I believe there are correlations, chronologically as well as socio-historically, between the abolition of slavery in the Americas (as decided by individual European countries) and the dismantling of city walls/city fortifications in European capital cities during the 1830’s-1860’s. While these two very different processes have not been correlated before, I believe this time period and these historical manifestations are an example of the transformation of morality and ethics domestically and internationally (abroad in the colonies) during the 19th century.
Read MoreGaslighting Blackness: Recollecting our identity through cultural geographies
When you’re told what’s Black is White, and that your experiences don’t exist–it’s easy to feel crazy in our society.
Reading these articles, in addition to my own research on Black geographies, made me think about the experiences of Black people in Europe and North America–but also Black people everywhere. It made me think about how often Black people have to wait for articles that are shared on Facebook to learn about the historical geographies of our culture, and cultural production more generally. It made me think about how in Europe and Brazil (and many other places), anti-Black racism is often brushed off as an American construction and non-existent.
Read MoreA List: Things in European and North American City Culture that Exist because of Colonialism

We love our cafe culture here in Europe, but our tea and coffee would not be sweet without the molasses imported from the colonies in the Americas, specifically the West Indies (Jamaica, Barbados, etc) and French colonies. We would have no tea diversity or variety without colonization in Asia, and it certainly would not be so cheap. For all those coffee lovers, you mostly realize where the coffee you drink comes from when cafes have names for them like: “Colombian Java” or “Jamaica’s Blue Mountain Coffee.”
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