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A32 FEATURE
Saturday 4 January 2020
Slavery museum in Liverpool aims to confront painful legacy

By RUSSELL CONTRERAS crossed the Middle Pas-
Associated Press sage had to fight for human
LIVERPOOL, England (AP) — rights and against violence
Scarlet shackles sit peace- amid white supremacy —
fully on display in front of the ideology that launched
a sad, gray backdrop. The racialized slavery in the first
now rusted leg irons once place. There's also photos
locked human ankles dur- of the civil rights struggles
ing 18th century voyages in the United Kingdom
from Africa to some Eu- from London's "Keep Britain
ropean port, then to the White Rally" in 1960 to the
Americas. Toxteth Riot of 1981 in Liv-
Who the shackles held re- erpool over allegations of
main a mystery. But as a police harassment.
citizen of the United States, The museum ends with a
I've likely broken bread with space for changing exhib-
a descendant of the wom- its related to the themes
an forced to wear this in- around modern-day slav-
strument. Maybe my uncle ery. During my visit in No-
fought alongside her kin in vember, I encountered an
a war. Or it's possible one of exhibition called "Am I not
her distant relatives is now a woman and a sister" — a
be my relative. moving image installation
These are the thoughts I by England-based artist
entertain recently while Elizabeth Kwant. She co-
walking through the re- created the project with
flective International Slav- In this Nov. 24, 2019 photo, a sculpture of former slave and later abolitionist writer Olaudah Equia- female survivors of modern-
no is displayed at the International Slavery Museum in Liverpool, England.
ery Museum in Liverpool, Associated Press day slavery in partnership
England. Founded in 2007 with Liverpool charity City
on the bicentenary of the man suffering and is similar Hearts. The project links cur-
abolition of the British slave to O Mercado de Escra- rent human trafficking to
trade, the museum sits just vos — the slavery museum the story out of the Middle
a short walk from the dry in Lagos, Portugal, where Passage.
docks where slave trading the European slave trade In the U.S., journalist Nikole
ships were repaired and fit- began. But Liverpool's mu- Hannah-Jones has sparked
ted out in the 1700s. (And seum is much larger, more conversations about the
it's close by the The Beatles interactive, and more am- legacy of slavery in that na-
Story, the world's largest bitious without being ex- tion's history with her inter-
permanent exhibition pure- ploitative. active 1619 Project in The
ly devoted to the home- Inside, visitors immediately New York Times. It examines
town band.) Once a major are taken on a medita- In this Nov. 24, 2019 photo, a set of shackles used to hold en- the 400th anniversary of the
slaving port, Liverpool grew tive experience focusing slaved Africans in forts and castles along the coast from Tamale, arrival of the first enslaved
thanks to merchants' finan- on Africa before European Ghana, are displayed at the International Slavery Museum in people from West Africa on
cial ties to the enslavement contact. You are greeted Liverpool, England. the present-day America's
of people to the Americas. by quotes of American Associated Press eastern shore. The project
Today, the building tells the abolitionists and civil rights oon and samples of Igbo the American Declaration challenges readers to con-
story of the enslavement leaders etched into stone wall painting from Nigeria. of Independence. sider how their own lives
of people from Africa and walls before you see tra- You can listen to samples During the Middle Passage have been shaped by the
how this British city benefit- ditional masks from pres- of drum signals from the portion, visitors encounter legacy of slavery and it is
ed from human bondage. ent-day Sierra Leone and Republic of Congo or a shackles and chains used helping inspire activists in
The Liverpool location re- Mali. There are vibrant tex- Mbuti hunting song. The in forts and castles along places like Albuquerque,
claims a space once con- tiles from Ghana, intricate messages are clear: before the African coast to hold New Mexico, to push for
nected to worldwide hu- headdresses from Camer- enslavement, Africa was a humans before their horrific their own museum of black
diverse and complex con- journey. A small replica of history. Walking by an in-
tinent with long artistic and a slave boat illustrates how stallation of former slave
religious traditions. captives were tossed into and abolitionist Olaudah
Next, visitors are whisked small compartments. Next Equiano, I heard two young
toward a room tackling to the ship are 18th-century black women discussing
enslavement and the bru- whips and branding irons. the 1619 Project and how
tal Middle Passage. Racial Yes, these were used. they didn't understand the
ideologies and Europe's un- Then, there was resistance, criticism it faced for trying
familiarity with the cultures liberation, and the long to reshape a narrative in
of Africa sparked the slave fight for civil rights. Surpris- the U.S. As we left the Equi-
trade which grew once Eu- ing, I walked into an area ano sculpture, we stopped
ropean powers expanded dedicated to the African at a display of a 1920-era
to the Americas, the mu- American heroes from Har- Ku Klux Klan robe and hood
seum tells us. In this room, riet Tubman to the Rev. from Port Jervis, New York.
details of the voyage of the Martin Luther King. Jr. and But I could feel we were
In this Nov. 24, 2019 photo, latex figures made in the 1940s de- ship Essex are reconstruct- Malcolm X. U.S. news foot- relieved the glass case sur-
picting daily life in Jamaica in the sugar cane fields displayed at ed. That's a slave ship that age from the 1950s and rounding it protected us.
the International Slavery Museum in Liverpool, England. left Liverpool on June 13, 1960s illustrates how the We were safe for now.
Associated Press 1783, just nine years after descendants of those who But were we?q