The Bentley Was a Prison.
Hugo Maynard
Diaspora & Migration • Cultural Identity & Belonging
My Family Colonized the Congo. (Part 1)
Natalie Berthe
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She spent her life calling out racism, fighting for justice, and showing up for communities that have been harmed. Then she found out her family were the people she had been fighting against her entire life.
Natalie Berthe is Belgian and Italian, born in the United States, and holds Belgian citizenship. She always knew her family had ties to the Belgian Congo. She did not know what that actually meant until recently.
In Part 1 of this two-part conversation, Natalie sits with the reckoning. What it felt like to find out. What her father told her about Bon Papa. What it means to love someone and then find out what they did.
In this episode
- Do all groups think about heritage the same way
- The history of the Belgian Congo and King Leopold
- How Natalie's family were not bystanders but active participants in her family's history
- The moment she found out what her great-grandfather did for work in the Congo
- What she did when she got off that phone call
- Why she is not looking away
- Part 2 continues on Friday.
Keep listening
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Have a story about your heritage?
Reconnecting, discovering something new, or deciding what to pass on? I’d love to hear it.