By Rubén Solís García

Note: This reflection paper is written in the context of connecting Lowndes County. Alabama and the Southern Movement Alliance Assembly and the broader US South struggle for Emancipation and Freedom, and the travel to and experience in South Africa (Capetown) and the Democratic Revolution and social transformation taking place there after Apartheid in1994.

The Apartheid

The Apartheid

Coming from the Southern Movements (organized by project South & Southern Movements Alliance) gathering the Southern Movements Assembly, held in Lowndes County, Alabama, I am struck by the connection (geo politically) between both regions, the US South and South Africa, as a travel to Capetown, separated by thousands of miles, yet connected by people and history. The connecting tie is the trans-atlantic connection, historically based on the slave trade triangle lasting five (5) centuries, where millions of Black people from Africa ended in the South of the United States under forced labor (slavery) and develop ed the original accumulation of capital that served for the development of several industrial revolutions, 19th and 20th centuries. The US South became the home of millions of Black that have been in continual resistance and struggle for full emancipation.

The 300 people who participated in the Southern Movement Assembly (SMA) were young people, Black, and females. Generationally, the SMA had people whose ages ranged from children and toddlers, Adolescents, teenagers, young adults, and elders. The SMA organized by Project South was made up of the participating organizations were diverse, including Indigenous,Latinos/as, Blacks, Asians, Whites, and LGBTQ community. Lowndes County, Alabama is the place where ‘Black Power’ was developed in the struggles of 1965, the LCFO, the Freedom tent City set up after people were pushed off their land, because the people dared to vote, who were stopped from exercising their right to vote by the white establishment and the KKK violence. The racial violence resulted in many activists murdered. Moreover, the actions in the South and Southwest, the POWER movements with the Liberation thinking and organizing, led to the enactment of the Civil Rights Act, and the Voter Rights Act of 1965. [Read More]

Read full South x South Africa 2012 Document (113KB PDF)

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