"Like many of my generation, my first conscious experience of slavery, and when I began to connect the dots of my heritage to the world around me, was through the 1977 television series Roots, based on Alex Haley’s epic novel. Like many around the world I experienced a number of emotions including rage and guilt but more importantly we as viewers were left with an important legacy of an awareness of history from this powerful visual testimony. It was compelling family viewing unlike say Strictly Come Dancing or X Factor today. I remember watching intently every Sunday evening aged 11 with my Mum. As its story unfolded Roots became my story and our shared story. I don’t remember at that point wanting to kill white people or any of those things that the media feared, but I was awe-struck. [...] It was the rebellious Kunta Kinte, who constantly kept running away and was beaten, whipped and eventually had his foot cut off, who resonated with me. He also refused to acknowledge his ‘slave name’ Toby and with my quick temper and hot tongue it was very easy for me to make the connection of what life would have been like for a rebellious young black man in slavery. I banished the memory of Kunta Kinte being trapped in a net by fellow Africans and erased the uncomfortable feelings and implications that came with his capture. That was my only early recollection of slavery until my mid-teens. I was also naively unaware that the city that I had made home had played such a major role in the Transatlantic slave-trade."

Roger Griffith opened Sunday 12 January's matinee screening of 12 Years a Slave with an extract from his forthcoming novel From the Windrush to the White House, some of which can be read above. 

Opening the film in this uniquely personal way provided this Bristol audience with a contemporary counterpoint to the story they were about to see. A reminder that the repercussions and outcomes of the slave-trade are still apparent all around us in the UK as well as America, and that education on this barbarous section of history is scarce and often sugar-coated.

Following the screening Roger shared his powerful responses to the film, and opened the floor to the audience. A frank and honest discussion of the film followed, with tears, personal stories and deeper investigation of the its context and impact.

12 Years A Slave is presented is partnership with Ujima Radio 98FM

 

 

Posted on Sun 12 Jan 2014.

---