"Somebody asked why is it called "Juneteenth" insteada "Freedom Day."
I said,
The word "Juneteenth", to me, contains within it a profound record of the African-American experience of language. With our native languages mostly lost, taken or abandoned, and english thrust upon us, there is a great tradition of passive rebellion and nonconformity amongst enslaved people -- sometimes expressed through language. It's expressed in Juneteenth, I believe, in creating an evolved, improvised (think jazz) hybrid word. Such lingual reclamations of power are mildly annoying, by design, to the enslavers. 'Why won't you do what I say?! Why won't you do it the right way?!'*
*This is my own theory as a biracial man, philosopher and theorist."
—Dion Flynn
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