What is ‘Juneteenth’ and why Latinos should understand and commemorate this day?

As Juneteenth approaches and people begin to make plans to celebrate the holiday, it’s important to remember how and why this became a moment worth celebrating.

The moment started building during the New Year’s Eve before January 1, 1863.

“Enslaved and free African Americans gathered in churches and private homes all across the country awaiting news that the Emancipation Proclamation had taken effect,” according to the Smithsonian Museum. That night would later affectionately be termed “Freedom’s Eve.” Through the 13th Amendment slavery ended throughout the United States.

However, nobody willingly gives up anything they consider to be their property. Enslavers felt a deep sense of entitlement over the bodies providing the free labor they were receiving. This meant, even though the “Emancipation Proclamation was made effective in 1863, it could not be implemented in places still under Confederate control,” Smithsonian archives note. In fact in the Confederate state of Texas, freedom wasn’t seen by the enslaved people there until more than two years later on June 19, 1865, when some 2,000 Union troops arrived in Galveston Bay in an indisputable display of force.

This day, now known as Juneteenth, marked not only the end of an era of trauma but became a momentous time for hope and joy, for the possibilities of what freedom could bring. Remember this was all happening just after the Civil War ended and so this is a huge moment where they could reflect on everything they had endured. The now free folks knew for two years that they were supposed to be let go. Some of them probably gave up hope. This was an occasion to revel in what must have felt like having a dream realized.

Celebrating Juneteenth in our contemporary era is not just about reflecting on these atrocities but also continuing to further their dream. This is still a time for hope and joy. Just because slavery was outlawed doesn’t mean racism was eradicated.

Celebrations like these are a crucial time for different communities of people of color, especially Latinos and Black people to unify and be joyful together. By being joyful in the face of the oppression today, like police brutality and violence from ICE as they pursue mass deportations. Finding reasons that bring us together as a people is a slap in the face to the powers that are consistently trying to divide us.

For Latinos to celebrate Juneteenth can renew hope between the two communities. It demonstrates that Latinos see the victories of the Black community’s as theirs too. It’s important to acknowledge that a gain in power for the people on the bottom of the racial hierarchy, creates a gain in power for all the groups above it.

By prioritizing joy during these kinds of oppressive attacks, like the ones we have suffered recently, we affirm our humanity and reject narratives that reduce us solely to our struggles. The “lazy Mexican” and the “lazy Black man” are stereotypes that continue to be perpetuated. They still call Black people and Latinos criminals. For Latinos, celebrating Juneteenth and choosing joy alongside Black people can be an act of defiance against these systems of oppression that seek to dehumanize and marginalize us.

When Latino people separate Black struggles and resilience from their narratives it perpetuates the system that they are also oppressed by. The fact that when Black people rise we all rise, makes Juneteenth’s historic mark a special occasion for all of us.

Ilona Coutee, a senior Spanish and Psychology double major at the University of Nevada, Reno (UNR) wrote this article to Noticiero Móvil.