For enslaved men & women in America’s south, birds meant forced labor. But they also meant food, opportunity, and even freedom. The Library of Congress’s Slave Narratives Collection has amazing stories not just about Black suffering and resilience, but also relationships w/ nature. (1/7)🗃️🧵
Enslaved men and women in America’s South developed their own ornithology. To them, birds meant forced labor. But they also meant food, opportunity, and sometimes even freedom.
The Slave Narratives Collection contains 2000+ interviews conducted from 1936-38 with people born into slavery. They’re priceless first-person accounts of how enslaved men & women suffered, saw the world, and sought freedom. They’re free to read at the Library of Congress - and worth reading. (2/7)
Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1938 contains more than 2,300 first-person accounts of slavery and 500 black-and-white photographs of former slaves. These na...