Carol J. Williams / Los Angeles Times – A mannequin portrays a white planter’s wife in the basement carriage display of the Sunbury House.
In keeping with our focus on Black history during the month of February to coincide with Black History Month in the USA we highlight an article which appeared in the Los Angeles Times yesterday (10 February 2008). The author Carol J. Williams writes in the article that most Barbadians want to forget about that part of our past which is linked to slavery. It seems that our friend Carol Williams arrived at her conclusion because of her interaction with staff members at the historical Sunbury Plantation great house. To borrow a quote from her article:
Doralene Lashley, 43, puts up her hands to halt the conversation when asked whether she or the plantation’s two dozen other employees, most, like her, descended from enslaved Africans brought here during the colonial era, mind that so little of their forebears’ labor and craftsmanship is acknowledged in heritage houses presented to visitors as replicas of the past. “I personally try not to talk about it. ‘This one did this and that one did that,’ ” Lashley, the catering manager, says distractedly as she checks on the serving trays for a luncheon. “Talking about the past just has a negative impact on the present.”
Source: Los Angeles Times
The columnist went on to quote Ikael Tafari who agreed with her conclusion that Black Barbadians are reluctant to be reminded of that part of history tied to the slave trade, “a sociologist who heads the Commission on Pan-African Affairs, says it has been a struggle to persuade the Caribbean’s black leaders to take their people’s rightful place in history.”Pain and humiliation are not something people want to relive,” he says of black Barbadians, who make up 95% of the island’s 290,000 people. “You can’t understand the level of denial about the slave trade that exists at the official level.”
We are not sure that we agree fully with the LA Times columnist but we feel here observation is worthy of discussion.
The blogmaster invites you to join the discussion.