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© 02/06/07
Happy 28
Days of Watching White People Fret About Black History
Without Bothering To Learn Any While We Trot Out The Same
Old Trivia That We Re-Hash Every Year For One Month,
Settling for Mere Days of Recognition When What We Really
Oughta Do Is Make Sure Our History is Integrated Into
American History and Celebrate Our Achievements Every Month
of the Year, Not Just In February!
Whew!
That’s a long title but I couldn’t make it any shorter.
Look, twenty-eight days is pretty special, I admit. There’s
only one day for the Irish, St. Patrick’s Day, and the
Mexicans, Cinco de Mayo. But African-Americans have been
here as long as Europeans, so our celebration of our
historical contributions to this country should be just as
long as theirs is: twelve months, not one.
It was an
African, Crispus Attucks, who was the first ‘American’ to
die in the Revolutionary War. A statute is erected to him in
Boston, but most Americans don’t know his name, yet the
names of Patrick Henry and other Revolutionary War heroes
are written in American history books for all to see. Why is
Crispus Attucks name only written in books about
African-American history?
Some folk
want to do away with African-American History celebrations,
hoping that would usher in a new era of inclusion. Of
course, that is very unlikely, given this country’s record
of not including any recognition of our achievements without
a fight in any medium, whether it be history books, museums,
period movies, art, music or just folklore.
What I
propose is an AfrAm Historical Timeline calendar each year
that points out the significant dates we should remember and
the things we should observe on those dates. For instance,
January would include MLK’s birthday and the national
federal holiday honoring him, as well as the anniversary of
the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation and the
creation of “watch night’ services. Each month would
chronicle such events and historical moments in our history,
ending with the Kwanzaa celebration in December, following
Christmas and Channukah.
In the
meantime, when every American knows the name of the
African-American who was the first American killed in the
American Revolution, African-American History will just be
American History.
Until then,
we’ve only got those 28 days and MLK Day and Juneteenth and
those seven days of Kwanzaa and the fourth Saturday in July
when down in Texas where I’m from the black community has a
big homecoming celebration every year and that reunion they
have every year in Spencer Sharples and April 4th,
the anniversary of the assassination of MLK and Nelson
Mandela’s birthday (when is that exactly?) and any of the
rest of the year when we feel like celebrating some black
person in this country or elsewhere on the planet who has
done something of significance like being born alive and
sane, like surviving, like speaking truth, like making
music, like standing up for what’s right, like being human
despite all efforts to dehumanize and demoralize each and
every one of us.
© 2/6/07 AfrAm Style
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