I immediately reeled back to a recent conversation with a close friend regarding Black History Month. He was adamant that the celebration of black history was not only obsolete because racism was now a thing of the past, but that it was also insensitive of negroes to consume an entire month with explorations of their struggles and triumphs as a people when so many other races have had significant trials and triumphs. I was sort of on the fence about the whole situation.

While I agree with my friend that other races should be given the opportunity to take centerstage as well I cannot support the removal of Black History Celebrations. Especially now that racism has reared its ugly head again. I also understand that negative discrimination is a problem faced by all ethnicities and that at times negroes themselves are perpetrators.

Despite being held at the Coliseum, the site of the 1912 Republican
convention, an overflow crowd of six to twelve thousand waited
outside for their turn to view the exhibits. Inspired by the three-week
celebration, Woodson decided to form an organization to promote the
scientific study of black life and history before leaving town.  On
September 9th, Woodson met at the Wabash YMCA with A. L. Jackson
and three others and formed the Association for the Study of Negro
Life and History (ASNLH).
He hoped that others would popularize the findings that he and other black intellectuals would publish
in The Journal of Negro History, which he established in 1916.  As early as 1920, Woodson urged black
civic organizations to promote the achievements that researchers were uncovering.  A graduate
member of Omega Psi Phi, he urged his fraternity brothers to take up the work. In 1924, they
responded with the creation of Negro History and Literature Week, which they renamed Negro
Achievement Week.  Their outreach was significant, but Woodson desired greater impact.  As he told
an audience of Hampton Institute students, “We are going back to that beautiful history and it is going
to inspire us to greater achievements.”  In 1925, he decided that the Association had to shoulder the
responsibility.  Going forward it would both create and popularize knowledge about the black past. He
sent out a press release announcing Negro History Week in February, 1926.

Woodson chose February for reasons of tradition and reform.  It is commonly said that Woodson
selected February to encompass the birthdays of two great Americans who played a prominent role in
shaping black history, namely Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass, whose birthdays are the 12th
and the 14th, respectively.  More importantly, he chose them for reasons of tradition.  Since Lincoln’s
assassination in 1865, the black community, along with other Republicans, had been celebrating the
fallen President’s birthday.  And since the late 1890s, black communities across the country had been
celebrating Douglass’.  Well aware of the pre-existing celebrations, Woodson built Negro History Week
around traditional days of commemorating the black past.  He was asking the public to extend their
study of black history, not to create a new tradition.  In doing so, he increased his chances for success.

Yet Woodson was up to something more than building on tradition. Without saying so, he aimed to
reform it from the study of two great men to a great race.  Though he admired both men, Woodson
had never been fond of the celebrations held in their honor. He railed against the “ignorant
spellbinders” who addressed large, convivial gatherings and displayed their lack of knowledge about the
men and their contributions to history.  More importantly, Woodson believed that history was made
by the people, not simply or primarily by great men.  He envisioned the study and celebration of the
Negro as a race, not simply as the producers of a great man. And Lincoln, however great, had not
freed the slaves—the Union Army, including hundreds of thousands of black soldiers and sailors, had
done that. Rather than focusing on two men, the black community, he believed, should focus on the
countless black men and women who had contributed to the advance of human civilization.

From the beginning, Woodson was overwhelmed by the response to his call.  Negro History Week
appeared across the country in schools and before the public.  The 1920s was the decade of the New
Negro, a name given to the Post-War I generation because of its rising racial pride and consciousness.  
Urbanization and industrialization had brought over a million African Americans from the rural South into
big cities of the nation.  The expanding black middle class became participants in and consumers of
black literature and culture.  Black history clubs sprang up, teachers demanded materials to instruct
their pupils, and progressive whites stepped and endorsed the efforts.  

Woodson and the Association scrambled to meet the demand.  They set a theme for the annual
celebration, and provided study materials—pictures, lessons for teachers, plays for historical
performances, and posters of important dates and people.  Provisioned with a steady flow of
knowledge, high schools in progressive communities formed Negro History Clubs.  To serve the desire
of history buffs to participate in the re-education of black folks and the nation, ASNLH formed branches
that stretched from coast to coast.  In 1937, at the urging of Mary McLeod Bethune, Woodson
established the Negro History Bulletin, which focused on the annual theme. As black populations grew,
mayors issued Negro History Week proclamations, and in cities like Syracuse progressive whites joined
Negro History Week with National Brotherhood Week.

Like most ideas that resonate with the spirit of the times, Negro History Week proved to be more
dynamic than Woodson or the Association could control.  By the 1930s, Woodson complained about
the intellectual charlatans, black and white, popping up everywhere seeking to take advantage of the
public interest in black history.  He warned teachers not to invite speakers who had less knowledge
than the students themselves.  Increasingly publishing houses that had previously ignored black topics
and authors rushed to put books on the market and in the schools.  Instant experts appeared
everywhere, and non-scholarly works appeared from “mushroom presses.”  In America, nothing
popular escapes either commercialization or eventual trivialization, and so Woodson, the constant
reformer, had his hands full in promoting celebrations worthy of the people who had made the history.  

Well before his death in 1950, Woodson believed that the weekly celebrations—not the study or
celebration of black history–would eventually come to an end.  In fact, Woodson never viewed black
history as a one-week affair.  He pressed for schools to use Negro History Week to demonstrate what
students learned all year.  In the same vein, he established a black studies extension program to reach
adults throughout the year.  It was in this sense that blacks would learn of their past on a daily basis
that he looked forward to the time when an annual celebration would no longer be necessary.
Generations before Morgan Freeman and other advocates of all-year commemorations, Woodson
believed that black history was too important to America and the world to be crammed into a limited
time frame.  He spoke of a shift from Negro History Week to Negro History Year.  

In the 1940s, efforts began slowly within the black community to expand the study of black history in
the schools and black history celebrations before the public.  In the South, black teachers often taught
Negro History as a supplement to United States history.  One early beneficiary of the movement
reported that his teacher would hide Woodson’s textbook beneath his desk to avoid drawing the
wrath of the principal.  During the Civil Rights Movement in the South, the Freedom Schools
incorporated black history into the curriculum to advance social change.  The Negro History
movement was an intellectual insurgency that was part of every larger effort to transform race
relations.

The 1960s had a dramatic effect on the study and celebration of black history.  Before the decade was
over, Negro History Week would be well on its way to becoming Black History Month.  The shift to a
month-long celebration began even before Dr. Woodson death.  As early as 1940s, blacks in West
Virginia, a state where Woodson often spoke, began to celebrate February as Negro History Month.  In
Chicago, a now forgotten cultural activist, Fredrick H. Hammaurabi, started celebrating Negro History
Month in the mid-1960s.  Having taken an African name in the 1930s, Hammaurabi used his cultural
center, the House of Knowledge, to fuse African consciousness with the study of the black past.  By
the late 1960s, as young blacks on college campuses became increasingly conscious of links with Africa,
Black History Month replaced Negro History Week at a quickening pace.  Within the Association,
younger intellectuals, part of the awakening, prodded Woodson’s organization to change with the
times. They succeeded.  In 1976, fifty years after the first celebration, the Association used its influence
to institutionalize the shifts from a week to a month and from Negro history to black history. Since the
mid-1970s, every American president, Democrat and Republican, has issued proclamations endorsing
the Association’s annual theme.

What Carter G. Woodson would say about the continued celebrations is unknown, but he would smile
on all honest efforts to make black history a field of serious study and provide the public with
thoughtful celebrations.

I just read an argument against Black History Month by actor, Morgan Freeman, ‘You’re going to relegate my history to a month,’ in the Washington Post.  Implying that Black History Month reduces black history to one month.  However, this is not true, at all.  The installation of Black History Month, in 1976. into America’s list of observances has done anything but reduce our history to a month.

When I was in elementary school, I can remember the limited mention of blacks in school issued history books.  Because of this, the teachers were forced to create black history handouts to give to each student.  I remember feeling very appreciative when a teacher would go to that extent to share a piece of my heritage with me.  However, the sad part about this, is that some of the teachers would not even touch on black history, but, once during the whole school year.  At this time black history observance was just one week a year.

Those black history handouts were treasured by me and were sheets that I would carry home proudly to show my parents.  I would hold on to these pieces of paper and save them for months or even years.  There were quite a few years of these handouts, before there was significant mention of black history in school issued text books.  After those years of handouts, text books began including blacks in each each time line that students covered; still limited, however.

I credit Black History Month with opening up a door; giving all Americans the opportunity to learn about the contributions of black men and women.  Yes, this is particularly important to young black girls and boys, but, teaching black history benefits all young people.  Hopefully, having a broader view of how this country came about and how Black Americans contributed to our nation, will help tear down some of the misconceptions and stereotypes.

Black History Month is an observance that should be continued to be honored.  The arguments, that it has become commercialized, is futile.  In America, what hasn’t become commercialized?  Black History Month is like anything else, it’s what you choose to make it.  For me it marks a time when our nation showed me that I came from more than slavery, but, there were black people who were doctors, inventors, lawyers, business people, writers, scientists, and great educators.

To think of Black History Month as a limitation is very unfortunate.  With our young black people seeking out gang affiliations in order to gain an identity and shedding each others’ blood in the streets over colors; there has never been a more urgent time for young people to be taught just where they came from.  Yes, the times have been hard, but, we came through it then, and can overcome the things that challenge our communities now.  Black History gives us vision and a realization that we can rise above our differences and tragedies.

Apparently on Wednesday around 4 a.m. police found his body in his Sherman Oaks home with a self inflicted gun shot wound to the head.  He was taken to the hospital where he was officially pronounced dead at age 75.  With the confirmation of his death artists that had known him and worked with him or felt that he was responsible for his career immediately issued statements of condolences and utter shock at the way he passed.  Black Entertainment Television (BET) is already scheduled to air The Hippest Trip in America at 8pm 2.1.12 a documentary of the late great Don Cornelius. 

It’s almost unbelievable that he died in such a terrible way.  I grew up watching Soul Train every Saturday morning at 11am.  My siblings and I couldn’t wait to see who would perform, what cool dances they were going to do.  Every time it was time for the Soul Train line we would get up and do our own little dance down the aisle.  Those memories are so vivid in my mind, it’s almost as like it was yesterday.  I’m sure the memories are just as vivid in the minds of others who also grew up watching Soul Train.  The success of Soul Train was that it was nothing else like it on television during those days.  There was nothing else that African American music lovers could relate to and it was a must to tune in to see our stars.  I can almost guarantee that at every African American family get together, wedding, family reunion or other family function there is music, there is a Soul Train line being done somewhere!

Don Cornelius will truly be missed and his legend will live on in the hearts and souls of us who grew up with him and the Soul Train dancers. Don Cornelius is said to be responsible for boosting the popularity of The Jackson 5, James Brown, Marvin Gaye and other such artists that have performed on the famous stage over at the Soul Train studio.  So hats off to you Mr. Cornelius Peace, Love and Sooooooul!!

We should be proud to be called American and have that beautiful skin tone. I love my hair even if it knots up at times. Yes, its like wool but so is Jesus hair and I may use some Ebonics here and there but I’m still proud. Let the schools know that it is alright to celebrate this month and allow all the children to join in. I’m brown skinned and I’m proud of it. I was not born in the50’s or 60’s but I have some idea what other’s thought of us. I have experience racism and being pushed in back of the line. I cry when I watch Mississippi Burning but I don’t want any other race to suffer because of it. Black history is want I want to hear about this month and I want stand for nothing less. I’m proud of who I am and where I came from.

The children need to know how proud I am and when they return from school I’ll let them know, although they may look at me crazy. I will shout I’m proud and walk like it too. I’m an African American and not a nigger, negro, black or colored but African American and I want to celebrate it. Thanks for allowing me to be expressive . Good day!

George Washington Williams, an Ohio lawyer and minister published in 1882 the first recorded work of the history of the Black race. History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880 describes the arrival of the first slaves in the North American colonies and then tells of the history of major events involving African-Americans. His purpose in writing was to lift the Black race to its rightful place in American history by instructing the present and informing the future.

Frederick Douglass, a famous orator and ex-slave, stressed the humanity of the black race as a people and was influential in speaking and writing about the anti-slavery movement of that time.

Between 1910 and 1930 a period emerged called the Harlem Renaissance, in this period African-Americans began to celebrate their African history.

W.E.B Du Bois, an African-American historian wrote The Souls of Black Folk which stressed his peoples history as the influence of three different cultures: African, African-American, and American. In another historical work of his, The Negro (1915)told of the history of African-Americans in Africa.

Carter G. Woodson, created Negro History Week in 1926, which preceded today’s Black History Month, looking back to Africa he emphasized the influence of African-Americans on American History.

Artists, poets, novelists and musicians during the Harlem Renaissance referred to Africa as their source of culture and history.

In the 1960s and 1970s Malcolm X, a black activist saw the history of the African-American as an important component of black liberation and power. He stated that the reason the Black race has failed in America is because of a lack of knowledge about their history. Pero Dagbovie states in African American History Reconsidered, that the black race black needs to understand their past in order to move into their future.

Universities and colleges began to offer classes and programs in African-American studies and history in the 1960s. American history textbooks began to incorporate African-American history, as well as women’s and Native American history into their standard narratives.

In 1974 President Gerald Ford recognized the importance of African-American history and declared February to be ‘Black History Month’. Since this time, both black and white historians have expressed the works of earlier African-American historians, and studied the influence of Africa on African-Americans. Historians also have created the black women’s history and explored the stories of the United States as theories of race relations.

History has expanded to include the working class, women, Latino Americans, Native American as well as the experiences of African-Americans. All of these histories have become intertwined in today’s U.S. History textbooks.

African-American history, today is interconnected with all of these other fields in U.S. history.

Would you not say that Du Bois’s definition of African-American history is the interaction of African, American and African-American peoples and cultures.

Carter G. Woodson, the founder of the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History in 1915 has been given the credit for establishing this holiday in 1926.  He founded Black History Week, February 12, 1926.  However, the true origin of Black History Month goes back to 1966.  Maulana Karenga established Kwanzaa in 1966 as the first exclusive African American holiday.  The purpose was to give the Black community the opportunity to celebrate their own history and accomplishments.  Kwanzaa’s roots began as part of the Black Nationalist movement in the 1960’s.

 The name Kwanzaa derives from the Swahili phrase” matunda ya kwanza”, which means the first fruits of the harvest.  During the early years of Kwanzaa, Karenga said that it was meant to be an alternative to Christmas that Jesus was psychotic, and that Christianity was a white religion that black people should not celebrate. However, as Kwanzaa gained mainstream adherents, Karenga altered his position so as not to offend practicing Christians. He then made the statement in 1997: “Kwanzaa was not created to give people an alternative to their own religion or religious holiday.”  Kwanzaa is celebrated December 26 – January 1 every year.

The celebration includes decorating their houses with art objects, colorful cloth, and the wearing of kaftans by the women.  The celebration may also include music and singing, and the reading of the African Pledge and Principles of Blackness. Cultural exhibitions include the Spirit of Kwanzaa, an annual celebration held at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts featuring interpretive dance, African dance, song and poetry.

For many years, Black History Month was celebrated the second week in February to coincide with Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, the two most instrumental in emancipation.  In 1976, it was expanded, as part of the bicentennial celebration, to include the entire month of February.

This year, I decided to have the children (and myself) experience something a little different.  We went to the Garden State Discovery Museum in Cherry Hill, NJ, to watch a performance of the play “Sunjata Kamalenya” presented by the McCarter Theater Center.  “Sunjata  Kamalenya” is the second of three events being offered by the Discovery Museum to celebrate Black History Month this year: the previous event was a performance by the Universal African Drum and Dance Ensemble, and the last event will be an African Safari program to run on February 26-27.  This three-part series is just a small portion of the Discovery Museum’s Passport to Discovery program, which features cultural, artistic, and scientific performances and events from around the world, including a Chinese lunar new year celebration, Italian Carnevale, Egyptian Exploration, Holi Festival of India, Waffle Day–a Swedish national holiday, and more.  Another theatrical performance, “Hercules” will be offered in April.

The interactive play “Sunjata Kamalenya, ” offered by the McCarter Theater Center as one of their professional touring shows, is based on The Epic of Sunjata (or Sunjiata), which is an oral history about the life of Sunjata, the first ruler of Mali.  The Epic informs us that Sunjata was a strong, powerful and just king, who, with the help of his hunchbacked and ugly mother, saved his people from the clutches of  an evil sorcerer king.  Sunjata united the neighboring towns and villages, defeated the sorcerer king, and established a model kingdom which would last for some 400 years.

“Sunjata Kamalenya” interprets the early portion of The Epic: Sunjata’s father is visited by a huntsman who advises him that, to defeat the sorcerer king and bring peace to his people, he will need to marry an ugly and hunchbacked woman (“well, not ugly, but peculiar”) who will deliver to him a son who will become the hero of his people–Sunjata.   “Sunjata Kamalenya” is a completely interactive performance, in which members of the audience are brought on stage to participate as actors and dancers, and the entire audience serves as the chorus.  The professional troupe itself consists of 5 persons–every other part is played by a member of the audience.  And although the show is designed primarily for children in grades k-8, it is equally entertaining for older children and adults, many of whom are also tapped to play characters in the drama.  I should know–I was selected to play the very important–and very ugly–hunchbacked mother of Sunjata! (“not ugly, just peculiar,” according to the script).

Hearing the story of Sunjata performed in such an entertaining, interactive way really struck a chord with my children, and all of the children (and adults) in the audience.  Many of us, myself included, had never before heard of The Epic of Sunjata, but now, thanks to this great production, will always remember it and the importance of this enlightened Mali King (and his hunchbacked mother, too).   

Source: for more information on Sunjata and The Epic of Sunjata, visit en.wikipedia.org/wiki/sundiata_keita.

For more information on the Garden State Discovery Museum’s programs and exhibits, please visit www.discoverymuseum.com.

For more information and a schedule of events for McCarter Theater, please visit www.mccarter.org.

I have to admit that a lot of African Americans don’t fulfill their duties in respecting their race. For those of you who know what it means to be an African American should be encouraged and do something culture related. We don’t need to relive what happened in the past but we should give the world our talents and inspiration. Never be ashamed of where you came from.

Celebrate your heritage and this goes for all the other races as well. Be proud and honor one another We all are apart of history. Some people may chose to contribute bad vibes and this is not o.k. Try your very best to bring positivity and loyalty to humanity. Celebrate as MLK would have wanted us too.

The coloured race is the most celebrated race in the history of man kind, through songs in the dark ages of the African forest, leaping from tree to tree seeking out evolution, for the black soul is said to be in Earnest pursuit of enlightenment. Through rights of passage, marriage and death, they have celebrated each point through song and dance. It is said the coloured man has an extra soul that is offered whole hearted to each piece of peace touched, through the harshest state, they gave life to the cotton they picked in the fields, to the lords they served, to the song they sung, to the bleeding backs in pain, their cry is given life. From enslavement, the colored soul rose to freedom, and now self enslaved. In mind their inability to break from the past has rendered them slaves to their minds and seek in vain to apportion blame. But the facts remain, history speak of the souls in huge words, in poetry, vases, songs and plays in life and theatres.

Tyler Perry I would say is the most celebrated pure black soul. He bought the plight of the African American livelihood in his own life and brought it to various corners of the vast sky, he gave recognition to the dimmest star. from the faults to what make as proud to be who we are. As much as his work speak volumes, it seem that most view his work as negative. They say the black soul is viewed to him (Tyler) as negative and troubled, he only brings the pain that brings the dark mind down. Coincidentally, the African mind has always been in the gutter, and i believe its not to any one but oneself to raise the standards not to a higher level but to an actual higher level. We own our lives, we are the slave masters to our destiny. The mind if left can beat the body down that it cannot seem to rise again.

Tyler and many other souls cannot be blamed, we face our fears, we face our troubles, and bringing them to light be it on script or social gatherings lets us embrace our dark side, make the wounds heal. Let as not deny ourselves simply because our past flames, let as gather the courage as humans, solidify and make our presence felt, for our mark is the northern star.

to black history month