re challenging to go back a long time and try and dig up evidence that you were here many years ago. and that was what created such a challenge for the wind rush generation. the u. k. government says it's working to make sure employers and landlords don't discriminate against people who have applied for settle status, but haven't got a decision, but for tens of thousands of use. it isn't. what happens next is far from clear. nadine bob al jazeera london, ah, this is out of there, and these are the headlines to grind fighters have dismissed, ethiopian government unilateral cease fire. on monday, the rebels captured the regional capital mcclay and they say they will fight to secure the whole region. not web reports from nairobi. will the sci fi itself in the 1st place was something that was agreed. it was something that the government unilaterally declared by itself when they appeared to be very much on the back foot

after the t p l. f had taken back the regional capital of mikella, and it's t 5 or something has been called for for the month by humanitarian organizations. with the growing pressure from the u. s. at least in the biden administration, came to power to, to try and bring these these side to the table. nobody was interested in sci fi us now. the government talking about it that a t p l f very much, are not. meanwhile, the u. s. has warned both ethiopia and eritrea that it will take further action is the declaration of sci fi into fails to end the violence there. a congressional committee in washington d. c. has meant to discuss the crisis. police in western canada are reporting an increase in sudden death. as a record breaking heat wave continues to scorch parts of north america. at least 65 people have died in the vancouver area just since friday. most of them elderly. the temperatures have sought to nearly 50 degrees celsius and some areas palestinians

have been protesting in the cell. one district after israeli with art is boulders palestinian business there. it's one of 20 properties threatened with demolition after. and israeli court, well they don't have a panel. the u. s. says it will contribute $120000000.00 in grants to fancied on that really from the international monetary fund. on tuesday, the i m f approved a 2500000000 dollar loan for cartoon for more than 3 years. washington has held it as a historic moment for you, don, and it's people. several top north korean officials have been faxed off. so what's being described as a grave incidence and showing young methods to fight co. 19 need to can learn accuse them of neglecting their duties. and so that, that posed a huge crisis to the safety of the nation. well, there is the headlines. i'll have a number update for you here on under the or after the stream. when the code 910,

demi q and board is close, there is a friend from high one, a one east investigate has some has been abandoned out of size and out of mind on al jazeera, the i, me, okay, you're watching the stream in today's episode, we are going to be joined by clint smith. he has a right to a poet and the author of this new book. how the word is passed of reckoning with a history of slavery across america. clean it is so good to see you. welcome to the stream. it was a journey through black history. i wanted to go visit every single chapter in real life when you sat down to write this book. what is your mission? yes, so thank you so much for having me. the origin of the book a originated in my hometown and world, and i was watching several confederate that you the monuments come down. and pg

beauregard, the confederate, general jefferson davis and better president bobby lease confederate general. and thinking about what it meant that i grew up in a majority blast city, in which there were more modules to labor than there were 20 people. and what does that mean? what does it mean to get to school? i had to go to our property, we boulevard to get to the grocery store. i had to go down jefferson davis parkway to get to my middle school with name dr. elite a better se that my the street my parents live on is named after somebody who owned a 115 slave people. and one of the implications of that because we know that symbols and maggie and names are not just symbols, they are reflective of the story that people tell. stories people tell, shape the narrative, communities carry those narrative, see public policy and public policy shapes material conditions of people's lives. which isn't to say that taking that you wouldn't labor is going to erase the racial wealth gap in contemporary united states. but it is to say that all these things are part of the same ecosystem of stories that help us make sense of what has happened to community. and that's what must be done for community in order to move

forward. and so i was thinking about that in my home town in orland and i wanted to sort of brian it out and explore how different places across the country and even across the ocean wracking with deal directly with their own relationship to the if you how story you tell, i don't want to quit black history. i'm going to call it american history. you tell american history with such ease and comfort, and an ability to draw people in whether they are white or they're not white. you help share those stories. that is, all history is sharing stories. so why in the united states it's so difficult to share the stories of every body, not just the stories of the ancestors of white europeans. i think because he calls into question so much of the narrative that shapes a contemporary american america is predicated on the midst of meritocracy is predicated on the idea that the reason one community was one way in another

community looks another way is because of people in those communities, what they haven't, haven't done not is not because of what has been done to the new generation after generation after generation. and so if we take an honest account of what has happened to people and, and different groups of people over the course of american history, and we account for the harm that has been done and how recent that harm is, right? my part of what i write about in this book is not only our physical proximity to this period of time, but i tend to think all the time about how they are 250 years in this country. there's only not $150.00. so you have this institution had existed for a 100 years longer than as you have the woman who opened the national museum of african american history and culture, which is the big smithsonian museum documenting african american life that opened here in the united states in 2016, the woman who opened that museum along 5, the obama family in 2016, was the daughter of an sleepers. not the granddaughter or the great granddaughter. she's the daughter in 2016 if someone born into intergenerational charles. my

grandfather's grandfather was his place. i think about my 4 year old son thing on my grandfather's lap, and i imagined him sitting on his grandfather's back. and i'm reminded again that we talked a long time ago, wasn't that long ago at all. and when you realize our proximity to this period of history, then it makes clear that all temporary social, economic and political infrastructure is fundamentally tied to that and calls into question. so many of the ideas that people have around you know, whether, why certain communities do or don't have to paint, you know, what i'm going to do, i'm going to ask you, chief audience who are watching right now. if you have a question or comment about american history, you want to ask claims about and he comes through the lens of remembering that so many of black americans have a history of chattel slavery. then you can be in our youtube comment section right away. and i'll try and bring those conversations those comments into our show. but

i have a question. this is a question from hope she's on video, have a listen and then respond that. i wanted to ask mr. smith, what did you find most difficult? in writing and researching of this book, what did you find most rewarding and inspiring in the writing and reading and researching of this book. thank you so much for the question. i the most difficult thing was my trip to angola. i've worked in prisons and taught in prisons and jails for the past 7 years. the teacher and i thought i was, i was familiar with the landscape of incarceration in the country. and so i went to and goal at the context in goal present its largest, maximum security prison in the country. it's 800000 acres. why bigger than the island? the manhattan to its place where 75 percent of the people held. there are black men, 70 percent, are serving expenses, and it is built on top of

a former slave plantation. and what i tell folks is that if you were to go to germany and you have the largest maximum security prison insurance, and it was built on top of form, a concentration was the people held, they would get proportionately jewels. that place would rightfully be a global emblem of anti sen. it'll be a horn we'll be discussing. we will never allow a place like that to exist in that sort of content. and yet, here in the united states, we have the largest maximum security prison in the country with a vast majority of people on black mentoring licenses, work in fields of what was once a plantation law, someone watches, i'm on horseback with a gun over there, where they work for virtually no. and so what does it mean that that placing this in that context in that moment, what does it mean? how does whites from not only in physical violence against people's bodies, but also number collectively to certain types of violence. it doesn't mean that that place has a gift shop right there that there's a gift shop at the largest maximum security prison in the country where they sell shot glasses and coffee mugs and stuffed animals. and the sweatshirt and baseball cap, there was a prison mode, or there was a coffee mug that had a silhouette of

a washed. how long? and it said in gold community, i'm looking at your twitter feed right now. you look at like what the, what's right. it is, it's not only that this place is not interested in any sort of interrogation of its relationship which is bad, but that it is making a mockery and seemingly belittling the reality of the condition that thousands of people in that prison continue to live and it was there's a long way of saying that that was the most unsettling and haunting piece of what i experience. i want to talk about want to cello, which is the 1st chapter of your book, wanted shallow is the homeless thomas jefferson part. he was responsible for the declaration of independence, he's really ro, now historical figure, even for americans who may not know the history in too much detail. let me just tell you a little clip from the website,

because this is often how thomas jefferson is remembered. having this and have a look the, we hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights. that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. the claim that is historic is an epic missing out big details from what a lot of americans learn about their own history. so you went to monte cello and what did you find out? want to show the top of my list of places that i wanted to go. because i think that jefferson embodies so many of the contradictions in the policy and the complexity of the american project. in the sense that america, the places provided unparalleled and manageable opportunities for upward mobility and simulation for millions and millions of people across generations and ways that

they can never imagine. and it is also done so at the direct expense of millions, millions of other people who've been in a generation we subjugated and oppressed to create that novelty. and jefferson is someone within himself wrote in one book and one document that i'm in agree to keep one vote and other documents that black people are inferior. whites and both endowments. a body and mind. he wrote one of the most important documents and needs to be the western world. and also we linked over $600.00 people over the course of the lifetime, including for the children that he had by the plantation valley. and so i wanted to go to monitor to see how does an institution that is responsible for, for capturing conveying the legacy of this person. tell an honest, whole mystic full story of who this person was and what he represented in the contradiction embodied within his life. and not only that, but how does it tell the story of being played. people who lived at mont chuckle, hundreds of people crossing origins and lived and made homes and bill community and

fell in love and got married and have had and built live at this place. but in many ways was belong to them more than it belonged to jeff and jackson was away in paris in philadelphia and new york in washington dc for extended periods of time. and it was these and laid people off the granger's who made the life and who cultivated and made that land possible, and who also made everything jefferson days in his life possible. we cannot understand thomas jefferson, one of the most important founding fathers of our country and all that he contributed to the be the american experiment. without understanding that all the time that he had all the ideas, he was able to wrestle with rough with him right about where possible. because of the in the labor that he had working for him on time. taishan said, it's hard to believe that in 2021. there are people who do not know that thomas jefferson as slaves as a former teacher,

what do you think about that or in slave people? i mean, i encountered some of those folks when i was at manage. hello, ironically enough women done in grace, who i met when i went to monticello and i went up to them after i went on the slavery at mana cello, which is the tour at modulator, focuses specifically on the legacy of slavery and its relationship to jefferson. and i went up to them after and they said it really took a shine off the guy. i had no idea. no, i no idea the monitor was what they say, stay clean when you know, when they said what, how to, how do you handle that? i think you try to extend whatever grace and generosity you can to people, especially in this context because you are asking strangers questions that are in many ways deeply personal and reveal themselves to be deeply shameful. and so i'm not attempting to, in this book, to present myself in any way that is sort of antagonistic. i'm not attempting to do

work. gotcha. i can't believe you don't notice reflect the meat is a profound failure of our public consciousness. profound failure in the way to teach the history of american please. father. yeah. i think it's it's, it's not shocking because we know that the education system in america could be better. but this is like america one. 0, one. in the reality is that for so many people, they have no idea. they have no idea. and it is a reminder, i think for songs for so many of us, we can, it can be easy to forget that there are many people who, who aren't thinking about where in gauging with or are ever presented with is history. and so when i was speaking to donna and grace, it was clear that they were there, their foundation was being seeking like the, the idea that this founding father, this person whose home they had come to a sort of a pilgrimage. and if they got on planes, they rented cars, they got hotel room to the thomas jefferson and had no idea,

but he owned human being. and again, what does that reflect for me with an important reminder of the way, how so much so many millions of people in america, in no way understand slavery in any way that is commensurate with the actual impact that it had on this country. and how, how much different, what our understanding of what america look like today. be if we had a collective understanding of what has happened. if we had a collective understanding of who are founding fathers actually were, if we had a collective understanding of all that has been done in this country's name and who would have been done at the expense of one of my favorite places you visited, that made me want to go that because you, you tell your story as a novel, it's history. in fact, you really met these people, but you write it as if we're getting on a journey with youth and the writer. and it's like a story. have a look here. this is a thread that i really like one because the self is fun. see because the

storytelling that you leave into the thread, it is really important. i travel to whitney plantation, the plantation, louisiana, one of the in the country that is dedicated to telling the story of slavery from the perspective of the enslaved. and i love this place just from the book, from the pages because it felt like i was that one of the guides explained it almost like it was like a history book. but if you could be in the book, what was your friend about this plantation? yeah, when the plantation is, is a remarkable thanks. it is, as i say, one of the only plantations in the country that tell the story of slavery through the perspective of inflame people and, and the thing. but that shouldn't be remarkable. but, but it is, it is a place that is surrounded by a constellation of plantations where people continue to hold wedding, where people, you know, i talk to wedding planner, some talked about how sometimes people use the former laid cabin at these other

plantations as bridal suite. so what does it mean that someone would want to celebrate the most joyous day of their life, arguably on the side of intergenerational torture? and so the whitney plantation is sort of situated in the midst of that, a historic and fundamentally reject the idea that we can understand slavery or understand a plantation and anything other than intergenerational kind of torture. and also that at the same time, while we are understanding the system as one of torture, we are also understand the people. it's fully human as fully embodied person. and part of what they do is make sure that you are confronting the names and the words and to whatever extent possible the faces of people who had been laid on and off and doing it through the perspective of women and children who in our public again our public consciousness to the extent that there is one about slavery in a very gendered one, that sort of renders slavery as a, as

a very masculine product phenomena. and it's actually something that impacted women and children and really specific, insidious ways that the whitney has, has made a, made an effort to uplift. it's interesting that sherry has a question for you. i'm going to bring that question in in a moment, but the parts of the book, what i really felt you as a mile, as a person, was when you were talking about children when they were in these or 4 situations. as in slave people and the children, most children didn't make it past the age of 5 years. old mothers sometimes would kill their kids because they didn't want them to end up as enslaved. young girls, young women were, were assaulted rate year after year of the year after year the families were separated, goes on and on and on and on. sherry has this question for you about his the question dr. smith. thank you so much for how the word is passed.

we cannot read this book and remain detached. we go through it thinking about how we are connected to these events and also how our families are connected to these legacies. and so my question for you is, how has this project changed you or your outlook as an educator? and as a parent you so much the question sherry one thing that it is done for, for whatever reason. so much of my understanding of slavery, which i think is the effective of have so many people understand. the institution was centered on the spectacle of court, which is to say the whipping and the beatings and the county and the, and the work and the torture. that the torture that one experience working in the

fields were being subject to sort of i'm going to present dominion of the women mulash. i think what working on this book did was give me a more shoot understanding the thing that i can have one of the role that family separation played and psychological and emotional terror that is embodied within that. and i think part of that is because i, i was writing it my wife and i had 2 children of our own. so now i have a 4 year old and a 2 year old. and when you just take a moment to sort of think about like if i'm to think about what if i were asleep at night. and then i woke up and my children were gone. just disappeared in the middle of my i can not even bring myself to imagine how even even thing i'm like becoming full that how, how profoundly horrific that would be. right. the idea that at any moment i'd be

separated from my children, never see them again. and this is something that millions and lay people's lives across generation. at any moment you could be separated from your children, your parents or community and you might never see them again and i for some reason, i never really. i knew family separation was a part of it clearly, but i never really sat down to reflect on the sort of emotional and psychological implications of back. and i think going to a place like that with me that focus so much on the lives of children really made it much more intimate and sort of visceral sort of exercise to imagine what that must have been marked for, for people to, to know that, that could happen at a moment when you talk about african americans in history always feels relevant. there's no time where it doesn't so relevant. so your book,

the book is very timely, but he's always going to be timely. because african americans are so woven into the history of america. june, teens is one example of that. i always was amazed by the story of june teeth, which was that it took a while for all americans and all african americans to realize the slavery has actually ended. and when that word came to galveston in texas, that day was known as june 10th. this is a very brief history. i know clean can do better. but the reason i want to explain that is because we have a commenter who want to ask you about jean tv and the whole idea of what you teeth means. so this is rashawn. yeah, this is rashawn skiwski me, if you could, my brain cell thinking that rashawn who sang june 13th is a very special holiday. it is now an official federal holiday in the united states

. this is what he has to say about june 10th with june teeth becoming a federal holiday is a big deal in all americans should embrace it as celebrated as june 10th becomes our 11th federal holiday. but make no mistake. june teeth becoming a holiday is simply symbolic in nature. it does nothing to address the bodily economic and emotional wounds that slavery put on to black americans. only reparations can help to deal with it. imagine if 156 years after the holocaust, the only thing that germany deal was create a federal holiday. that is the current status of what is happening to black americans in the united states. june 18th can help to continue to educate us to change some of these outcomes. yeah, i absolutely. we were rashawn who we should not mistake the holiday of june t or

a material resources that deserve to be intervened deserve to be given to and repair in order to repair on that has been done to certain community. what i'll say about it is, i think of it as a sort of both and there's a boat and in this right, it is absolutely true that june 18th, in and of itself, is not enough. that i would not go as far to say, and i don't think which i'm saying is that it doesn't matter because it doesn't, that it does matter that there is now holiday that in its own way, celebrate the end of one of the worst thing that this country i've ever done, and it matters because black activists and specifically black activists in texas have been fighting for recognition of june teeth and have been fighting for june to become a federal holiday for decades and decades and decades. and so if i were to sit here and say it doesn't matter, then i think i would be doing a disservice to the work that somebody lack of decades. but with that said to a shawn point in and of itself is not enough. and i think what we're experience now

is experiencing now is the sort of marathon of cognitive dissonance that is reflective of the way that american black americans experienced countries into which is to say that you have june 18th, because becoming a federal holiday at the same time that there is a state thanks and effort across state legislatures throughout the country that is specifically intending to prevent teachers from teaching the very thing from which the context of june teen emerge. and so you have those things, the legislatures where something to prevent black people from having the same access to the franchise as at their counterpart. and so there is a sort of tension that exist there, but, but duty matters of the holiday. but in and of itself is not enough. most certainly is a holiday. and so i think we have to whole both of those realities. i have one last question for you comes from you to how can the usa prove that he has dealt with

a slave owning past? wow, that's fine. oh, many of us show what would you say current? how long do we have? oh man, no pressure. we have to account that would have been done. one thing that i, you know, we've invoked germany a couple times in the show and aspect germany has something called stumbling stone . and there tens of thousands of these in germany. whereas if you go up to a nike store or mcdonalds or kfc youngest, in front of some of these places, will be a brick and is slightly elevated off the ground. a brass brick that has names in inscribed in them. and i thought were taken from these homes. and so i think that we did something similar to that like they do during the holocaust in the context of lee in my go a long way and helping the author of how the world is past the reckoning was the history of slavery across america. clint smith, thank you for being on the screen today. thank everybody. see you next time.

ah the by the grazing, the damage code to the precious gras, samantha chile, it's being reversed with one of the world's biggest at a conservation project. they're pretty emblematic of the pedagogy and if they're plentiful and they're calm like this, and then you know that the system is coming back and that they feel no threat. and that's why you know, i, for re wilding passive, go on. i'll just say era, challenging the way mainstream media report, the news stories like these should be easy pickings for political reporters out of all power to account how it is in journalism is breaking among the destruction of civilian property. this is all evident for what firm tries underneath the speaking

. we've been getting stories of john taken from the houses in the middle of the night and tortured the listening post covers the way the news is covered on each and every one of us have a lot of responsibility to change our personal space for the better the more we could do this experiment many of us could increase just a little bit that wouldn't be worth doing. but he had any idea that it would become a magnet is incredibly rough asking for women to get 50 percent representation in the constituent assembly. here in kitty, pick up the collect, the segregate, to say the reason this extremely important service they provide to the city. we are we, we need to take america to try to bring people together trying to deal with people

left behind me. ah, threatening was from to brian forces and if you're again saying they will stop at nothing until the entire region is liberated. ah, hello there, i'm just saw the pay and this is out of their life. and also coming up over a 100 people died during a record breaking heat wave and canada with temperatures nearing 50 degrees celsius israeli force as.