What Does Freedom Mean to You?

Date: July 31, 2012
Contact: Wouter Ketel, 252-728-2250 ext. 3005

HARKERS ISLAND, NC - Calling all teenage film makers, poets, and photographers! The National Park Service, in partnership with the National Park Foundation's African American Experience Fund, today launched Expressions of Freedom, a nationwide artistic competition to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation.

Contest submissions will be accepted from students 13 to 18 years old in three categories - photography, poetry, and digital short films. The first-place winner in each category will receive a $2,500 academic scholarship and the second-place winner will receive a $1,000 academic scholarship. The deadline for entries is October 15, 2012. Details are available at https://www.nps.gov/freedom.

"The issue that was at the heart of the Civil War - the continual struggle for equality for all - remains relevant today," said Jonathan B. Jarvis, Director of the National Park Service. "This contest encourages young people to reflect on their own personal meanings of freedom and creatively express those thoughts."

Expressions of Freedom is designed to connect student artists to the significance of the American Civil War, the Emancipation Proclamation, and the system of national parks that commemorate events associated with the Civil War and the Civil Rights Movement.

While no major Civil War battles were fought on the shores of Cape Lookout National Seashore, the barrier islands and the watermen who lived there, both free and enslaved, played important roles in the effort to control the coast. Knowledge of local waters was a powerful tool needed by both the Union and Confederate Navies. Black sea captains and sailors were often pressed into service to guide war-time vessels safely through the inlets or to serve on fast blockade runners trying to slip past the coastal blockade.