Legacies of American Slavery

Centenary College is proud to be one of six Regional Collaboration Partners for the Council of Independent College’s Legacies of American Slavery initiative. Following the end of the Civil War in 1865, the backlash against Emancipation used the legacies of American slavery to perpetuate white supremacy. Superficially neutral rules kept White people in power by using the legacies of slavery to exclude Black people. For example, laws requiring that voters be able to read appear neutral, but since it had been illegal to teach enslaved people to read just a few years earlier, they perpetuated white supremacy.  Many of these structures continue to create unequal life chances for the descendants of enslaved people. Therefore, we propose to examine how the legacies of slavery continue to affect healthcare in our community.

The multi-year project will engage students, faculty, staff, and community members in research, teaching, and learning activities designed to explore the multiple legacies of slavery in the United States.

Centenary is working in partnership with Huston-Tillotson University in Austin, Texas on the topic of “Race, Health, and Medicine.” The project will explore some of the historical roots of modern racial inequities in access to and quality of health care in Shreveport and the state of Louisiana, with the goal of identifying concrete solutions to address these disparities.