Slavery over time

One of the major points of our discussion about slavery in class was that while the institution and many of its direct aftereffects, like Jim Crow and legal disenfranchisement, are memories of the past, the real effects of slavery have continued on into the present. And this is not true just in the United States - it is easy to forget the effects of slavery on Africa itself. The legacy of European colonialism is still only winding down, while in nations such as Liberia and Sierra Leone - the legacy of attempts to repatriate freed slaves to the African continent - a deep and lasting ethnic divide sprung up between the former American and British slaves and the established inhabitants of both countries which has repeatedly prompted conflict, both before and after de jure independence.

We have certainly come a long way; a joke circulating in Kenya right now comments that a Luo (a Kenyan ethnic group represented by the presidential candidate Odinga) will become President of the United States before one becomes President of Kenya. There are signs that America is beginning to be post-racial - or at least has moved beyond the black-white divide. African-Americans have made huge strides in the past fifty years, not only in the high-profile world of politics but in business and culture. This is crucial: political involvement can immediately confer only electoral legitimacy, while cultural and financial activity offer moral authority through personal skill and prowess. However it has taken nearly ten generations for there to be any sort of real African-American presence in the upper class and poverty and income disparities fall disproportionately on black Americans. We have a long way yet to go.

I can't help thinking of the expression "time heals all wounds." I think this is as true of slavery as of anything else. Not only will the memories - and the scars - fade (though they will never disappear), but the aftereffects of slavery like poverty and inequality will also wear away as African-Americans are better and better represented in business, politics and the arts. The greater the injustice the more time is needed, however, and slavery was about as big as they come. In the meantime America must learn to be patient and above all to keep talking about it so the issue's potency will start to wear away and it need not be a problem confronted with either raised voices or uncomfortable silences.