Friday, August 24, 2007

Slavery Remembrance Day Events


Friday 24 August 07

An African woman in traditional dressHelen Renner in her wonderful dress

I was pleased to be able to go along to the Slavery Remembrance Day events yesterday at Otterspool Prom. Thank goodness for the great weather! It was a busy afternoon with delicious Caribbean food followed by the libation ceremony and a mixture of live performances. The libation ceremony was a unique experience - it is a solemn African traditional ceremony, which remembers, acknowledges and honours African ancestors, elders and leaders. Chief Angus Chukuemeka commended the work of National Museums Liverpool and its staff, in producing a museum which he said touched deep seated emotions.

After the ceremony I met Helen Renner (pictured) a resident of Birkenhead, originally from Ghana. I wanted to talk to her because she was wearing amazing traditional dress! She explained that it was made from the commemorative cloth of her school, whose patterns symbolised different aspects of the school and Ghanaian culture. You can see it has a pattern of fish scales and cocoa pods, to represent the importance of the fishing and cocoa industries and is decorated with images of people from the Achimota School that it commemorates. Helen had been around the slavery museum and was planning to go back to have more time to take it all in.

My favourite part of the live performances that followed were the two dancers who performed fantastically energetic routines to traditional African music by the River Niger Orchestra. It was quite moving when they performed a dance to show how the slaves were forced to dance on the ships and how they were whipped as they did so. Everyone enjoyed the poetry performance by Levi Tafari who was met with cheers and got people on their feet. A day of great variety that I enjoyed being part of.


Posted by Lisa | 24/08/2007 08:17   | Comments [0]

Post a comment

All comments require the approval of the site owner before being displayed.
Name
E-mail

Comment (HTML not allowed)  

Enter the code shown (prevents robots):

Live Comment Preview
By posting your comment you have agreed to the terms and conditions below

Terms & Conditions

National Museums Liverpool welcomes your comments. All comments are moderated and will only be published if they adhere to the following standards. The editors reserve the right not to publish comments which they deem inappropriate:

  1. Our Maritime Archives and Library deals with enquiries relating to all aspects of Liverpool's maritime history including ships, passengers, seafarers, shipping and maritime companies. Their web pages describe the information they hold and how to get in touch, along with useful research guides on popular subjects such as tracing seafaring or emigrant ancestors. Please do not submit requests for this type of information as comments on this blog.
  2. Specific enquiries, as opposed to comments on blog posts, should be submitted using our contact system. Please note that we do not provide valuations.
  3. Posts must be text only and under 1000 characters (including spaces). Html code, links or multimedia are not permitted.
  4. We will aim (but do not guarantee) to publish approved comments within 72 hours although there may be delays over weekends and during public holidays.
  5. Please do not post anything that is libellous, abusive, obscene, prejudiced or unlawful.
  6. Do not contravene any rights to privacy (such as personal contact details), copyright or trademark legislation.
  7. Please do not spam or post commercial promotional information.
  8. By posting you agree that you are wholly responsible for the content that you post. Although the blog comments will be moderated National Museums Liverpool will publish comments in the good faith that they comply with the law.
  9. By posting your comment you agree that it may be reproduced by National Museums Liverpool online or in print without compensation.