What Is Juneteenth?

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A teach-in with all the info you need to know about the history, significance, and joy of this day

Juneteenth provides us the opportunity to remember and recreate the joy of freedom.

Specifically, it commemorates the freedom from race-based chattel slavery for Black people in the United States.

But now that Juneteenth is a national holiday, there is a risk.

The risk is that it becomes a hollow annual tradition devoid of passion or reflection.

One way to resist the dulling effects of repetition is to remind ourselves what Juneteenth is and why it is important.

A couple years ago, I conducted a Juneteenth Teach-In. I included all the essential info you need to know about the holiday:

• The text of General Order No. 3 that General Granger read to enslaved people in Galveston, TX on June 19, 1865

• Why it took so long for word of emancipation to spread

• Three primary source reflections on the horrors of slavery to remind us why we needed emancipation in the first place

• Why we need Juneteenth as a national holiday and some of the inherent risks

• Why Black people should *celebrate* Juneteenth and why white people should *commemorate* it

Watch the Juneteenth Teach-In and be sure to subscribe to my new YouTube page.

Happy Juneteenth!

Footnotes by Jemar Tisby is a reader-supported