You are invited to attend “Black Genealogy and Reparative Justice: Honoring the Ancestors, Restoring Our Families,” the first of this year’s ongoing Braxton Institute Dialogues on Resisting and Thriving. Black History Month is a season for remembering, and bringing back together parts of ourselves and our stories that may have been scattered or lost.
At the Braxton Institute we celebrate Black History Month all year long! This month’s program brings together a group of courageous descendants of Jesuit enslavement who spend long hours in genealogical libraries and state archives documenting the paths of ancestors separated by the internal slave trade, focusing on the connections between Maryland and Louisiana. Using DNA and the tools of genetic genealogy, they meet “new” relatives whose connections are unknown, as well as fresh opportunities for re-membering, re-claiming and memorializing those enslaved ancestors whose identities and stories are being returned to us by the tender care of these descendants.
Along the way, they often encounter horrific and traumatic histories, but also tributes to courage and resistance. They also work together to move universities and other institutions to acknowledge their part in these historical events. Join us for what is sure to be a moving Dialogue on Resisting and Thriving!
Panelists
Cousin Lynn Locklear Nehemiah, DDS, Loyola University Maryland’s task force for investigating the University’s ties to slavery
Cousin Kevin Porter, official for the US Federal Government; family history researcher
Cousin Mélisande Short-Colomb, multi-media performance artist; Community Engagement Associate, Georgetown U. Global Studies Lab
Cousin Karran Harper Royal, founder, Descendants of Jesuit Enslaved Ancestors Online Community
Moderator
Cousin Rev. Joanne M Braxton, Ph.D, Braxton Institute for Sustainability, Resiliency, and Joy; Professor Emeritus, William & Mary; Distinguished Visiting Lecturer, Starr King School for the Ministry
Dialogue on Resisting and Thriving Respondent
Dr. Jody Lynn Allen, Robert Francis Engs Director of The Lemon Project: A Journey of Reconciliation; Assistant Professor of History, William & Mary