Tag Archives: Slavery

Daddy Dearest

Posted on February 22, 2024 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

My father, a Native Southern Son, was born in the same month and year Negro History Week was established. Then, we were Negroes. Thirty-four years later, when I was born, we were still Negroes. When my father died at the … Continue reading →

Posted in Family, Memory & Personal Essays | Tagged 1960s, Black Arts Era, Black Shadows and Through the White Looking Glass, Civil War, Confederacy, Decisive Decade, Emmett Till, Family, fathers, Fourth of July, Jim Crow, Michael Easley, raising black boys, Relationships, Richard Wright, Segregated South, Slavery, Southland, The Ethics of Living Jim Crow: An Autobiographical Sketch, Virginia, War of Northern Aggression, World War II | 3 Comments

From the American Revolution to the Black Arts Cultural Revolution

Posted on February 21, 2024 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

After the American Revolution, most of the defining moments in American history involve or revolve around Black people. Black folk were even involved in the American Revolution, fighting on both sides – the British promised Africans and the descendants of … Continue reading →

Posted in Politics & Public Affairs, Streets of Rage | Tagged 1619, 1619 Project, American Revolution, Black Arts Era, Black Patriotism, Black Shadows and Through the White Looking Glass, Boston Massacre, Camelot, Crispus Attucks, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Growing Up, John F. Kennedy, Larry Neal, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr., Nation of Islam, patriotism, Poetry, Robert F. Kennedy, Slavery, urban decay | Leave a comment

Happy Valentine’s Day to African American Literature!

Posted on February 14, 2024 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

Since it is Valentine’s Day, I dare to say that I have an ongoing love affair with African American literature. And, once again, I am teaching African American Literature in the 20th Century for another college. (I previously taught it … Continue reading →

Posted in Politics & Public Affairs | Tagged African American Literature, Amherst method, Andra Day, Black Arts Movement, Black National Anthem, Black Patriotism, Black Poetics, Black Shadows and Through the White Looking Glass, Booker T. Washington, Brotherman: The Odyssey of Black Men in America -- An Anthology, Eurocentric, Henry Louis Gates, Herb Boyd, James Weldon Johnson, Larry Neal, Lift Every Voice and Sing, Norton Anthology of African American Literature, Robert L. Allen, Slavery, Some Reflections on the Black Aesthetic, Three Negro Classics, Toni Morrison, Unspeakable Things Unspoken: The African American Presence in American Literature, Valentine's Day, Valerie A. Smith, W. E. B. Du Bois | 2 Comments

Correcting The Miseducation of the Negro

Posted on February 3, 2024 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

Carter G. Woodson’s seminal book, The Miseducation of the Negro, published in 1926, is a book Black folk should periodically revisit, perhaps every three years, ideally every year. If you are Black and you have not read the book, then … Continue reading →

Posted in Education & Teaching, Politics & Public Affairs | Tagged 1619 Project, Aristotelian Logic, Aunt Jemima, Black History Month, Black Shadows and Through the White Looking Glass, Brown v. Board of Education, Candace Owens, Carter G. Woodson, Clarence Thomas, Classical Rhetoric, Compulsory Education Act (1852), General Grammar, Jim Crow, Nicholas Capaldi, Plessy v. Ferguson, raising black boys, Russell Sage College, Slavery, The Art of Deception: An Introduction to Critical Thinking, The Miseducation of the Negro, The Trivium, U.S. Senator Tim Scott, Uncle Tom | 4 Comments

From The Miseducation of the Negro to Critical Race Theory

Posted on February 2, 2024 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

Carter G. Woodson, “the father of Black History,” wrote The Miseducation of the Negro in 1926. Woodson earned his PhD from Harvard University, and during his academic career served as the Dean of Howard University, an historically Black research university, established … Continue reading →

Posted in Race, History & American Society | Tagged Billie Holiday, Black Shadows and Through the White Looking Glass, cancel culture, Carter G. Woodson, Civil War, Critical Race Theory, Day of the Rope, DEI, Harvard University, Howard University, Lynching, Slavery, Strange Fruit, The Miseducation of the Negro, Toni Morrison | 5 Comments

Virginia on My Mind

Posted on August 19, 2023 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

There is something that keeps drawing me back to Virginia. Although my father was born in North Carolina, he grew up in Virginia and returned there in 1946 after he was discharged from the segregated U.S. Army. He was drafted … Continue reading →

Posted in Family, Memory & Personal Essays, Genealogy | Tagged 1960s, Bath County, Black Shadows and Through the White Looking Glass, Decisive Decade, Family, fathers, Growing Up, Native Southern Sons, North Carolina, Red Summer, Segregation, Slavery, Virginia, World War I, World War II | 1 Comment

James Baldwin’s Journey Through Politics

Posted on May 6, 2023 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

Thirty years ago I wrote an essay, “The Election Time Blues.” It spoke about how political discourse in America was depressing; at least, it depressed me, and it continues to do so. When crime is on the platform, it becomes … Continue reading →

Posted in Literature & Cultural Criticism, Politics & Public Affairs | Tagged "Journey to Atlanta", Abraham Lincoln, Bill Clinton, Black Shadows and Through the White Looking Glass, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, Donald Trump, Franklin D. Roosevelt, George H.W. Bush, Harriet Tubman, Isabel Wilkerson, James Baldwin, Joe Biden, John F. Kennedy, Nelson Rockefeller, patriotism, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Slavery, The Best and the Brightest, Willie Horton | 1 Comment

The Pledge of Allegiance, Little White Lies, and All that Jazz!

Posted on March 7, 2023 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

It has been more than 50 years since I was in elementary school in the New York City public school system, yet I remember, word for word, the “Pledge of Allegiance.” At this time, I thought nothing of it, but … Continue reading →

Posted in Justice Chronicles, Politics & Public Affairs, Race, History & American Society, Streets of Rage | Tagged 13th Amendment, Atomic Bomb, Black Codes, Black Power, Black Shadows and Through the White Looking Glass, Camelot, Confederate States of America, Critical Race Theory, Culture Wars, Great Society, Growing Up, Hiroshima, internment of Japanese Americans, James Brown, John F. Kennedy, Little White Lies, Lyndon B. Johnson, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr., Nagasaki, patriotism, Pledge of Allegiance, raising black boys, Richard Nixon, Robert F. Kennedy, Segregation, Slave Codes, Slavery, urban decay, war on crime, World War II | Leave a comment

Racial Reckoning & Reparations

Posted on February 24, 2023 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

As a society, we (Americans) have talked about a “racial reckoning,” and reparations for the descendants of Africans who built this country. Neither a racial reckoning nor reparations have happened. A racial reckoning has not happened because most white folk … Continue reading →

Posted in Race, History & American Society | Tagged Black Shadows and Through the White Looking Glass, Bryan Stevenson, Critical Race Theory, Equal Justice Initiative, Esperanto, Manifest Destiny, racial Esperanto, racial reckoning, reparations, Slavery, W. E. B. Du Bois, White Man's Burden | 2 Comments

The “new” Jim Crow is as old as the Union

Posted on March 7, 2022 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

Ever have a “Eureka!” moment? During my legal research in the early 1980’s, I came across something that, beyond a reasonable doubt, confirmed what people had been talking about without much evidence, beyond the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, … Continue reading →

Posted in Politics & Public Affairs, Race, History & American Society | Tagged 13th Amendment, Alexis de Tocqueville, Black Shadows and Through the White Looking Glass, Brown v. Board of Education, Democracy in America, Emancipation Proclamation, Gustave De Beaumont, hyperincarceration, Martin Luther King Jr., Mass Incarceration, Michelle Alexander, On the Penitentiary System in the United States and Its Application in France, Slave Codes, Slavery, The New Jim Crow | Leave a comment

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