The Celebration of Black History Month

THE CELEBRATION OF BLACK HISTORY MONTH

The words of the gospel favorite, “How I Got Over” should inspire each of us to use February and the national celebration African American Heritage Month or Black History Month as a time to “fill our cups”, our heads, our homes, our children, our relatives, our churches, our schools, our communities, our country and the world with the joy and appreciation of the achievements and the quest of the African American population for respect and dignity.
Americans have recognized black history annually since 1926, first as "Negro History Week" and later as "Black History Month." What you might not know is that black history had barely begun to be studied—or even documented—when the tradition originated. Although blacks have been in America at least as far back as colonial times, it was not until the 20th century that they gained a respectable presence in the history books.
The national theme this year revolves around reflections on the important book written by Dr. W.E.B. DuBois, The Soul of Black Folk.
“I will not stop here to inquire whose duty it was….whether that of the white ex-master who had profited by the unpaid toil, or the northern philanthropist whose persistence brought on the crisis, or the national government whose edict freed the bondmen…but I insist it was the duty of someone to see that those workingmen [freed slaves] were not left alone and unguided without capital, without land, without skill, without economic organization, without even the bald protection of law, order, and decency…”

Blacks Absent from the History Books

We owe the celebration of Black History Month, and more importantly, the study of black history, to Dr. Carter G. Woodson. Born to parents who were former slaves, he spent his childhood working in the Kentucky coal mines and enrolled in high school at age twenty. He graduated within two years and later went on to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard. The scholar was disturbed to find in his studies that history books largely ignored the black American population—and when blacks did figure into the picture, it was generally in ways that reflected the inferior social position they were assigned at the time.

Established Journal of Negro History

Woodson, always one to act on his ambitions, decided to take on the challenge of writing black Americans into the nation's history. He established the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (now called the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History) in 1915, and a year later founded the widely respected Journal of Negro History. In 1926, he launched Negro History Week as an initiative to bring national attention to the contributions of black people throughout American history.

Why Should We Study African American History?

It is important for all Americans and especially those on American college and university campuses to take the time to fill in the “gaps”, between the “idealize” and “romanticized” renderings of American history and some of the “real” and “still traumatizing” events that some cannot forget and others refuse to remember! The study of Negro/Black/ African American History presents that challenge to all of us.

“The American Negro must remake his past in order to make his future”

“History must restore what slavery took away. For it is the social damage of slavery that the present generation must repair and offset.”…Arthur Schomburg
Librarian and Book collector

“The achievements of the Negro properly set forth will crown him as a factor in early human progress and a maker of modern civilization.”…
Carter G. Woodson
Historian

“History is a people’s memory, and without a memory, man is demoted to the lower animals.”…………………………………………..Malcolm X
Nationalist leader

THE NATIONAL THEME FOR 2008
“Carter G. Woodson and the Origins of Multiculturalism”

From its inception, America has been a landscape peopled by diverse ethnic and racial groups, and today virtually all peoples are represented. If America has always been racially and ethnically diverse, the nation's self-image has not always recognized its multicultural history. Until the last decades of the twentieth century, America has seen itself largely as the flowering of Anglo-Saxon culture and prided itself on allowing immigrants to adopt the American way.

During the early years of the twentieth century, a small number of intellectuals began to question whether America was simply a transplant of English civilization. W. E. B. Du Bois, Theodore Herzel, and Randolph Bourne believed that modern America should embrace the cultural differences that newcomers brought with them to America. Democracy, they believed, required tolerance of difference and could sustain those differences in harmony.

Among those intellectuals of the Progressive era, Carter G. Woodson did most to forge an intellectual movement to educate Americans about cultural diversity and
democracy. For the sake of African Americans and all Americans, Woodson heralded the contributions of African Americans and the black tradition. In 1915, he established the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History and by the time of his death in 1950, he had laid the foundation for a rethinking of American identity. The multiculturalism of our times is built on the intellectual and institutional labors of Woodson and the association he established. He should be known not simply as the Father of Black History, but as pioneer of multiculturalism as well. In honor of its founder, the Association for the Study of African American Life and History devotes the 2008 National Black History Theme.