Montgomery, Alabama (AP) — When a simulated wave hits overhead, chained statues of men, women, and children stick out of the sand. This is a symbol of the estimated 2 million people whose slave trade ended in the watery tombs of the Atlantic Ocean. ..

This exhibit is part of an extended museum created by the Equality and Justice Initiative, which focuses on the legacy of American slavery. The expanded Legacy Museum, a companion to the group’s famous Lynch Victims Memorial, opens on Friday and takes visitors on a journey through the origins of the slave trade, from the civil rights era to modern criminal justice issues. I’ll take you.

Bryan Stevenson, Secretary-General of the Equal Justice Initiative, said the museum’s goal is to teach and confront “a part of American history that is not often taught.” Healing.

“I think there’s something better in America. I think there’s something like equality, freedom, and justice that we’ve never experienced. But to achieve that, I We will have to face the protracted challenges created by this long history of problem damage, racial inequality, “Stevenson said in a telephone interview.

The museum ranges from the days of slavery, lynching and Jim Crow law to mass imprisonment and modern criminal justice issues, which are the focus of the legal affairs of the Equality Justice Initiative.

The 40,000-square-foot (3,700-square-meter) Legacy Museum in downtown Montgomery, Alabama is on the site of a former cotton warehouse. “You are standing in a place where a enslaved black man was forced to work in bondage.”

Down the dark corridor, images of the slaves talking are projected onto the wall behind Selver, who speak to the visitors standing in front of them. The first is a woman begging for the abducted children. In another example, two children snuggle up to each other.

Say, “Mom, mom … have you ever seen mom?”

The walls are lined with earthen vases taken from where Lynch’s victims were killed. In another exhibit, visitors are invited to take a Jim Crow era literacy test to register for a vote.

“How many jelly beans are in the jar in front of you? How many seeds are in the watermelon?”

Stevenson’s early legal affairs focused on winning the immunity of those who were unfairly convicted on behalf of death row prisoners. His memoir Just Mercy became a movie of the same name.

Stevenson said he came to believe that slavery did not disappear and evolved. That is, the elaborate myth of black inferiority that was used centuries ago to justify slavery did not just disappear in 1865.

“And even if the Civil Rights Act is passed, we guess when we see about blacks. That’s part of the reason why there are so many frustrations around. I’m sitting in Starbucks or walking in the library or on the sidewalk, “said Stevenson.

The Equal Justice Initiative opened the Legacy Museum and the National Peace Memorial Hall in 2018. The monument commemorates 4,400 blacks killed in Lynch and other racial killings between 1877 and 1950. Shaped pillar.

Just as South Africa has a site about apartheid and Germany mourns the Holocaust victims, the organization aims to create space for people to “face this history honestly.”

“One of the things we say is that the purpose of the museum is for our children to move their lives freely without any guesswork, without suffering from this history of racial inequality. “But there’s a lot to do to get there, and I hope this will give people a chance to do the job,” Stevenson said.

Copyright 2021 AP communication. all rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without permission.

Expanded museum traces American slavery heritage | Nationwide

Source link Expanded museum traces American slavery heritage | Nationwide