This year marked the sixth time UTA has hosted a Juneteenth celebration. Attendees enjoyed food, music, and opportunities to learn more about the holiday’s history through commemorative performances of dance and spoken word.
For Courtney Jackson, her favorite part of Juneteenth is the sense of community and camaraderie when people from different walks of life come together to learn and celebrate.
“I’ve been celebrating Juneteenth since I was a kid—I’ve always known what Juneteenth meant and what it represented,” said Jackson, an academic advisor in UTA’s Department of Kinesiology. “It’s very special to me now because every year I go to the Levitt Pavilion with my sorority and serve at the Juneteenth celebration there. We’ve had opportunities to hear from Ms. Opal Lee herself and also play a part in helping educate and spread more awareness of what Juneteenth is."
Juneteenth—a combination of “June” and “nineteenth”—has been a day of celebration for more than 150 years. It commemorates June 19, 1865, when news of the federal order ending slavery in the United States reached enslaved people in Galveston, Texas—more than two months after the end of the Civil War and more than two years after President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation.
