This article is part of a series in celebration of a new, dynamic voice in Black America: the NUBIANO Exchange. Brace yourself for the NUBIANO experience. 


Nick News: The Legacy of Slavery reflects on the peculiar institution of American slavery, by examining its birth, as well as its lasting effects, through the eyes of children and guest Dr. Cornel West. Half documentary and half roundtable discussion, The Legacy of Slavery seamlessly switches between the two formats, as Nick News host Linda Ellerbee facilitates a kid-friendly exploration of American slavery — rooting conversation in a historical context, as she poses questions that examine the way in which the history of slavery is taught and addresses slavery's lasting impact on the American psyche.

At the outset, Linda Ellerbee admits that the issue of American slavery has always been a hard thing for kids to talk about, no matter their racial background. With that in mind, The Legacy of Slavery gently explains the horrors of slavery and handles this heavy issue with great care, allowing Ellerbee to stir the strong emotions it brings up—anger, shame, resentment and sorrow — without straying from historical truth. By successfully navigating the subject's possible emotional storms, Nick News: The Legacy of Slavery manages to foster a meaningful discussion on how slavery still shapes the course of people's relationships today.

The opening segment features Julius Lester, author of To Be a Slave, a Newberry Honor book. Lester points out that the first blacks that came to America were not slaves, but indentured servants. The development of the American economy would soon change all of this. Lester notes that "[t]he choice to make black people slaves in the colonies was just that: a choice. A choice based on economics. Crops, such as tobacco, required a large number of workers. Who would do all of this work? The answer at first was not African-Americans."

Some white men from England had also been indentured servants. Because they were white, though, "they could simply run away and disappear into the population." Native peoples, then, were sought for labor purposes. They could not be enslaved permanently, however "because they knew the land, they could disappear in the forest and not be found. It slowly began to dawn across the colonists that blacks were identifiable, because of the skin color. And that secondly, in terms of labor, there was almost an endless supply of Africans that could be brought to work."