ? Who ?
Why should anyone alive today be afraid of something that happened that they have nothing to do with ?
I think that certain people would want others to be ‘afraid’ or even ‘guilty’ but it aint gonna happen .
If there’s anyone alive today in the western hemisphere who doesn’t know about slavery I’d like to know who they are . So the question is , what is the real motivation for constantly trotting out something that is common knowledge ? How ‘educated’ must everyone be ?
Or will they ever be educated enough ?
@ Toodle-oo: I don’t think folk want people to be afraid of anything when it comes to what went on in slavery. It happened and those that prospered from it, passed it on to their children. This is what you will don’t understand…
“No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. Each tree is recognized by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thornbushes, or grapes from briers. The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks.
I forgot my Amen…
I fear people may interpret ‘history’ as ‘our history’.
Interesting how some wish to quickly deflect away from that system of slavery dealing with black slaves vs white slave owners (yes it’s ok to say it) in the Americas and Caribbean. I am not referring to slavery between ethnic groups or human trafficking today. I am specifically referring to the oppressive nature of slavery that occurred for 400 years from the white race to the black race resulting in the systemic and institutional racism of Jim Crow from the past and the new Jim Crow of the present (skewed incarceration rates of black men, racial profiling, being shut out of the system etc.) Read Michelle Alexander’s book ‘The New Jim Crow’ for some eye opening information. That is why I posed my question to white people. Why are they afraid to face that part of history. Last I checked, other than with other Africans and Arabs, I do not recall the mass wholesale system of slavery occurring in other countries involving forced black labour. This is history which cannot be swept away or rewritten and the pathology of such is passed down generationally even today on our tiny island. Despite some believing that it’s all kumbaya when Obama was elected for example, the continued racists policies still exist today in all so subtle ways and in all types of different coded languages and practices whether some want to put their head in the sand or not. We need more attempts at open dialogue on this and healing. So again to those who keep saying we need open dialogue on this topic when efforts like CURB, BRRI, talking about it in the media and even this lecture are repeatedly ridiculed and met with disdain from the white community in the main, how do we have this dialogue?
You ask ‘How do we have this dialogue ? ‘ Well a good start would be be for all the people who disliked my remark to pony up and answer the question I asked instead of silently hitting ‘dislike’
We all know the history .. fact
Why does repeating it endlessly continue ? What is supposed to happen next ? Like the big dream of a ‘big conversation’ , what happens when we’re all subject to listening to what we already know again and the conversation is over ?
Are a certain segment simply using the topic to constantly browbeat and psycho bully ? Nothing’s going to change . We’re all still going to have to get up in the morning and try to figure out how to make ends meet. And then we die .
Like it or not , it’s history and we’re all here in the present and we’re all benefiting from what happened before us . Blacks included .
Does anyone really think that reparations will ever happen ?
@ Toodle-oo: We don’t know all the facts… We only know what was recorded by media, diary or whatever box that was hidden in Master’s closet. What about the things that went on in the dark to the black women and children of slavery? I’m talking about the women that were raped who birthed the black child with the blue, green and grey eyes. How many of them (Victims) disappeared once the aggressor found out the she was pregnant? There are plenty more unanswered questions out in graves of those that were silenced.
Speaking of ‘facts’ , did you ever hear of , or read , the report that was done on Slavery in Bermuda written by a British ‘inspector’ in the early 1800′s ?
It’s interesting to say the least and confirms what many have long said not only in the way local slaves were treated compared to ALL other jurisdictions but as it pertains to their educations and entrepreneurial skills and the fact that many were home owners .