Historic Stagville, 5828 Old Oxford Rd, Durham, is hosting a Jonkonnu celebration this holiday season.
Jonkonnu at Stagville
Celebrate Jonkonnu, a historic African American holiday tradition, with Historic Stagville and St Sya Academy on Saturday, December 7, 2024, from 4:30 to 6 p.m. This is a free event.
Durham youth and musicians will perform at Horton Grove on December 7 to honor Jonkonnu, an African diaspora masquerade with roots in West Africa and the Caribbean.
After the performance, join the lead artists around a bonfire for more music and stories about Jonkonnu traditions in the Americas. Jonkonnu at Stagville is created by the artists and students of St Sya Academy, along with lead teaching artist Braima Moiwai.
Jonkonnu traditions connect African diaspora communities across the Atlantic and Caribbean. It is still celebrated in communities in Jamaica, the Bahamas, Belize, and more. In North Carolina, people of African descent resisted cultural erasure by preserving dance, drum, and costume traditions like Jonkonnu. Stagville is one of the rare sites of slavery in North America with primary source documentation of Jonkonnu.
The performance will be outdoors at Horton Grove, with storytelling and drumming around the bonfire afterwards. Be sure to arrive by 4:30 so you don’t miss a minute of the great performances!
You are welcome to bring your own chairs or blankets to sit. Parking will be in the grass lot on Jock Road. The program is entirely outdoors, with walking in low light and over uneven surfaces. Please contact stagville@dncr.nc.gov with any questions about accessibility.
Historic Stagville
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