Posted on Feb 20, 2023
1 side owned slaves. The other side started Black History Month. How a family heals
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https://www.npr.org/2023/02/19/ [login to see] /woodsons-slaves-black-history-month-family-heal
"Those who have no record of what their forebears have accomplished lose the inspiration which comes from the teaching of biography and history." — Carter G. Woodson
There are many things from childhood that Brett Woodson Bailey doesn't remember. Maybe it has to do with his cancer diagnosis at 4-years-old, living in the hospital for almost two years, undergoing intense courses of radiation and chemotherapy. He thinks that plays a part in why so much of his childhood is "hazy."
Forgetting after all, is a side effect of trauma.
"Those who have no record of what their forebears have accomplished lose the inspiration which comes from the teaching of biography and history." — Carter G. Woodson
There are many things from childhood that Brett Woodson Bailey doesn't remember. Maybe it has to do with his cancer diagnosis at 4-years-old, living in the hospital for almost two years, undergoing intense courses of radiation and chemotherapy. He thinks that plays a part in why so much of his childhood is "hazy."
Forgetting after all, is a side effect of trauma.
1 side owned slaves. The other side started Black History Month. How a family heals
Posted from npr.org
Slavery
American History
Trauma
Rights
Family
Posted 1 y ago
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An interesting family. Like most Americans, I have ancestors on both sides of the slave issue.
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
MSG Stan Hutchison Slavery? Not So Much in My Family. Now Native American Issues? Yeah there's a Bit of a Rub there, I'm a Dawes, My Oldest 3 Grandchildren are Part Native Americans. "Dawes Roll?' I Get it, it was the First "Census" as Such of Native Americans and still used to "Confirm" Native American Ancestry but there is Something Pretty Screwed Up with a Document by a Scotsman being used to determine Who Is and Who Isn't "Native American".
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
..."NPR asked Craig if he ever talked with the Black Woodsons about monetary reparations. His family benefitted from their ancestors violently forced labor, after all.
Craig said it never really came up. But recently he put Brett in his will. He says it was something that should've happened a long time ago.
NPR asked Brett if Craig's showing up for him, and for Adele, was a kind of reparations.
"I guess in a way it depends on your perspective," Brett says. "It could be a kind of reparations, whether it's intentional or unintentional."
"You could view it as him making up for his ancestors," he says. "Or you could just view it as him being a good cousin. It depends on the way you frame it."
For Brett, seeing their relationship solely through the lens of repairing the past ignores the real connection they've established in the present. The one that holds Brett and Craig and Adele, and all the other Woodsons, together. The one that keeps them showing up.
If trauma can make us forget, can remembering help us heal? Maybe it can. Maybe it can't.
Still we owe it to history to remember, Craig says.
We owe it to each other.
Edited by Marcia Davis and Maquita Peters; Photos edited by Virginia Lozano contributed to this story"
..."NPR asked Craig if he ever talked with the Black Woodsons about monetary reparations. His family benefitted from their ancestors violently forced labor, after all.
Craig said it never really came up. But recently he put Brett in his will. He says it was something that should've happened a long time ago.
NPR asked Brett if Craig's showing up for him, and for Adele, was a kind of reparations.
"I guess in a way it depends on your perspective," Brett says. "It could be a kind of reparations, whether it's intentional or unintentional."
"You could view it as him making up for his ancestors," he says. "Or you could just view it as him being a good cousin. It depends on the way you frame it."
For Brett, seeing their relationship solely through the lens of repairing the past ignores the real connection they've established in the present. The one that holds Brett and Craig and Adele, and all the other Woodsons, together. The one that keeps them showing up.
If trauma can make us forget, can remembering help us heal? Maybe it can. Maybe it can't.
Still we owe it to history to remember, Craig says.
We owe it to each other.
Edited by Marcia Davis and Maquita Peters; Photos edited by Virginia Lozano contributed to this story"
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