They Enslaved Him – And That Was Their Biggest Mistake
Black History Year
PushBlack
4.6 • 2.2K Ratings
🗓️ 5 October 2022
⏱️ 4 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
They kidnapped him as a child. They took him far from home and enslaved him. Who would have thought that he would be the voice to unravel their cruel institution?
Today on 2-Minute Black History, we learn the story of Olaudah Equiano
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | What's up, fam? This is Jay from Push Black. And as you know, over here, we're passionate |
| 0:06.3 | about building black power and taking control of our liberation. One of the ways to build |
| 0:12.8 | power together is through massive, unprecedented voter turnout. Every person in our community |
| 0:20.1 | matters. That means you, you matter, and your vote matters. Tuesday, November 8th is election |
| 0:29.0 | day. Put that in your phone, make a plan for when you're going to go vote and help three people |
| 0:33.8 | in your life make their plans. Hold each other accountable. Make it happen. |
| 0:39.7 | Visit pushblackvotes.com for more information and the pledge to vote in 2022. Peace. |
| 0:45.8 | They kidnapped him as a child. They took him far from home and enslaved him. |
| 0:58.8 | Who would have thought that he would be the voice to unravel their cruel institution. |
| 1:05.2 | I'm Sydney from Push Black and you're tuned in to two minute black history. What you didn't |
| 1:11.2 | learn in school. |
| 1:15.0 | Olauda Aquiano was 11 when the white men came. He had loved his life in the small, |
| 1:22.0 | heightened village in present-day Nigeria. But it was all stripped from him when he was kidnapped |
| 1:28.0 | and enslaved. First, they took him to the West Indies and then they shipped him to America, |
| 1:40.7 | where he was sold to a sea captain. |
| 1:46.9 | Aquiano, disgusted and terrified by enslavement, knew that the world needed to hear his story. |
| 1:54.0 | They needed to know about the cruelty. But how? |
| 2:02.4 | He educated himself despite enslavement and eventually bought his freedom. |
| 2:08.2 | Aquiano then moved to Britain and it was there that he wrote the first book of its kind, |
| 2:13.6 | the slave narrative. It exposed slavery for what it was and transformed the institution. |
| 2:23.6 | His book was an instant success and the first edition sold out almost immediately. |
| 2:30.4 | Translated into many languages, it opened eyes across the world. It was even a contributing |
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