"No one thinks of Mexico and Peru as black. But Mexico and Peru together got 700,000 Africans in the slave trade. The coast of Acapulco was a black city in the 1870s. And the Veracruz Coast on the gulf of Mexico and the Costa Chica, south of Acapulco are traditional black lands."

Freedom

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Insight & Reflection

This reflection on freedom by Henry Louis Gates resonates across generations. It highlights a fundamental truth about human nature: our continuous search for meaning in freedom is what ultimately defines our character and our path forward.

About Henry Louis Gates

Henry Louis Gates Jr., popularly known by his childhood nickname "Skip", is an American literary critic, professor, historian, and filmmaker who serves as the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and the director of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University. He is a trustee of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History. He rediscovered the earliest known African-American novels and has published extensively on the recognition of African-American literature as part of the Western canon.

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Editorial Note: This quote is curated and fact-checked by the Quotes Archive Editorial Team. Verified Literature Specialist.

More by Henry Louis Gates

"All of the guests on 'Faces of America' were deeply moved by what we revealed about their ancestry. We were able to trace the ancestry of Native American writer Louise Erdrich back to 438 A.D. We found that Queen Noor is descended from royalty, and that's before she married King Hussein of Jordan."

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"Very few, if any, first-generation black or white or Asian kids will pursue a Ph.D. They'll pursue the professions for economic security. Many will go to law school and/or business school."

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"I give a speech to the black freshmen at Harvard each year, and I say, 'You can like Mozart and ice hockey...' - and then I used to say 'golf,' but Tiger took over golf! - 'and Picasso and still be as black as the ace of spades.'"

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More about Freedom

"I sent American troops to Iraq to make its people free, not to make them American. Iraqis will write their own history and find their own way."

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"There is no city or country in the world where women and girls live free of the fear of violence. No leader can claim: 'this is not happening in my backyard.'"

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