Session 4:
Materials
Dharma friends at the first U.S. Buddhist Delegation to the White House in 2015. You can find a personal testimony about that event here.
1) Racial Karma and Storehouse consciousness (20-30 min)
Note: Larry Ward’s book is called “America’s Racial Karma”… Of course, this is entangled with British Racial Karma. He unpacks aspects of colonial thought and ways of being that will be of value of a global audience.
America’s Racial Karma - short interview of Larry Ward (short article)
and/or:Healing America’s Racial Karma (excerpt from his book, provides more detail on his model of racial karma)
Optional - if you would like to listen to Larry Ward, here is a 30 min Dharma talk where he explains some of the elements of his book. This might offer some fortitude, encouragement and support for engagement with the materials.
2) Forgotten Histories (45 min+)
David Olusoga - Britain’s Forgotten Slave Owners (15 min)
Episode 2 “Freedom” (1h18min)* from the Series ‘Black and British - A Forgotten History’ also by David Olusoga.
For viewing in the UK on iPLayer: episode 2.
For outside the UK here: link to episode 2.
*If you are short on time, it’s ok watch just the first 30 min.
3) Memory, stories, present realities (36 min)
Genealogist Who Tracks Down Modern-Day Slavery Practices in the US (20 min)
The Jolly Family (a family story from Scotland / England) (10 min) - This is an excerpt of a longer documentary you can see below “Britain And The Global Shame Of The Slave Trade “
Ken Burns, James Baldwin: Our monuments are representations of myth, not fact (6min)
In consideration of “remembering as practice,” this is an additional optional video:
Inside the memorial to victims of lynching (15 min)
Oprah Winfrey reports on the Alabama memorial dedicated to thousands of African-American men, women and children lynched over a 70-year period following the Civil War.
Resources to Go Deeper
This is a small collection of materials to go deeper if you wish, at your own pace — certainly not in a week!
On the Atlantic Slave Trade
Why Did Europeans Enslave Africans? (9min) Includes an “Americas” and more global perspective on the Atlantic Slave Trade, helpful if this topic is new to you.
On Black History (global focus)
Akala Full Address, Oxford Union 2015 (1h)
UK Focus
Chapter on “Histories” in “Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race” by Reni Eddo-Lodge (link coming soon)
Akala Interview Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire (22 min)
At ‘17 min, includes an interesting explanation of how race/class dynamics are different in the UK vs. US.
Everything you know about the British Empire is a lie George Monbiot (7 min - content warning, includes coverage of atrocities)
Britain Does Owe Reparations to India, by Dr Shashi Tharoor MP (15 min)
Britain And The Global Shame Of The Slave Trade - Timeline Documentary (49min) - Link for UK viewers here.
How Britain Glossed Over Their Role In Slavery - Timeline Documentary (49min) - Link for UK viewers here.
Both episodes include testimonies of British descendants of slave owners and enslaved people, vivid portrait of British life, politics and colonial economics of the UK in times of slavery.
Britain's Forgotten Slave Owners Episode 1 of 2 Profit and Loss
David Olusoga discovers the price of the abolition of slavery. Huge sums of money were paid out in compensation, not to slaves, but to the slave owners.
Britain's Forgotten Slave Owners Episode 2 of 2 The Price of Freedom
Historian David Olusoga traces the bitter propaganda war waged between the pro-slavery lobby and the abolitionists.
Full series ‘Black and British - A Forgotten History’
Full series 4 episodes only available in the UK (4hrs)
For outside the UK here: link to episode 2 and episode 4.
US Focus
Race and History - Interview with Bryan Stevenson, July 2016
The 1619 Project series.
1619 podcast by The New York Times
Know that a US senator is trying to prohibit the study of this in schools right now, as did the previous administration.
Article "When Americans Lynched Mexicans.” Link here
Reconstruction: America After the Civil War
Alternative link if this is not viewable in your country.
The series explores the transformative years following the American Civil War, when the nation struggled to rebuild itself in the face of profound loss, massive destruction, and revolutionary social change. This segment of history is rarely taught to white Americans and is absolutely critical.
Asian Americans
Asian Americans is a five-hour film series that will chronicle the contributions, and challenges of Asian Americans, the fastest-growing ethnic group in the US. Personal histories and new academic research will cast a fresh lens on U.S. history and the role Asian Americans have played in it.
Wellbriety Journey to Forgiveness
Documentary on the abuses of the Indian Boarding Schools, discusses the intergenerational trauma in Native communities