Decolonizing our tongues & celebrating Juneteenth through food w/ Dr. Sunyatta Amen | #TheBlackTable

Juneteenth commemorates June 19, 1865, when Major General Gordon Granger issued General Order Number 3 in Galveston, Texas, declaring the end of enslavement. The first celebration occurred in 1866, becoming a Texas state holiday in 1980 and a federal holiday in 2021, a direct outcome of the 'great reckoning' following George Floyd's death.

On June 19th, 1865, Major General Gordon Granger... issued General Order Number 3 declaring that not only was the war over but that enslavement was over. And the following year the first Juneteenth celebration took place... in 1980... became a state holiday. But of course, we're talking about it now in the context of the United States and a federal holiday cuz in May 2020 George Floyd lost his life in Minnesota... the president of the United States on June 17th 2021 created a Juneteenth holiday.

Dr. Sunyatta Amen, a fifth-generation herbalist from a family of institution builders (Black Pyramid, Tree of Life), views food as a powerful tool for cultural connection and resistance. During the Maafa (transatlantic slave trade), knowledge of herbal medicine and connection to nature through food allowed enslaved people to maintain a link to their origins and exercise personal power, even in disordered ways.

I am a fifth-generation herbalist and the descendant of Maroons... I believe that that kind of puts me in like this really awkward, strange space of uh being a a cultural custodian... one of the ways that we could connect to home was the knowledge of herbal medicine... that's why the food is so important, because that's the way we connect internally with the way we relate to nature... It is something you can control as an individual. So, one of one of the ways that we take personal power... is the control of what we eat or do not eat. It is a revolutionary act for better or worse.

Red is a pivotal ancestral color in West African traditions, symbolizing connection, power, and bloodlines. This symbolism extends to Juneteenth celebrations through red foods and drinks like hibiscus (sorrel, karkade, bissap, agua fresca de Jamaica), which are found across the African diaspora. These plants, brought on slave ships, not only provided medicinal benefits (like cooling the body) but also served as a 'thumbprint' of African presence, capitalism, imperialism, enslavement, and resistance.

Red is a significant ancestral color for us. In many of our West African traditions, red symbolizes ancestral connection and power through blood through blood connections... hibiscus plants with a lot of other botanicals that come from Africa like ginger and the various spices. As you said, came with us on those ships, and they not only allowed us to continue our practices, they continued to heal us... It's a vasodilator. It opens the blood vessels and it releases heat from the body. It's a It's a coolant... wherever they're growing, wherever you spy them, you're seeing Africa. It's the thumbprint... of capitalism, imperialism, enslavement, and resistance.

Commercial enterprises recognized the Black community's deep cultural affinity for red foods and deliberately marketed 'red-flavored' candies, sodas (like Kool-Aid), and other products. This strategy exploits an intrinsic cultural connection, moving beyond traditional red foods into highly processed, often unhealthy, imitations. The recent 'Juneteenth ice cream dust-up' exemplifies corporations attempting to capitalize on the holiday without genuine cultural understanding or respect.

commercial enterprises like how we mentioned Coke uh and and other makers of soft drinks and hard drinks... really started to recognize, 'These black folks like this red drink and red foods. Let's see how we can color things with as much red as possible'... the red sodas, Big Red and and um Kool-Aid... we don't describe it as a flavor... It's red flavored... this Juneteenth ice cream dust up that occurred where our food start to get marketed back to us.