Remember the Slave Trade and Teach!

By means of the International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition, UNESCO aims to recall the crucial importance of the transmission of history in order to shed light on the fight against all forms of oppression and racism today.

This effort is the eternal effort for the comprehensive affirmation of human dignity, and UNESCO devotes to it the full force of its mandate, through education, culture, sharing of information and scientific research, which help to construct in the minds of all ramparts against racism and prejudice.

The teaching of the General History of Africa and the Slave Route programme are examples of this. Ignorance is our enemy:

Ignorance is our enemy: it is used as an alibi by the indifferent who state that “we cannot change anything”, and sanctions the lies of those who claim that “they did not know”. .

Irina Bokova
UNESCO Director-General

Download the UNESCO brochure with lessons and information to teach our children. UNESCO Brochure – Slave Trade.  Also, watch the BBC Series, “The History of Africa” 

Many people are unaware of the African presence in Mexico, but more people were enslaved and shipped into Latin America than in the north. The state of Guerrero, in particular, has a large concentration of Afro-Mexicans. The state was named after Vicente Guerrero, Mexico’s second president, who was of African-Indigenous descent. He abolished slavery during his administration in 1829. For more information about Afro-Mexicans in Guerrero, visit: www.FreedomPathways.org