Juneteenth, the yearly commemoration of the day in 1865 when enslaved African-Americans in Galveston, Texas, learned of their emancipation by Abraham Lincoln, was observed under the sponsorship of the Sadie Peterson Delaney African Roots Library at the Family Partnership Center at 29 North Hamilton St. in Poughkeepsie on June 13.
The fourth annual celebration by the library featured a keynote speech by Dr. A.J. Williams-Myers, professor of black studies at SUNY New Paltz, the presentation of community awards, a short film about the historic day and a performance by the ReadNex Poetry Squad, a hip-hop group.
Although Lincoln had issued the Emancipation Proclamation following the great Union victory at Antietam in September 1862, word of it was kept from the enslaved people of Galveston for almost three years, as the war raged on. Juneteenth is therefore as much a symbolic representation of people coming into the truth from a state of ignorance as it is a celebration of legally sanctioned freedom, for a lack of knowledge is its own form of slavery.
An understanding of this fact led to the creation of the African Roots Library, whose stated vision “acknowledges the multifaceted nature of acquiring and celebrating knowledge.” Starting from a collection of books and videos and including programming for children and a planned adult research center, the library seeks to honor and encourage the transmission of history and culture through reading, oral history, painting, cultural artifacts and other forms of artistic expression.
This stated mission was reflected in the community awards presented during the program at the Lateef Islam Auditorium. The Community Griot Award, given to a person or group who shared information about the African American experience, was awarded to Walter Patrice, a neighborhood elder. The Lateef Islam Community Service Award, given to a person or group working to bring about social justice in the community, was awarded to two individuals: Denise Bolds, president of the Hudson Valley Chapter of the National Association of Black Social Workers, and Peter Leonard, chair of the Family Partnership Center Board, and director of field work at Vassar College. The Community Theater Award, given to a person or group who has brought to the community cultural expressions of the African and African American heritage and experience, was awarded to Carmen McGill, in recognition of her Black History Month programs held annually at Dutchess Community College.
In his keynote address, Williams-Myers stressed the themes of family and education, and affirmed that racism can only impede the development of both and injure society.
“Family is so important,” Williams-Myers said. “Without family, we are like a boat without a rudder. We African-Americans have fought so long to keep our families together against great odds.”
And the greatest of those odds, he affirmed, is the social pathology that led to the necessity of celebrating Juneteenth in the first place. “Racism, unfortunately, has not faded. And it impacts the black family disproportionately.
“We still need to address the issue of race. We thought that Brown vs. Board of Education would give us access to quality education. Yet in the 1960s and 1970s, when whites fled the cities for suburbia, they seemed to take quality education with them.”
Addressing the subject of criminality amongst minority populations, he affirmed that it was a result of insufficient attention to social needs.
“America pours billions of dollars into its penal system,” he lamented. “True, people commit crimes. But if you don’t create the atmosphere where people can learn, go to school, and find jobs there is no alternative for many people. If we are granted access to quality education, I guarantee you, racism, poverty and crime will be on the retreat.”
Closing with an affirmation of human solidarity based on shared origins, he stressed that anthropology had demonstrated a kinship derived from the human race’s beginnings in Africa.
“DNA has shown that we all go back to one woman who once lived in Africa,” he said. “We are all one family – the human family.”