2023 Theme: “Fighting slavery’s legacy of racism through transformative education”
“Today and every day, let us stand united against racism and together build a world in which everyone, everywhere can live lives of liberty, dignity, and human rights.” (António Guterres: United Nations Secretary-General)
“The enslavement of over 13 million Africans during the Transatlantic Slave Trade was driven by the racist ideology that these women, men and children were inferior because of the colour of their skin. Countless families were torn apart. Scores of human beings lost their lives.
Despite experiencing serious human rights violations, and intergenerational trauma over centuries, enslaved people persevered in their resilience, demonstrating courage and defiance against the conditions of enslavement, forced labour, and systemic violence and oppression.
The racist legacy of the Transatlantic Slave Trade reverberates today in harmful prejudices and beliefs which are still being perpetuated and continue to impact people of African descent across the world. Transformative education, which seeks to empower learners to see the social world critically and through an ethical lens to challenge and change the status quo as agents of change is essential to the work of teaching and learning about slavery in order to end racism and injustice and to build inclusive societies based on dignity and human rights for all people, everywhere.”
(UN Outreach Programme on the Transatlantic Slave Trade and Slavery: https://www.un.org/en/rememberslavery/observance/2023#)