Here is old footage of Billie Holiday performing her classic song Strange Fruit. Strange Fruit is a powerful and vivid song describing the henous lynchings that took place in the south. The strange fruit was the dead black bodies that were left hanging on the trees. This practice of lynching black bodies (especially black males) became prominent AFTER slavery was over, to maintain control and fear over the black population. Sometimes we gotta look back and understand where we have come from to better understand where we are headed.
Lynchings: Strange Fruit by Billie Holiday
Posted byDrew G. I. Hart, PhDPosted inUncategorizedTags:black, blues, Christianity, Faith, God, hip hop, history, jazz, Jesus, music, racism
Published by Drew G. I. Hart, PhD
Rev. Dr. Drew G. I. Hart is an associate professor of theology at Messiah University and has 10 years of pastoral experience prior to teaching. He currently directs Messiah University's "Thriving Together: Congregations for Racial Justice" program and co-hosts Inverse Podcast with Jarrod McKenna, an award-winning peace activist from Australia. Hart is the author of Trouble I've Seen: Changing the Way the Church Views Racism (2016) and Who Will Be A Witness?: Igniting Activism for God's Justice, Love, and Deliverance (2020). And he is also a co-editor and contributor to the recently published book entitled Reparations and the Theological Disciplines: Prophetic Voices for Remembrance, Reckoning, and Repair (Nov. 2023). Hart received bcmPEACE’s 2017 Peacemaker Award, the 2019 W.E.B. Du Bois Award in Harrisburg, PA, and most recently in December 2023 Life Esteem Ministries recognized him in Harrisburg with the Harambee Award for the Nguzo Saba Principle of Umoja—Unity for his faith-based activism and public scholarship in the community. Drew and his family live in Harrisburg, PA. View more posts
Drew G. I. Hart 