Juneteenth, Mass Protests, and Black Liberation
Friday, 19th June, marked the 155th anniversary of Juneteenth, the day Union soldiers arrived in Galveston, Texas to inform enslaved Black people about the end of the Civil War and their right to freedom under the Emancipation Proclamation. This is a personal reflection on the importance of Juneteenth, amid the massive global protests, from Keyaria Rhodes, AFRE’s programme manager.
Every year, Juneteenth is an opportunity to grapple with and confront our freedoms and unfreedoms as Black people in America. This year, many of us celebrated Juneteenth by community organizing, participating in public demonstrations, supporting Black-owned businesses, or by attending performances celebrating blackness. The images coming out of these celebrations, particularly the protests, to me, represent the embodiment of an afrofuturistic practice for the advancement of Black liberation as articulated by Octavia Butler, Nona Hendryx, Rasheedah Phillips, N.K. Jemison, and others.
Photo Credit: Twitter
I define this afrofuturistic practice as actively conceiving of a future for Black life beyond the parameters set forth through anti-Black racism and Western ideals of humanity that privilege whiteness, heterosexuality and other narrow qualities that shape our daily experiences. And while the violence against Black people is well-documented in the news and on social media, the imagery of today’s movement (and from the past) signals a possible future where Black liberation is realized. What I am seeing in this moment is an extension of what Robin D.G. Kelley refers to as our Black radical imagination illustrated through unapologetic demonstrations and demands.
The aesthetics captured from the protests animate Black liberation before its time. They assert that there is no better time to declare that BLACK LIVES MATTER. And they assert that since there’s no justice, there can be no peace. These demonstrations, like afrofuturism, disregard the temporal format of the Western world. They’re at the right time, all the time, despite the government-issued curfews and despite the prevalence of COVID-19 within Black communities. Images from the movement delegitimize the authority of the state, which insists on the impossibility of Black life and liberation.
When I think about this moment, what comes to mind for me are the images of protesters with half of their face covered but with an activated expression pictured through their clenched fist. I think about the images of a body of protesters standing and shouting in solidarity, forgoing social distancing procedures, and confronting the police forces strapped in their riot gear. I also think about the powerful declaration “BLACK LIVES MATTER” that’s painted on what is now known as 1600 Black Lives Matter Plaza and leads directly to the White House.
The visual archive being developed from these global protests is bringing society closer to the reshaping of our daily lives. Not only do they index societal intolerance for the anti-blackness that is expressed through mass incarceration and police brutality, the aesthetics of mass protests also make a transformed society possible through the agency and audaciousness depicted through the imagery. They represent societal changes, which stem from the racial justice work happening both inside and outside of institutions.
In response to the most recent killings of Black people by the police and other racists forces — including the killings of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, Tony McDade, Malcolm Harsch, Robert Fuller, Rayshard Brooks and so many other and lesser-known victims — people are not making demands within the parameters of the current public safety infrastructure. Instead, protesters are demanding new social contracts like those who came before us.
In this process of remaking our society, we can learn from the afrofuturistic practices of people who draw from their powers of creation to disrupt notions of time, space, humanness (and so much more). Afrofuturists complicate Western ideals of humanity by disregarding its boundaries. The social parameters that afrofuturists offer through their artistry make new ways of relating to the world and each other possible. Their lenses make the invisibilized people who have been victimized, who remain unnamed or lesser-known, knowable. An afrofuturistic practice (through photography, writing, dialogue, music, film, etc.) reestablishes social contracts through which Black lives, women’s lives, and trans lives matter. Nona Hendryx actively creates an inclusive future in the present through her role in the performing arts for example. Afrofuturism enables us to expose the ways we are imprisoned through our acceptance of Westernized notions of time, space, and our place within the world order.
In order to imagine a future where we all belong, where we can live our best lives — free from the social, political, and economic constructions that define our current society, we must understand the contexts through which we exist, while embracing practices that enable us to transform into a world where we all can be. Our ancestors had to do this to ultimately gain their freedom, making Juneteenth possible, and so must we.
Photo Credit: Matthew Hatcher/Getty Images