PORTSMOUTH, NH — The Black Heritage Trail of NH is excited to present Youth to Power:  Young Female Activists, the community dialogue that closes out the 2023 Elinor Williams Hooker Tea Talk series on Sunday, March 12, at 2:00 PM.

Free and open to the public, this hybrid program is presented in person at the Temple Israel at 200 State Street in Portsmouth and is simultaneously available online. Registration is required.

Black Women have been leaders in this country for centuries as abolitionists, voting rights advocates, college founders, civil rights defenders, labor leaders, entrepreneurs, and more. Often, their work to overcome race and gender stereotypes has been seen as unusual or magical, serving to minimize their labor and talent.

For this closing discussion panelists Ronelle Tshiela, Rekha Mahadevan, and Saniyah Bolton will present their views on where we are culturally as a state and where they see us heading.  In addition, they will share how their activism shapes their world view and hopes for the future.

Ronelle Tshiela, a 2024 JD candidate at UNH Franklin Pierce School of Law, was named to NH Business Review’s biennial list of the most influential business leaders in the state for 2021. A native of Manchester, New Hampshire, Tshiela founded the city’s Black Lives Matter chapter when she was 17. She was later appointed by the governor to serve on the NH Commission on Law Enforcement Accountability, Community, and Transparency.  She continues to challenge prominent lawmakers who dismiss the idea of racism being an issue in New Hampshire and legislators who scale back recommendations she and her colleagues make.

Rekha Mahadevan is a rising senior at Berwick Academy. She most recently worked on a project to bring recognition to five neglected tombstones of a 19th century African American family in her hometown of Madbury. She continues to demonstrate her leadership as the Vice President of the Seacoast NAACP Youth Council and guides informative tours for the Black Heritage Trail of NH.

Saniyah Bolton, a junior at Exeter High School, is the Co-Director of the BLM Seacoast youth division. Her passion for equality and racial justice is evident in her advocacy for marginalized groups and those who face the impacts of racial oppression. “As I serve on various panels and at events, I aspire to create an environment where equity, justice, and inclusion prevail.”

 

Funmi Oyekunle, the coordinator for the CONNECT Program at University of New Hampshire will serve as the moderator.

 

The 2023 Elinor Williams Hooker Tea Talks Series are grounded in history and lived experience about current issues in the Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC) community. They offer these communities the opportunity to dialogue in a safe space about race, equity, social justice and belonging.

 

For more information and to register, visit: www.blackheritagetrailnh.org.

 

 

 

The Black Heritage Trail of New Hampshire is an independent 501(c)(3) organization

that promotes awareness and appreciation of African American history and life in order

to build more inclusive communities today. We work to visibly honor and share a truer,

and more complete history of our state through exhibits, educational programs, curriculum development, guided walking tours and by documenting and making visible many of the sites that testify to the state’s rich Black history. Annual programs include the Elinor Williams Hooker Tea Talk series in February and March, a multi-day Juneteenth Celebration; statewide readings of Frederick Douglass’s speech in July, the Black New England Conference in October; and a monthly poetry reading series from November to January, all of which help in understanding human dignity when it is free of historical stereotypes.

 

Images below:

From left to right: Saniyah Bolton, Ronelle Tshiela, Rekha Mahadevan, and Funmi Oyekunle,