co-founder, w.e.b. dubois was born and raised in the berkshires. and, while the black community here is small, it has had periods of greater visibility. >> between the '60s and '70s, there was a lot more diversity in the schools. city hall was more diverse. so, there was more presence. >> reporter: dennis powell is the president of the n.a.a.c.p.'s berkshire county branch. he grew up in pittsfield, berkshire county's largest city. >> even the relationship with the police was completely different. i mean, walking home from the boy's club, i always hoped that i would run into a police officer, because i felt safe. police officers knew our name. they knew our parents' names. >> reporter: but many black people in the berkshires still struggle more than their white neighbors. about 36% of black residents here live in poverty, compared to about 10% of the white population. that economic divide exacerbates the feeling, shared by many, of being unseen. what are some of the biggest issueshat you hear about from black and brown communities here in the berksh

short but powerful jab penned by w.e.b. dubois. that poems last lines, if we must die, let us be with our backs pressed to the wall, dieing but fighting back. it becomes so transgressive after world war i that he is branded a communist and almost deported, but in world war ii churchill returns to that language to galvanize britain. >> the anecdote is important to go into. he is a railroad porter, and he is traveling with his friends, young black men at the time, and they're going from town to town. every time the door opens they don't know if there is a riot. again rumor and newspaper that were usually a day late is all they had. they're running to their hotels. he started carrying a gun. he was terrified and he is so nerve racked, he goes into a bathroom and scrawls out this sonnet. some of his friends start crying and he sends it off to a little magazine that publishes it it, and then it is published all over. it doesn't ever mention race, but everybody knew what it was about. to the point where there was white senators in the se

now, i want to begin with a quote by a very eminent african-american scholar activist named w.e.b. dubois. here's what dubois said about the atlantic slave trade. dubois wrote "the most magnificent drama in the last thousand years of human history is the transportation of 10 million human beings out of the dark beauty of their mother continent and into the newfound el dorado of the west. they descended into hell." he continued, "it was a tragedy that beggared the greek. it was an upheaval of humanity like the reformation and the french revolution." well, i think dubois is exactly right. this is a stunning drama of human history, the atlantic slave trade. and i would ask you to notice his reference to el dorado. the mythic city of goals sought after by the spanish conquistadorist when they came to mexico and peru. well, el dorado was finally found. not that actual city, but a slave system that would produce gold and wealth on a scale previously unimaginable. so it is a story about el dorado after all. now, i've said that the slave trade is the foundation of american history. i mean that in

and that, folks, is the drama that w.e.b. dubois was talking about. okay. i'll stop right there, and let's talk. questions? and let me say that if you have questions about a particular slide, we can go back to it. yes? >> you said at one point there were slaves on it. was there anyone policing that at ports? >> that's a very good question. there was a government apparatus to check this. what they would do is make the surgeons keep reports. this was a required part of the documentation of every voyage. that doesn't mean they didn't cheat. but there was also the possibility that your vessel could be intercepted by the royal navy, at which point they might ask you precisely how many you had on board. so, i think there was some policing of it. i think it would be fair to say that there was also quite a bit of cheating. >> yes? >> with america, how the effects of slavery still live on today, how is that compared to the south american countries and central american countries and brazil? how does this compare? >> that's another good question, and it's actually one

short but powerful jab penned by w.e.b. dubois.hat there is another famous poem poem'se period, that last lines, if we must die, let us be with our backs pressed to the wall, dying but fighting back. so transgressive after world war communistis branded a and almost they consider deporting him, etc., but in world war ii, churchill returns to the very galvanize britain. language in order to galvanize britain. -- cameron: the anecdote is important to go into. he is a railroad porter, and he is traveling with his friends, as a lot of young black men at the time, and they're going from town to town. every time the door opens they don't know if there is a riot. rumor and newspapers that were usually a day late is all the information they had. they're running to their hotels. -- he started carrying a gun, he was very terrified and he is so nerve-racking by all of this, he goes into the bathroom and scrawls out this sonnet. he reads it to his friends and some of them start crying. he sends it off to a little magazine that publishes it it,

and that is the famous black intellectual historian, activist, one of the founders of the naacp, w.e.b. dubois. dubois wrote a book called "black reconstruction in america" and the very title shows you that he wanted to center the role of african-americans in this whole drama about reconstruction. read the subtitle, right? an essay to what a history of the part which black folk played in the attempt to reconstruct democracy in america. from 1860 to 1880. from the civil war to well after reconstruction is over in 1880. he published this in 1935. and he's not only centered african-americans in this story, he's saying this is not just a matter of reconstructing the union. it's a matter of reconstructing american democracy. its value, its ideals. and when black people are demanding citizenship and equal rights, they're imagining the interracial democracy that we live in today. so we're really coming up with a whole new conception of american democracy, and it is very contested in the 19th century and continues to be contested until today. you know, who is an american citizen? should people have eq