Celebrating Juneteenth
6/19/2021
In the wake of current events, we feel the need to use our voices as a platform to educate and inform our community to better our department and possibly the minds of others. We recognize the lack of information of our peers and want to take this special holiday, Juneteenth, as a day to educate and put racial injustice at the forefront of this education.
Juneteenth is a direct example of racial injustice. Dating back to 1865, it was on June 19th that the union soldiers finally landed at Galveston, Texas to share the news that the war had ended and that all the enslaved were now free. Unfortunately, this news reached two and a half years after President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, which had become official January 1, 1863. In spite of all this, Juneteenth is a day to embrace our history, learn from our past, and move forward in unity knowing we ALL contributed to the greatness of this country.
Unfortunately, we ourselves still experience racism’s and it’s many nuisances today and the ways in which it limits how people see us and our potential. In order to illustrate this, we each have taped our mouth shut with the racial microaggressions we have heard that have negatively affected us.
We Rose
From Africa’s heart, we rose
Already a people, our faces ebon, our bodies lean,
We rose
Skills of art, life, beauty and family
Crushed by forces we knew nothing of, we rose
Survive we must, we did,
We rose
We rose to be you, we rose to be me,
Above everything expected, we rose
To become the knowledge we never knew,
We rose
Dream, we did
Act we must
Kristina Kay, We Rose © 1996, Juneteenth,.com
