History

Without Sanctuary, Lynching in America

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Audience: This exercise was initially created for a group of Asian American Christians studying African American History.

Format: 2 page handout

Description: This is an instructional guide for interacting with the website Without Sanctuary, an online museum exhibit of lynching postcards and photographs from throughout American History. The guide begins with a prayer and gives instructions for a quick self-guided tour through the exhibit, with reminders to pay close attention to one’s mental health while being exposed to such a dark and evil part of our history. The guide ends with two prayers taken from Kenji Kuramitsu’s A Booklet of Uncommon Prayer, 2017.

Purpose: The online exhibit Without Sanctuary is astonishing but not an easy history to absorb. In studying the history of lynching, it is of the upmost imperative that we honor these lives and stories with reverence and care.