INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY MARCH 8-2025

Saturday March 8 will be celebrated internationally as International Women’s Day (IWD.) The day was first recognised by the United Nations (UN) in 1977 following a resolution calling for member states to proclaim a day for women’s rights and international peace. In adopting its resolution, the UN General Assembly recognized the role of women in peace efforts and development and urged an end to discrimination and an increase of support for women's full and equal participation. The theme for IWD 2025 is “For ALL women and girls: Rights. Equality.” International Women's Day is a time to honour and celebrate the achievements of women. To raise awareness of the work that needs to be done to ensure the full participation of women and girls and to celebrate the progress that has been made. Women across the globe, in various societies, have had to struggle for progress. Racialized women living in European dominated societies have had to struggle against sexism and racism. On April 7, 1973, at the National Congress of Black Women in Canada, Rosemary Brown said: "To be black and female in a society which is both racist and sexist is to be in the unique position of having nowhere to go but up." Rosemary Brown was the first African Canadian woman elected to any provincial legislative assembly in Canada, on August 30th 1972 in British Columbia. Rosemary Brown is one of many African women in the Diaspora who have achieved against great odds and whose names are not widely known. The African Proverb: “Until lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunter” makes a profound statement about the lack of widespread knowledge of our African sheroes. In 2025, we do have historians who have documented some of the stories of the lives of pioneering African women on the continent and in the Diaspora. As a Pan-Africanist, the lives of African women globally have been of interest since childhood. As we approach IWD 2025 I think about the numerous African women who have inspired change. The history of those women has been researched and documented by our historians including Dr. Afua Cooper who published “The Hanging of Angelique,” in 2006) and Dr. Natasha Henry who published an article about Chloe Cooley (http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/chloe-cooley-and-the-act-to-limit-slavery-in-upper-canada/) Books about other African Canadian women who inspired change include “Sister to Courage” about Viola Desmond published in 2010 by Wanda Robson, the 1998 published “Mary Ann Shadd Cary: The Black Press and Protest in the Nineteenth Century” by Jane Rhodes and “Sylvia Stark: A Pioneer” by Alfred Ernest Jones, Torie Scott and Karen Lewis published in 1991. Some African women in the Diaspora and from the continent who inspired change in their communities during slavery and colonization did so in groups. They took collective action in sisterhood. During every struggle for equality and freedom from enslavement, colonization and occupation by foreign entities, women have participated. The women of Buxton Village on the East Coast of Demerara in Guyana and the Igbo and Ibibio women of Calabar and Owerri in southeastern Nigeria, resisted unfair tax laws imposed by British colonizers. Following the August 1, 1838, end of the “Apprenticeship system” in Guyana, groups of formerly enslaved Africans pooled their money together, bought abandoned plantations and established villages throughout the Guyanese coastland during the “African Village Movement.” Of the more than 100 villages established by Africans in Guyana, Buxton Village on the East Coast of Demerara is the most well-known. With the establishment of Buxton Village, there was resistance from the British colonizers who had formerly dictated every area of the lives of Africans. The former enslavers tried sabotaging the growth of the recently established village. The Buxtonians survived the deliberate flooding of their farms and other attempts to dislodge them from their homes. The final straw was an unfair taxation of their land by the colonial government. Several attempts to dialogue with the British governor were rebuffed. When the villagers heard that the governor would be passing by their village as he inspected the recently laid train tracks, it was an ideal opportunity to dialogue with the governor. As the train approached Buxton, the women of Buxton strode onto the train tracks putting their lives on the line. The men followed when the train was forced to stop and supported the women in immobilizing the train by applying chains and locks to its wheels. The Governor was forced to meet with the villagers who demanded that he repeal the exorbitant, unfair taxation of their land. Following that impromptu meeting at the train line, surprisingly, the governor did repeal the tax law. Buxtonians are famous throughout Guyana for their resistance to British colonization; every Guyanese knows that “Buxton women stop train.” In the Calabar and Owerri provinces in southeastern Nigeria, thousands of Igbo and Ibibio women organized in 1929, to resist the policies imposed by British colonial administrators. The women called their campaign the Ogu Umunwanye (Women’s War) and forced the colonial authorities to drop their plans to impose a tax on women. The “Women’s War” in Nigeria was considered the most serious challenge to British rule in the history of colonized Nigeria. It took months (November and December 1929,) for the British colonizers to suppress the “Women’s War.” British police and military were sent out to deal with the protesters and reportedly killed 100 women. The “Women’s War” sparked changes beyond the rescinding of unfair tax laws; it inspired the tax protests of 1938, the Oil Mill Protests of the 1940s and the Tax revolt of 1956. On Saturday, March 8, a group of African Canadian women will launch their recently published book “Reflections on Sisterhood: Voices from Black Canada,” at 1553 Eglinton Avenue West from 2:00 to 5:00 p.m.

AFRICAN HERITAGE MONTH FEBRUARY 2025

African American scholar/historian, Carter Godwin Woodson was the founder of Negro History Week in 1926 which eventually became Black History Month and now African Heritage Month, African Liberation Month etc. As we express our Kujichagulia/Self-Determination we name the month of February as we see fit and tell our story. The African proverb “Until the lion has its own historian, the tale of the hunt will always glorify the hunter” comes to mind during this month. Our history has been ignored and even distorted for centuries, since the enslavement of our ancestors. Mutabaruka, an African Jamaican Rastafari dub poet, musician, actor, educator, and talk-show host, has famously said: “Slavery isn’t African history. It Interrupted African history.” Although slavery is not the entirety of African history or the history of the descendants of enslaved Africans, it has had a profound effect on us as a people. The enslavement of Africans whose descendants live in every corner of the earth are affected by the 400 years enslavement of their ancestors. Carter Godwin Woodson was an African American historian, author and journalist. He was one of the first scholars to study African American history. He founded the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH) on September 9, 1915, to address the lack of information on the history, culture and accomplishments of African Americans. The effects of 400 years enslavement still haunt us almost 115 years after Woodson launched the ASALH. Woodson made the documentation and promotion of the history of Africans his life’s work. He wrote and published 19 books about African history and culture. His most popular book is “The Mis-education of the Negro,” which was published in 1933 where he addresses a problem that plagues our community to this day: "When you control a man's thinking you do not have to worry about his actions. You do not have to tell him not to stand here or go yonder. He will find his 'proper place' and will stay in it. You do not need to send him to the back door. He will go without being told. In fact, if there is no back door, he will cut one for his special benefit. His education makes it necessary." Woodson was also a regular contributor to the publication of another African descendant who was very passionate about educating Africans about their history. Woodson frequently wrote articles for the weekly publication "Negro World" which was owned by The Honourable Marcus Mosiah Garvey. The two men shared similar values and thoughts on the condition of and how to improve the lot of Africans, “at home and abroad.” Woodson launched Negro History Week during the second week of February 1926, to honour Frederick Douglass. The history of Africans in Canada has been recognized and celebrated since the 1950s when the Canadian Negro Women's Association began the celebration of the community’s history in Canada. This work was continued by the efforts of Stan Grizzle and the Ontario Black History Society (OBHS) which led to the recognition province wide in 1979 of February as Black History Month. In December 1995, Canada's federal parliament officially recognized February as Black History Month. The motion, which was initiated by then Member of Parliament Jean Augustine, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister, received unanimous approval. Dr. Augustine is the first African Canadian woman elected, 1993, to the Canadian Federal Parliament in its then 126-year history (established July 1, 1867.) The first national observation of February as Black History Month in Canada was February 1996. The Canadian government unveiled the theme for 2025 Black History Month on January 21st, Lincoln Alexander Day. The theme is: “Black Legacy and Leadership: Celebrating Canadian History and Uplifting Future Generations.” There has been an African Presence (enslaved and free) in Canada even before the country was named Canada. The first documented person of African descent to arrive in Canada is Mathieu DaCosta, in the 1600s. He was part of the 1603 expedition of French explorer Samuel de Champlain, as an interpreter for the French with the Mi'kmaq people. First launched in 1996, the “Mathieu Da Costa Challenge,” is a national contest for youth ages 9 to 18. The history of the enslavement of Africans in this country began in 1628 with the documented sale of six-year-old Olivier LeJeune in Quebec and ended on August 1, 1834, when slavery was abolished. The child who was sold in Quebec and given the name Olivier LeJeune was an African child who was kidnapped from the African continent. He was sold by David Kirke who was one of the English privateering Kirke brothers. During his life of enslavement in Quebec Olivier LeJeune was sold several times. He was buried on May 10, 1654, when he was approximately 32 years old. Enslaved Africans were not known for their longevity. We have come a long way since the days when Dr. Woodson established “Negro History Week.” During this month whether we name it Black History Month, African History Month or African Liberation Month we need to recognize and commemorate the global history of Africans. The theme for Black History Month 2025 is: “Black Legacy and Leadership: Celebrating Canadian History and Uplifting Future Generations.” Let us do that.

COUNTRY MUSIC WAS INFLUENCED BY AFRICAN MUSIC

COUNTRY MUSIC WAS INFLUENCED BY AFRICAN MUSIC Murphy Browne © May 10-2024 “I was wondering about our yesterdays, and starting digging through the rubble and to say, at least somebody went through a hell of a lot of trouble to make sure that when we looked things up we wouldn't fare too well and that we would come up with totally unreliable portraits of ourselves. But I compiled what few facts I could, I mean, such as they are to see if we could shed a little bit of light and this is what I got so far: First, white folks discovered Africa and they claimed it fair and square. Cecil Rhodes couldn't have been robbing nobody 'cause he said there was nobody there.” Excerpt from Black History/The World by Gil Scott-Heron In 1980, African American jazz poet, singer, musician, author and spoken-word artist Gilbert Scott-Heron released “Black History/The World” on the album: “Moving Target.” Gil Scott-Heron deconstructed colonialism, racism, and African history as told and documented by people who were not African. Those “historians” told their version of our story. In “Black History/The World,” Gil Scot Heron illuminated the African proverb: “Until the lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunter.” Similarly, until the Africans from the African continent and in the Diaspora began documenting their own stories, everyone else told and wrote their version of African stories. Gilbert Scott-Heron wrote and performed “Black History/The World” in 1980. In 2024, several decades later some people who do not know the African stories are telling their version. I was reminded of Gil Scott-Heron’s “Black History/The World,” when I read about Asa Blanton, a white Indiana State University nursing student who said Beyoncé is "not country" because Beyoncé is not white. Blanton said in a video shared on TikTok: “I’m sorry, but if you’re Black, you’re not country. I don’t care, I wish I meant that in the nicest way, but babe, I know you were raised in the country or your grandparents were … but they was picking, OK? They wasn’t planting. Just keep that in mind. They wasn’t making money. They were getting sold for money. You ain’t country.” Asa Blanton and many others like her do not know of the historical African influence on country music, even during the enslavement of Africans. "In reality, just like most popular music genres, country music in the U.S. began with Black People.” The story of country music begins with the banjo. The modern-day banjo is a descendant of a West African instrument, made from gourds, called the Akonting. When Africans were taken from Africa and enslaved in America, the knowledge of making their instruments were with them. Enslaved Africans created their own music, hymns, spirituals, and field songs—all with roots in African music. The banjo was seen as an exclusively African American instrument. White people did not play the banjo during that time. In the 1850s, minstrel shows became popular with the racist satirical form of entertainment where white performers in Blackface mockingly used the banjo as a musical instrument as they imitated the music and dance of enslaved Africans. The minstrel shows brought the banjo to white audiences and gave rise to hillbilly music during the 1920s. Hillbilly music was renamed country and was claimed as the music of the south. The performers drew inspiration from slave spirituals, field songs, hymns, and the blues, which were African American music. In the 1920s and 30s, despite segregation, some white hillbilly performers collaborated with African American artists to record music. Patrick Huber, a White history professor at Missouri University of Science and Technology acknowledges, “Nearly 50 African-American singers and musicians appeared on commercial hillbilly records between those years — because the music was not a white agrarian tradition, but a fluid phenomenon passed back and forth between the races.” In 1778, James A. Bland, an African American from New York wrote “Carry Me Back to Old Virginny” which became the official state song of Virginia in 1940. An African American minister wrote a hymn “When the World is On Fire.” That hymn became a 1928 hit “Little Darling, Pal of Mine” by “The Carter Family,” a White family of musicians. That song inspired “This Land is Your Land” sung by White performer, Woody Guthrie. In Nova Scotia Canada on May 12, 1785, under the heading "Negro Frolicks" Prohibited: “Officials in Nova Scotia ordered "50 Handbills [to] be immediately printed forbidding Negro Dances & Negro Frolicks in [the] town of Shelburne." “Libya and Egypt used to be in Africa, but they've been moved to the 'middle east'. There are examples galore I assure you, but if interpreting was left up to me I'd be sure every time folks knew this version wasn't mine which is why it is called 'His story.'” Excerpt from Black History/The World by Gil Scott-Heron Murphy Browne © May 10-2024

TOUSSAINT LOUVERTURE MAY 20-1743

Murphy Browne © May 20-2023 TOUSSAINT LOUVERTURE MAY 20-1743 I send you with this letter a declaration which will acquaint you with the unity that exists between the proprietors of San Domingo who are in France, those in the United States, and those who serve under the English banner. You will see there a resolution, unequivocal and carefully constructed, for the restoration of slavery; you will see there that their determination to succeed has led them to envelop themselves in the mantle of liberty in order to strike it more deadly blows. You will see that they are counting heavily on my complacency in lending myself to their perfidious views by my fear for my children. It is not astonishing that these men who sacrifice their country to their interests are unable to conceive how many sacrifices a true love of country can support in a better father than they, since I unhesitatingly base the happiness of my children on that of my country, which they and they alone wish to destroy. Blind as they are! They cannot see how this odious conduct on their part can become the signal of new disasters and irreparable misfortunes, and that far from making them regain what in their eyes liberty for all has made them lose, they expose themselves to a total ruin and the colony to its inevitable destruction. Do they think that men who have been able to enjoy the blessing of liberty will calmly see it snatched away? They supported their chains only so long as they did not know any condition of life more happy than that of slavery. But to-day when they have left it, if they had a thousand lives they would sacrifice them all rather than be forced into slavery again. Excerpt from Toussaint L’Ouverture’s Letter to the Directory, November 5, 1797, published in The Black Jacobins by C. L. R. James 1963 François Dominique Toussaint L'Ouverture was an enslaved African born on May 20, 1743, two hundred and eighty years ago, on the Caribbean island of Saint Domingue (Haiti.) He is recognized as one of the leaders of the Haitian Revolution. The Africans who were enslaved in Haiti by a group of French men and women are the only group of Africans who seized and maintained their freedom from chattel slavery. They declared their independence on January 1, 1804, after years of armed struggle against European forces beginning in August 1891. L’Ouverture chose his last name sometime in 1793. He used the last name L’Ouverture for the first time when he wrote a letter dated August 29, 1793, in which he encouraged enslaved Africans to unite: “Brothers and friends, I am Toussaint Louverture; perhaps my name has made itself known to you. I have undertaken vengeance. I want Liberty and Equality to reign in St Domingue. I am working to make that happen. Unite yourselves to us, brothers, and fight with us for the same cause. Your very humble and obedient servant, Toussaint L'Ouverture.” He had carried the last name Breda at birth because like enslaved Africans everywhere he was given the name of his enslavers. His enslavers owned the Breda plantation where he was born. In 1797 when he wrote his Letter to the Directory L’Ouverture was 54 years old and had been free for about 4 years. For a man who had been enslaved for most of his life it was an extraordinary achievement to be able to read and write. In every society where Africans were enslaved by White men and women literacy was not encouraged for the enslaved Africans and in some places (USA) being literate was a death sentence for an enslaved African. L’Ouverture’s letter referred to the people who were determined to re-enslave the Africans in Haiti who had been freed by the French Revolutionary government on February 4, 1794. This declaration on paper that the enslaved Africans on plantations owned by French men and women were free did not happen because White people suddenly had an epiphany that enslaving other humans was wrong. They were forced to declare an abolition of slavery because the Africans in Haiti had seized their freedom three years earlier in 1791. In 1789 when the revolutionaries in France proclaimed the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen they did not care about the freedom or rights of enslaved Africans whose coerced labour made France one of the richest European countries of the time. Haiti was France’s Pearl of the Antilles. The late African Guyanese scholar and historian Walter Rodney in his 1973 published book How Europe Underdeveloped Africa included a quote from a presentation made in 1791 by Cardinal Maury, a member of the French National Assembly who urged the French National Assembly to maintain slavery in the French colonies: “If you were to lose each year more than 200 million livres that you now get from your colonies; if you had not the exclusive trade with your colonies to feed your manufactures, to maintain your navy, to keep your agriculture going, to repay for your imports, to provide for your luxury needs, to advantageously balance your trade with Europe and Asia, then I say it clearly, the kingdom would be irretrievably lost. Bishop Maury (of France): Argument against France’s ending the slave trade and giving freedom to its slave colonies. Presented in the French National Assembly, 1791.” The French Revolutionary government seized power from the French monarchy and the aristocracy and declared France a republic in September 1792, murdering their king the following year. After a blood bath popularly known as the Reign of Terror (September 5, 1793 – July 28, 1794) where French men and women marched their fellow citizens to the guillotine to be slaughtered by the tens of thousands, the bloodthirsty citizens settled down and turned their attention once again to the colonies. With the fighting and killing in France, White people did not have time to take care of business in the colonies, but they had no intention of losing all that unpaid labour that was provided by Africans. After dispatching tens of thousands of their tribe via the guillotine the French led by a Corsican (Napoleon Bonaparte) once more turned their covetous eyes to the riches of Haiti. Bonaparte drunk with power after defeating much of Europe declared himself Emperor of France even though he was not French. He then tried to retake Haiti from the Africans who had taken their freedom and established their independence as a nation. The French had reneged on their declaration of freedom for enslaved Africans and had re-enslaved Africans in their colonies. Under Napoleon’s rule the French passed a law on May 20, 1802, revoking the law passed on February 4, 1794, which had abolished slavery in the French colonies. On June 7, 1802, Bonaparte’s general LeClerc captured L’Ouverture after deceiving him by inviting him to a meeting with an offering to negotiate. Le Clerc realizing that he could not defeat the Africans led by L’Ouverture pretended to be willing to negotiate with L’Overture as the leader of his people. On June 15, 1802, the kidnapped L’Overture and his family were transported to France on board the French ship Le Heros. On his arrival in France L’Overture was imprisoned and on April 7, 1803, he transitioned to the ancestor realm, a victim of his belief in the non-existent honour of Bonaparte and the French. In 2023, the name Toussaint L’Ouverture is well known as Haiti’s liberator. Toussaint L’Ouverture was born 280 years ago on May 20, 1743. Murphy Browne © May 20-2023

JOSIAH HENSON AND NANCY HENSON OCTOBER 28-1830

Murphy Browne © October 26, 2021 “I was born June 15th, 1789, in Charles County, Maryland, on a farm belonging to Mr. Francis N, about a mile from Port Tobacco. My mother was the property of Dr. Josiah McP, but was hired by Mr. N to whom my father belonged. The only incident I can remember which occurred while my mother continued on Mr. N's farm, was the appearance one day of my father with his head bloody and his back lacerated.” From The Life of Josiah Henson, Formerly a Slave, Now an Inhabitant of Canada, as Narrated by Himself by Josiah Henson published 1849. Josiah Henson was an enslaved African man who fled slavery in the USA and arrived in Canada 191 years ago, on October 28, 1830. Henson with his wife and four children arrived in Canada four years before slavery was abolished in Canada on August 1, 1834. In his 1849 published Narrative about his life, Henson documented the horror of living as an enslaved African man, including his only memory of his father (Henson was 3 or 4 years old) who was maimed as punishment for defending his wife against a White rapist. “His right ear was cut off close to his head and he had received a hundred lashes on his back. He had beaten the overseer for a brutal assault on my mother and this was his punishment. And though it was all a mystery to me at the age of three or four years, it was explained at a later period, and I understood that he had been suffering the cruel penalty of the Maryland law for beating a white man.” Henson would later describe in grim detail how his father was punished. “The day for the execution of the penalty was appointed. The Negroes from the neighboring plantations were summoned, for their moral improvement, to witness the scene. A powerful blacksmith named Hewes laid on the stripes. Fifty were given, during which the cries of my father might be heard a mile, and then a pause ensued. True, he had struck a white man, but as valuable property he must not be damaged. Judicious men felt his pulse. Oh! he could stand the whole. Again and again the thong fell on his lacerated back. His cries grew fainter and fainter, till a feeble groan was the only response to his final blows. His head was then thrust against the post, and his right ear fastened to it with a tack; a swift pass of a knife, and the bleeding member was left sticking to the place.” Henson’s father was eventually sold and he never saw his father again. Describing the last time he saw his father, Henson remembered “He was beside himself with mingled rage and suffering.” Henson could not remember much about his father before the horrific maiming, but he later learned that “Previous to this affair my father, from all I can learn, had been a good- humored and light- hearted man, the ringleader in all fun at corn- huskings and Christmas buffoonery. His banjo was the life of the farm, and all night long at a merry- making would he play on it while the other Negroes danced. But from this hour he became utterly changed. Sullen, morose, and dogged, nothing could be done with him. The milk of human kindness in his heart was turned to gall. He brooded over his wrongs. No fear or threats of being sold to the far south- - the greatest of all terrors to the Maryland slave- - would render him tractable. So off he was sent to Alabama. What was his fate neither my mother nor I have ever learned.” Years later Henson detailed the reason his father had been brutally punished, maimed and then sold away from his family. “The explanation I picked up from the conversation of others only partially explained the matter to my mind; but as I grew older I understood it all. It seemed the overseer had sent my mother away from the other field hands to a retired place, and after trying persuasion in vain, had resorted to force to accomplish a brutal purpose. Her screams aroused my father at his distant work, and running up, he found his wife struggling with the man. Furious at the sight, he sprung upon him like a tiger. In a moment the overseer was down, and, mastered by rage, my father would have killed him but for the entreaties of my mother, and the overseer's own promise that nothing should ever be said of the matter. The promise was kept- - like most promises of the cowardly and debased- - as long as the danger lasted.” While Henson was still a small child his enslaver Dr. Josiah McPherson, died and Henson, his mother and siblings were sold at auction. “My brothers and sisters were bid off one by one while my mother holding my hand looked on in an agony of grief, the cause of which I but ill understood at first, but which dawned on my mind, with dreadful clearness as the sale proceeded.” Henson as a 5- or 6-year-old became so ill after his mother was sold that he was eventually sold to his mother’s new enslaver Isaac Riley, “at such a trifling rate that it could not be refused.” Henson married Nancy, an enslaved African woman when he was 22 years old and the couple eventually had 12 children. When Henson was 36 years old his enslaver Isaac Riley, the man to who Henson and his mother had been sold, found himself in financial difficulties and to hide his “assets,” persuaded Henson to take 18 enslaved Africans (including Henson, his wife and their children) from Maryland to his brother Amos Riley’s plantation in Kentucky. The group of 18 enslaved Africans led by Henson, left Maryland in February 1825. While passing through the free state of Ohio, "colored people gathered round us, and urged us with much importunity to remain with them." Henson refused to remain a free man in Ohio, considering that it was more important to keep the promise made to his enslaver than to free himself, his wife, his children and the other enslaved Africans. Years later, as a free man living in Canada, Henson lamented that decision "I have often had painful doubts as to the propriety of my carrying so many other individuals into slavery again, and my consoling reflection has been, that I acted as I thought at the time was best. In the 1973 published Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies and Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks in American Films African American film historian and author Donald Bogle writes: “Always as toms are chased, harassed, hounded, flogged, enslaved, and insulted, they keep the faith, n'er turn against their white massas, and remain hearty, submissive, stoic, generous, selfless, and oh-so-very kind. Thus they endear themselves to white audiences and emerge as heroes of sorts.” Josiah Henson eventually made the decision to flee from enslavement on the Isaac Riley plantation in Kentucky and arrived in Canada on October 28, 1830. Henson did not make the journey to freedom alone. He brought his wife and the four children that they had at time, to Canada. The Henson family travelled on foot by night and hid in the woods by day. After a long and dangerous six-week journey, the Hensons arrived in Upper Canada/Ontario on the morning of October 28, 1830. In 1830, (Upper Canada) Ontario had become a refuge for enslaved Africans (beginning in 1793) who had escaped from the United States, even though slavery was practiced in the province and throughout Canada until August 1, 1834. In 1793, Lieutenant-Governor John Graves Simcoe passed An Act to prevent the further introduction of Slaves, and limit the Term of Contracts for Servitude within this Province. That law was enacted because of the resistance of Chloe Cooley, an enslaved African woman in Upper Canada/Ontario. On March 14, 1793, Chloe Cooley, an enslaved African woman in Queenston, was beaten, bound, thrown in a boat and sold across the river to a new owner in the United States. Her screams and violent resistance was brought to the attention of Lieutenant Governor John Graves Simcoe by Peter Martin, a free African man living in Canada who had been a soldier in Butler's Rangers, and had witnessed the outrage. Simcoe tried to abolish slavery in the province. He was met with opposition in the House of Assembly, some of whose members were enslavers. A compromise was reached and on July 9, 1793, An Act to Prevent the further Introduction of Slaves and to limit the Term of Contracts for Servitude within this Province was passed that prevented the further introduction of slaves into Upper Canada and allowed for the gradual abolition of slavery although no slaves already living in Upper Canada/Ontario were freed. It was the first legislation that limited slavery and led to a freedom movement of enslaved Africans from the USA, that became known as the Underground Railroad. The Act did not prevent the buying and selling of enslaved Africans in the province as evidenced by the infamous advertisement on February 10, 1806, where Peter Russell, a member of the House of Assembly was selling Peggy Pompadour and her 15-year-old son Jupiter. The legislation did not end slavery in Canada or even in Ontario, but it did prevent the importation of enslaved Africans. This meant that any enslaved African who fled slavery in the USA and arrived in Upper Canada/Ontario was free. When the Henson family arrived on October 28, 1830, others had already made Upper Canada/Ontario their home, including Black Loyalists from the American Revolution and many other freedom seekers from the War of 1812. Henson became a leader in the community. In 1841, Henson and a group of abolitionists bought 200 acres of land southwest of the Town of Dresden and established Dawn, an African Canadian community where other enslaved Africans who fled slavery in the USA could settle. At its height, the Dawn settlement had approximately 500 residents, but many members returned to the USA in the 1860s after slavery was abolished there. Henson chose to remain in Canada and he and his wife supposedly spent the remainder of their lives in the two-storey house which today is on the Uncle Tom's Cabin Historic Site in Dresden, Ontario. The site was acquired by the Ontario Heritage Trust in February 2005, ironically, 180 years after Henson began that ill-fated journey (February 1825) from Maryland to Kentucky. Henson transitioned to the ancestral realm on May 5, 1883, at almost 94 years old. Murphy Browne © October 26, 2021

AFRICAN HERITAGE MONTH 2021

AFRICAN HERITAGE MONTH 2021 Ninety-five years ago, during the second week of February 1926, African American scholar/historian, Carter Godwin Woodson launched "Negro History Week." Since 1976 it was expanded from a one-week recognition of African history to a one-month recognition. This one-month celebration/recognition of our history began in February 1926 when African American historian Carter Godwin Woodson took the initiative to educate Americans about the history and achievements of Africans. At that time, many Americans (and others) mistakenly thought that Africans had no history beyond enslavement and colonization by Europeans. This is not surprising because during the four hundred years enslavement of Africans, their white enslavers made a concerted effort to strip Africans of all memory of their culture, language and history. Using savagely brutal means, (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMPFQo5V-lA) the slave holders succeeded in wiping almost all knowledge of African languages, culture and history from the memory of many enslaved Africans and their descendants. Vestiges of the languages, culture and history survived in fragments in every enslaved community. We managed to salvage remnants of our culture, languages and history in whatever European language we were forced to survive. Our African culture survived whether we were forced to speak English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Dutch, German or any other European language. In the lyrics of his song “Survival,” Bob Marley sang, “We're the survivors, like Daniel out of the lions’ den (Black survivors.)” Although you might hear someone grumble that “they” gave us the coldest month of the year, by now most of us know that the second week of February was chosen by Woodson in 1926 to honour Frederick Douglass who chose February 14 as his birthday. Douglass had to choose a birthday because like many enslaved Africans he had no written record of his date of birth. He did remember that his mother would refer to him as her “little Valentine” so he surmised he was born on February 14. In February schools, business places and community organizations usually plan at least one activity to acknowledge the history and culture of Africans. Most of these events are nothing more than an excuse to trot out some Africans in African attire, sample some African food, drum and dance. We need to ensure that any event in our schools or the places where we are employed do more than provide entertainment in recognition of the month. At the very least include the history of Africans in Canada with a display of books and posters. There are bookstores in the city owned by African Canadians where the owners are extremely knowledgeable about appropriate books for a display. During Black History Month, African Heritage Month/African Liberation Month (whatever we chose to name it as we exercise our Kujichagulia/Self-determination,) do more to spread the knowledge. Read a book about African history, read to your children, buy a book for your children or other people’s children. Starting now! Murphy Browne © February 2009 AFRICAN HERITAGE MONTH What's in a name? Shakespeare wrote that a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet. He could afford to think, write and even say those words. He was a White male who had power and privilege bestowed on him because of the colour of his skin. His parents probably named him; he was not given a name by people from another culture who had stolen his name and language from him. For enslaved Africans who did not have a choice in naming themselves it is a very different matter. Europeans re-named us. Under pain of death we were not permitted to use our own names or speak our mother tongue. Africans in the Diaspora are the only group of people who do not collectively know who they are. There are individuals and groups who will acknowledge that they are African, but as a people we do not yet know and take pride in who we are. Other groups whose ancestors left their places of origin many years ago are proud of who they are. There is a reason for this difference in attitudes. Our ancestors did not choose to leave; they were kidnapped, dragged out of their countries, out of the continent in chains and held captive their entire lives. Were it not for the 400-year enslavement of Africans we would all know that we are Africans and our names would reflect this knowledge. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUBdBaJA03Q Deliberate, strategic methods were used to alienate Africans from tradition and from each other, and to teach African inferiority and European superiority. Europeans first attacked African culture; then they denied that African culture ever existed. Stripped of their names and identities, our ancestors were no longer Africans; they were made "Negro" by White slavers. The names many of us carry today reflect the nationality of the Europeans who enslaved our ancestors. Had this not been the case, my great grandfather's name would not have been Kelly Murphy Jonas. His name would probably have been Kofi. Kofi is the Akan name given to a male born on Friday. My name would have been Abena, because I was born on Tuesday. My childhood friends Staye and Faye Daniels would probably have been Taiwo and Kehinde because they are twins. Taiwo and Kehinde are the Yoruba names given to twins. Africans in the Diaspora cannot claim one particular country as the country of their ancestors either; our history of enslavement with the accompanying destruction of family units makes it impossible. Since everyone has two biological parents, four grandparents, eight great grandparents and so on, it is possible that one person can have ancestors from more than eight different African groups. European slavers knew that divided we were vulnerable. They designed a system to make us lose the basis of our collective identity. We were separated, and then our names, our language, our stories, our songs, our family structures, even our understanding of God -- the things that bound us together -- were beaten out of us. Then, they had to make us believe in, protect and even demand White supremacy. We had to be taught to love and revere Europe and European culture more than life itself. We were also taught that Africans had contributed nothing to the world. There has been continued African resistance to this attack on our sense of self since the first Africans were kidnapped and enslaved. There were always people who resisted. Some of these freedom fighters are well known; many others are not. In 1971, Richard B. Moore wrote in an "Open Letter on Our People's Name" to Bayard Rustin, Executive Director of the Asa Phillip Randolph Institute: "This term 'Negro' has long been a synonym for slave, loaded continuously with scorn and hostility, and still linked in the public mind generally with a vile and repulsive image." Born in Barbados on August 9, 1885, Moore moved to New York as a young man. In the 1960s he created the "Committee to present the truth about the Name Negro". He also published the book, The Name Negro, Its Origin and Evil Use, as part of his campaign to encourage Africans to reclaim their names. He made the connection between the use of the word "Negro" and the beginning of the African slave trade. He proved Europeans used it in their attempt to instill an inferiority complex within Africans. Moore died in Barbados in 1978, but his work and his words live on. Carter G. Woodson initiated the celebration of Negro History Week in February 1926. Woodson chose February to honour the memory of Frederick Douglass. At the time when Woodson started the recognition of African heritage and history as a public entity, African Americans still used the name they had been given by Europeans. During the 1960s and '70s the "Negroes" and "Coloureds" of the U.S. renamed themselves Black. It was the time of being "Black and Proud." In 1976, as part of the American bicentennial celebrations, "Negro History Week" became Black History Month. Since then, we have been expressing our kujichagulia (self-determination) by naming our celebration Black History Month, African Heritage Month or African Liberation Month. In Canada, the Canadian Negro Women's Association pioneered the celebration of Black history in the 1950s. The Ontario Black History Society was instrumental in the recognition of Black History Month as a citywide celebration in 1979. In 1993, the celebration gained province-wide recognition. In 1996, due to the intervention of MP Jean Augustine in December of 1995, Black History Month became a nationally recognized celebration in Canada. Whatever you are comfortable naming yourself, educate yourself about your history. Murphy Browne © February 2009

EL HAJJ MALIK EL SHABAZZ MAY 19-1925

Murphy Browne © May 19-2020 EL HAJJ MALIK EL SHABAZZ El Hajj Malik El Shabazz was born on May 19th, 1925 in Omaha, Nebraska and transitioned to the ancestral realm on February 21st, 1965 in the Audubon Ballroom, Manhattan, New York. Shabazz was born into a home of Pan-African activist parents who as Garveyites adhered to the philosophy of the Honourable Marcus Mosiah Garvey. Garvey, born in St Ann, Jamaica, was the leader of the Pan-African movement and founder of the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League (UNIA-ACL.) The philosophy of Garvey’s UNIA-ACL provided the blueprint for several African centred movements that served to educate Africans in the Diaspora about their history. Ilyasah Shabazz, daughter of El Hajj Malik El Shabazz who spoke at the University of Toronto (OISE) on Monday, February 4-2008, reminded us that her father’s parents met at a UNIA convention in Montreal. Ilyasah Shabazz, her parents’ third child, was almost three years old (born July 22, 1962) and her mother Dr. Betty Shabazz was pregnant with twins, Malaak and Malikah when El Hajj Malik El Shabazz was assassinated on February 21st, 1965. When Ossie Davis eulogized Shabazz on February 27th 1965; he said in part “Here - at this final hour, in this quiet place - Harlem has come to bid farewell to one of its brightest hopes -extinguished now, and gone from us forever. Consigning these mortal remains to earth, the common mother of all, secure in the knowledge that what we place in the ground is no more now a man - but a seed - which, after the winter of our discontent, will come forth again to meet us. And we will know him then for what he was and is - a Prince - our own black shining Prince! - who didn't hesitate to die, because he loved us so." Even though there were approximately 400 people in the Audubon Ballroom on the night of Shabazz’s assassination, there is still confusion about the identity of Shabazz’s assassins. () There has been speculation that the American government was involved, since the Shabazz family had been under constant surveillance by the CIA and FBI, including having their telephone wiretapped. Fifty-five years later, there are many unanswered questions about the role of the US government in the assassination of Shabazz. It has been reported that the carefully orchestrated “confusion” began when two men began loudly arguing with each other just moments after Shabazz stood at the podium to begin his speech on February 21st, 1965. As his body guards approached the two men there was another distraction when a smoke bomb was detonated at the back of the room. The assassins chose those moments of confusion to attack and when the smoke cleared another one of our freedom fighters was gone. In “Redemption song,” Bob Marley asks, “How long shall they kill our prophets while we stand aside and look?” Today character assassination is more in line with the neo-conservative agenda of white supremacy in our midst. John Edgar Hoover, who was Director of the FBI in 1965 when Shabazz was assassinated, began his more than five decades (1917 to 1972) long career in the FBI by harassing the Honourable Marcus Mosiah Garvey. Hoover hired his first “Negro” operative in the FBI to sabotage the work of the UNIA-ACL and destroy Garvey’s life. He continued his dedicated harassment of and quest to destroy African freedom fighters including Shabazz, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the Black Panther Party, Paul Robeson and the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). In the 1960’s at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, Hoover is credited with writing an FBI memo that directed “We must stop the rise of a black messiah.” The white power structure was mightily afraid that the “Negroes” would rally around a charismatic leader like Shabazz who was forcing white America to realize that the group of people who they had oppressed for generations would not ask but would rise up and seize their civil and human rights. Hoover established the infamous COINTELPRO, the counter intelligence program of the FBI which was successful in sabotaging the work of individuals and groups that sought to end white supremacy in the USA and secure the civil and human rights and equality for racialised communities. The FBI did not pursue white supremacist groups or individuals that slaughtered African Americans and worked to deny racialized people their civil and human rights. Three African American men were convicted of assassinating Shabazz but there remain questions about the role of the FBI which fostered a climate of distrust in much of the African American activist community with surveillance, including bugs, wiretaps, cameras, spies and agent provocateurs. To the government of the USA, Shabazz was a danger because he planned to take a petition that documented human rights violations and acts of genocide against African Americans to the United Nations. Shabazz was assassinated on February 21st, 1965 but the work he did during his lifetime was not in vain. His advocacy, unswerving dedication to improving the life condition of Africans and internationalizing the human rights violations against Africans made him a target. Although Shabazz did not have the opportunity to present his case to the United Nations, a spark was lit. In the first decade of the 21st century, 36 years after Shabazz was assassinated, at the United Nations World Conference Against Racism (August 31st to September 7th 2001) the issue of slavery, racism and reparations for the descendants of enslaved Africans was addressed. It was recognized that: “Africans and African Descendants share a common history shaped by the slave trade, slavery, conquest, colonization and apartheid, all of which constitute crimes against humanity, and a common experience of anti-Black racism. We acknowledge that people of African descent live all over the world, although in many instances they have been renamed, suppressed and marginalized. On every continent African and African Descendants continue to suffer from racism. We affirm that the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and the enslavement of Africans and African Descendants was a crime against humanity and a unique tragedy in the history of humanity, and that its roots and bases were economic, institutional, systemic and transnational in dimension.” Since 2001 there have been several cases where Africans in the Diaspora have launched law suits (claiming reparations) against companies that were involved in the enslavement of Africans. The Reparations Coordinating Committee (RCC) and the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America (N'COBRA), working on behalf of 35 million American descendants of enslaved Africans, was preparing to file class action lawsuits against agencies of the federal and state governments. Reparations litigation against private corporations alleged to have profited from slavery has already begun. On March 25, 2002, in a U.S. district court in Brooklyn, Deadria Farmer-Paellmann and other plaintiffs filed suit against Aetna Life Insurance Corporation, FleetBoston Financial Services, and CSX Incorporated, a railroad giant, on the grounds that they "knowingly benefited from a system that enslaved, tortured, starved and exploited human beings." In 2002, the Canadian National Railway was also one of those companies named by a group of African Americans who sued for reparations in a Federal Court in Chicago, Illinois. The plaintiffs led by Deadria Farmer-Paellmann demanded that a humanitarian trust fund be created rather than individual payments. In Canada, no lawsuits have been filed although the issue of African centred schools as part of reparations to address the anti-African racism that leads to the inordinately high number of our youth not graduating from secondary school, might be a good place to start. On December 18, 2009, the United Nations (UN) General Assembly proclaimed the year beginning on 1 January 2011 the International Year for People of African Descent (IYPAD). On December 23, 2013, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution that stated: “The International Decade for People of African Descent will take place from January 1, 2015, through Dec. 31, 2024, and will include celebrations throughout the world." On Monday, February 4th, 2008, Ilyasah Shabazz shared with us the importance of learning about our history, which her mother ensured was a part of the Shabazz children’s education. This is especially important since our history is distorted, marginalized or ignored in the Eurocentric education system. As we deal with the continued racism in the education system including acknowledgement of systemic racism at the Peel Board of education, () we need to remember the words of El Hajj Malik El Shabazz, one of our greatest freedom fighters, and learn from that history as we strategically continue the struggle. Shabazz said: “A race of people is like an individual man; until it uses its own talent, takes pride in its own history, expresses its own culture, affirms its own selfhood, it can never fulfill itself. I believe that there will be a clash between those who want freedom, justice and equality for everyone and those who want to continue the systems of exploitation.” Shabazz would have been 95 years old today, May 19-2020 Murphy Browne © May 19-2020