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When I was younger, I did not always understand why my grandmother told the same stories again and again. At family gatherings, she would talk about the village where she grew up, the women in our family, the songs her mother sang while cooking, and the people who had found ways to survive when life was hard. Sometimes I thought I had heard every detail. At school, however, I learned a very different version of history. Black people appeared mostly in stories about slavery, poverty, war, racism. We are often presented as victims, not as thinkers, artists, organisers or people with a rich history of our own.
There was little space for the life stories my grandmother carried with her. As I became older, I began to truly understand that her stories were not simply memories. They were a form of resilience and resistance. They connected me to the people and the places I had never seen, but which are still part of me. They reminded me that my identity did not begin with the moment someone else decided to see me as different. For a very long time, I felt uncomfortable speaking about my identity or cultural heritage. I worried that people would not understand either, or that they would reduce them to stereotypes. But listening to my grandmother helped me realise that I do not have to explain any part of myself for it to be real or valued.
My grandmother life stories carried knowledge, humour, grief, pride, resilience. They showed me that I came from the people who had created, loved, resisted and endured. Eventually, I began to write down some of the stories she shared. I also started asking questions: What did my family celebrate? What languages did they speak? What songs did they sing? Each answer helped me see myself differently, discovering that storytelling deconstructs the narrow images that racism creates. When racialised people tell their own stories, we show that no single narrative can define us. Our life stories are not only about pain. They are also about heritage, strength, imagination, and the right to belong. |
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Published on 18.09.2026 at 11:28 
