Lunch and Learn: Keith Rushing on "Descended: Searching for My Gullah-Geechee Roots"

Co-presented with the Prince George's County Office of Human Rights

This fall, grab your favorite lunch at noon and tune in to virtual conversations with the Prince George’s County Office of Human Rights and the Prince George’s County Memorial Library System on topics from repairing the effects of racial injustice to fighting for equitable access to recovering from exile and loss. Let’s learn together!

Lunch and Learn returns with special guest Keith Rushing in conversation with the Prince George's County Office of Human Rights and the Prince George's County Memorial Library System discussing his new book, "Descended: Searching for My Gullah-Geechee Roots."

Registration not required. Click on the YouTube video linked below to stream the program live or watch the recording later.

About the Book:

A mysterious name initiates a journey to discover one family's past, and reveals more than was expected. It began with a name. Sancho. Gleaned from the memory of his oldest living relative, that name set author Keith Rushing on a quest to recover his family's story. Rushing came to learn that Sancho was an African name, a common practice among the Gullah-Geechee communities of the South Carolina and Georgia Sea Islands. He found that Sancho had been born into slavery on Hilton Head Island and later fought as a soldier in a war for self-emancipation. Rushing learned that after that war Sancho had become a small landowner. Above all, he discovered that his family's story was richer than he had ever imagined. In Descended, Rushing recounts his own journey of discovery, and in the process unfurls a dramatic story about the transformation of Hilton Head. Descended is a story about family, place, and the desire to understand where we have been and where we are going.

About the author: 

Keith Rushing is a former reporter who worked at newspapers in Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and California and now works as a communications strategist for an environmental nongovernmental organization. He has written blogs and commentary for the Huffington Post and Ebony.com among other online publications. Rushing grew up in Queens, NY, and now lives in Washington, DC, with his wife and two children.