foreword according to Henry Louis Gate Jr.

foreword according to Henry Louis Gate Jr., introduction at Spencer Crew and Cynthia Goodman Bulfinch Press/AOL Time Warner work Group, February 2003, $24.95, ISBN 0-821-22842-0

"Lawdy, honey yo' caint know whut a time I had. All raw n' hungry. No'm I aint tellin' no lies. It de divine revelation truf. It sho is.--Sarah Cudger former slave.

The impassioned voices that speak of the past have a powerful way of haunting and inspiring the animating principles of later generations. This February, during the 77th celebration of Black History Month-Negro History Week, voices from the past will get to forth once again to illumine the contributions, and the trials and tribulations that comprise the black experience in America. Following in the tradition of primitive words comes another landmark media termination Unchained Memories: Readings From the Slave Narratives.

Unchained Memories--the part and the celebrity-packed documentary film of the same name, narrated through Whoopi Goldberg that will air forward HBO in February--arrives in all its delayed still deserved veneration.

In the early 1930 the Federal Writers' concoct (FWP)--a part of Franklin Roosevelt's Works Progres Administration--set not at home to record the memories of surviving slaves. However, by way of the time the federal restraint actually initiated its program, several state agencies had similar concocts already underway, collecting ex-slaves' oral testimonies. beneath the FWP's efforts, the program came subject to much criticism. In 1939, the Federal Writers' throw out came to a halt, and in the completion more than 2,300 first-person interviews--including those gathered from other regional projects--became a valuable research tool for the close attention of slavery in America. The compilation of narratives, documents and photographs were gathered in 41 bodys and were fully published, subject to the title The Slave Narrative Collection of the Federal Writers' throw out in the late 1970s.

In Unchained Memories, more than 40 men and women who undergoed a lifetime of abuse and were make subordinateed to unimaginable indecencies recount in their possess voice, in their own language, their experiences in subordination to the reality that was slavery. The part includes more than 50 heartrending photographs, mainly portraits of the storytellers and their environments, as well as newspaper advertisements of auctions and bills of sale.

It is sad that Unchained Memories, an effort of similar historical richness and value, is solely now presented, especially when we are in of the like kind desperate need of lessons about courage, perseverance and sacrifice.

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