Pinkster 2023-Honoring Truth: Exploring Pinkster & African Dutch Liberation

272 Wall Street,Kingston NY 12401

04 June, 2023

Description

Aixa will portray Sojourner Truth at the programs held on June 3rd and June 4th. Aixa Kendrick (SAG-AFTRA, AEA) is a Stage and Screen Actress, Lincoln Center Lab Director, New Works/Jerome Foundation Playwright recipient for avant garde work and a Primordial Art Ninja Starchild. Among her numerous theater credits is her portrayal of Sojourner Truth in Cesi Davidson’s RAW TRUTH, for which she studied the broken-Dutch accent to deliver a startlingly accurate depiction of this exceptional 19th century freedom fighter. Aixa continues to choose projects that reflect diverse, multicultural female driven stories who portray women of strength, sensitivity and discovery. Lavada Nahon Lavada Nahon will moderate a discussion with Margaret Washington, PhD, author of Sojourner Truth’s America at the Honoring Truth program on Sunday, June 4 at Old Dutch Church. She will also teach community residents to play mancala at the Pinkster Celebration at the Senate House Grounds on June 4. Lavada Nahon, Interpreter of African American history, New York State Office of Parks Recreation and Historic Preservation. She is a generalist in New York African American history 19th through 20th century. She has 20 plus years of public history experience working with a variety of historic sites, societies, and museums across the tri-state region. Her mission is to bring history to life by giving presence to the Africans and people of African descent enslaved and free in the New Netherland/New York in whatever way possible. Margaret Washington, PhD Margaret Washington will discuss the legacy of Sojourner Truth and Pinkster, as well as sign her book “Sojourner Truth’s America" on June 4th at Old Dutch Church. Margaret Washington is Marie Underhill Noll Professor of American History, Emerita at Cornell University. Her major publications include the award winning, “A Peculiar People: Slave Religion and Community Culture among the Gullahs; an edited and annotated publication of the Narrative of Sojourner Truth, and a biography entitled, Sojourner Truth’s America. The latter won the Letitia Woods Brown Award from the Association of Black Women Historians, the inaugural Darlene Clark Hine Award from the Organization of American Historians and was voted one of the year's ten outstanding academic books by Choice Magazine. Washington has been advisor and historical consultant for numerous documentary films, including, “Africans in America”; “Wade in the Water: the Musical Legacy of Gullah Culture”; “Abraham and Mary Lincoln: A House Divided”; the CNN series, “Race for the White House"; and recently in “Black Patriots: Heroes of the Revolution” produced by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. In 2000, Washington was among the founders of the internationally recognized interdisciplinary Association for the Study of the Worldwide African Diaspora (ASWAD). Washington is currently writing a book entitled, “‘Thine for the Oppressed’: Women’s Biracial Activism and Black Emancipation.”