Black August: What Happened to New Goree?
August 3, 2025
The historical thought and action of black resistance and abolitionism shifted after the 1850 enactment of the Fugitive Slave Act. Recently published scholarship related to radical black resistance to slavery, by both male and female activists locally and nationally, will be considered as an exploratory context for the emergence of evidence of a free black community in Bristol, RI coined New Goree. The experience of free blacks in RI and the discovery of New Goree will be the focus of the creative panel in the What Happened to New Goree? circle process.
The engaged structured dialogue based on the Story Circle process originally developed in the 1970's by the Free Southern Theater and John O'Neill will be merged with a Socratic circle process for the Black August final circle of the series.
Resources:
We Refuse: A Forceful History of Black Resistance, by Kellie Carter Jackson: In We Refuse, Jackson offers an unflinching examination of the breadth of Black responses to white oppression, particularly those pioneered by Black women.
How to Start A Revolution: a documentary about Gene Sharp, an American political scientist who wrote extensively on nonviolent struggle, which have influenced numerous anti-government resistance movements around the world.
From Dictatorship to Democracy: A guide to tactics for nonviolent resistance.
