The Meaning Of Juneteenth: A Conversation With Black Levi’s® Employees
Community /
June 2021
African-Americans were born on the water, in the vast expanse between the nations from which they were stolen and the nation that through stolen Black labor grew into the most powerful nation in the world. The atrocities Black Americans have endured, generation after generation, can be read in Black names, etched onto Black tongues and are visible through Black features. The horrors of slavery, and the horrors that have come after, continue to underwrite American laws and customs. They always will.
But Black culture isn’t just one of suffering. Because being African-American — being here at all, 400 years later — is a celebration. It’s a triumph, a people overcoming in spite of unfathomable, ongoing hardship. No holiday better captures the suffering or celebration more than Juneteenth.
Juneteenth, observed today every year, celebrates the freeing of American slaves. But even that was fraught. Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation was in 1862, during the Civil War. Though slavery was illegal, slave owners in Confederate states didn’t free their slaves. Texas was one of the most remote slave states, it took until 1865 for Union soldiers to reach Texas and obligate slave owners to free their slaves. As a result, Juneteenth is celebrated most widely in Texas, but Black people across the country celebrate the holiday to various degrees, depending on where they live, whether the holiday was passed down through family, and other factors. Last year after George Floyd was murdered, companies around the country like Levi Strauss & Co. committed to making Juneteenth a corporate holiday. To commemorate the holiday, three Black Levi’s® employees sat down to talk all things Juneteenth — what it means to them, how they celebrate it, and where we go from here.
LEVI’S®: WHERE ARE YOU FROM? DID YOU GROW UP CELEBRATING JUNETEENTH?
JEREMY BROWN
Wholesale Inventory Planner, Dockers Canada
Yes, it was a holiday that was very big in my family when I was growing up in North Carolina. At an early age, I learned what Juneteenth was, why it was important, and why we celebrated. Celebrating Juneteenth is acknowledging the freedom of the last slaves across the South. Growing up, I realized that even though it can be a daily hardship, being Black is a daily celebration. I have to thank my grandfather for that. Born in 1920 with only a third-grade education, he taught me the importance of education, history and most importantly family. His grandparents were slaves. So through him, I learned about why we celebrated Juneteenth.
AMBER MORGAN
Manager, Product Development and Sourcing Operations
I’m from Los Angeles. My family roots, where my family was enslaved, are in Georgia and South Carolina. Traditionally, Juneteenth had always been more of a Texas celebration. But the nature of living in Los Angeles is that we have a lot of Texans. And so we saw Juneteenth celebrations pop up, but it wasn’t something my family celebrated until I was an adolescent. It felt organic. We decided to start celebrating Juneteenth, because it was celebrating Us, you know what I mean? So it was about honoring our familial ancestors as well as, like Martin Luther King Jr. and Marcus Garvey. Now my hometown has a Juneteenth celebration. There’s a little Jazz Festival.
LAWANDA WHITE
Senior Marketing Manager
In Texas, this has always been a joyous occasion. I grew up in Houston, Texas. I learned about Juneteenth in my family and as a member of a Black Girls Club named after Christia V. Adair, the African- American civil rights worker and NAACP leader based out of Houston. But I also grew up in a predominantly white environment. I attended a white school in the suburbs that didn’t want to celebrate the holiday, because it would’ve caused controversy. So you’re in school, and no one wants to touch it. But then I married a guy who went to Black schools his whole life and went to college at Prairie View A&M, an HBCU. His college definitely celebrated it. In his schools, they always spoke about Juneteenth as an educational moment. As I got older, I started going to parades and things like that. It became more of a celebration.
LEVI’S®: WHAT ARE YOU DOING THIS YEAR FOR JUNETEENTH?
Amber – We’ll have a cookout. I’m staying at my mom’s house, and it’s so funny because soul food is reserved for Christmas, because of all the calories. So I doubt it will be anything like that, or Thanksgiving. But we will put something on the grill, and I might make a little special dish.
LaWanda – This year I’m going to Chicago for Juneteenth. It’s my first time not being with my dad for his birthday. My son is an artist who lives in Chicago, and he’s doing a Juneteenth celebration there. He’s curating a show there, and pulling photographers and artists together over a four-day event. We’re going to all come together to celebrate who we are and celebrate the moment.
Jeremy – I have the pleasure of going to a wedding on Juneteenth. So I’ll be in Houston this year for the holiday. It’ll be really, really fun. And this year feels special because my African-American friend and my Nigerian friend are marrying, so it’s the joining of forces! It’ll be an amazing time.
LEVI’S®: HOW DID YOU REACT WHEN YOU SAW SO MANY COMPANIES RECOGNIZE JUNETEENTH AS A HOLIDAY?
Amber – I was shocked at first. Any time Black people’s issues are brought to light, I’m always still shocked. And that’s unfortunate, because we’re in 2021. It’s taken so long for something this obvious to be acknowledged. We need to celebrate or acknowledge the shared historical significance of the ending of human bondage in our country. So it’s great that so many people are now embracing Juneteenth, but I also get kind of dismayed about it. I feel like every advancement for equity and equality, Black people are the ones moving the needle. And I feel like that’s a heavy burden.
Jeremy – I had mixed emotions, because most people outside of the South don’t know what Juneteenth is or why it’s important. But I find it to be an amazing thing that a holiday so prevalent is being acknowledged. And I’m so happy that our Levi’s® co-workers who work in the South and around the country can take a day to be with family now. I love that Levi’s® is pushing the holiday.
LaWanda – I thought it was positive, and it was well-deserved. I think it’s a way to recognize another important moment in history. We still have so much work to do, but this is one step forward I feel.
LEVI’S®: WHAT COULD PEOPLE WHO HAVEN’T CELEBRATED JUNETEENTH BEFORE DO TO OBSERVE THE HOLIDAY THIS YEAR?
Jeremy – I would hope that they would use this day more as an opportunity to look inward and ask themselves, “Am I doing enough? Am I an ally? Am I standing on the right side as much as I can, and am I doing my part to help dismantle something that my ancestors helped create?”
Amber – I think everyone should use the day to reflect. Everybody celebrates July 4th. And there are differences to the holidays, but it’s amazing how so many people don’t see the two holidays as part of the same thread.