The enslaved man who sparked a rebellion against British rule in Barbados

+ How Sandy Hook spawned a new era of conspiracy theories US Edition - Today's top story: It's all in the flag: Bussa's Rebellion and the 200-year fight to end British rule in Barbados [View in browser]( US Edition | 16 December 2021 [The Conversation]( Hanukkah’s over and we’ve put away our moose menorah (you have things like that if you lived in Maine for 25 years). Christmas is next, along with a vacation from daily editing. That means I’m thinking about cooking up vats of Marcella Hazan’s Bolognese sauce for the freezer and diving into an assortment of books I’ve set aside for my time off. Chopping onions is one way to make me happy. Reading a book in a comfortable wing chair with a cup of steaming lapsang souchong tea on the table next to me is another way. I’m getting a head start on my reading and just cracked open “The Netanyahus: An Account of a Minor and Ultimately Even Negligible Episode in the History of a Very Famous Family,” a book by Joshua Cohen that is so wickedly funny I was laughing out loud at just the first page. Cohen’s book is historical fiction. In this week’s offerings from the politics desk, our stories bring you historical facts, including some that are not well known. You may have seen a couple of weeks ago that Barbados had finally cut all but the most symbolic ties with its colonial past and became a republic. [Historian Lewis Eliot describes how Barbados’ fight for independence]( began 200 years before, with a rebellion led by an enslaved overseer named Bussa. But Eliot doesn’t simply list the events of that time – he tells that history through a flag made by an enslaved rebel named Johnny Cooper, which “gives a complete explanation of Black attitudes toward emancipation, the actions enslaved Africans were willing to take to ensure their freedom, and most pertinently, what they expected that freedom to look like.” Naomi Schalit Senior Editor, Politics + Society Dancers perform during the presidential inauguration ceremony at Heroes Square on November 29, 2021, in Bridgetown, Barbados. Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images [It’s all in the flag: Bussa’s Rebellion and the 200-year fight to end British rule in Barbados]( Lewis Eliot, University of Oklahoma The revolt in Barbados occurred in 1816 when an enslaved driver named Bussa led insurgents against the British colonial militia. It took another 200 years before British rule officially ended. 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Without intentionally building the metaverse to be inclusive, it will be, too. - [Professors’ free speech rights can clash with public universities’ interest in managing their employees as they choose]( Helen Norton, University of Colorado Boulder When the University of Florida barred three professors from testifying in a lawsuit over voting restrictions, it raised important questions of academic freedom and free speech. - [Appeals court says Trump has given ‘no legal reason’ to defy Congress’ demand for Jan. 6 documents, but Supreme Court may have final say]( Jennifer Selin, University of Missouri-Columbia Diaries, visitor logs, handwritten notes and speech drafts are among the records Donald Trump has tried to keep from a Congressional committee investigating the Capitol riot of Jan. 6. Like this newsletter? 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