Ed. NOTE: This is a revised and updated version of an article that first ran in the Driftless Journal on February 27, 2020. (Until now, the article has never been published online in any form.)
What is Black History?
Wikipedia offers this: “… the part of American history that looks at the history of African Americans or Black Americans.”
That’s one way to think about it.
As a working definition, it seems reasonable enough. It is, in fact, something very close to what scholar and educator Dr. Carter G. Woodson – known as the “Father of Black History” – had in mind when, in 1926, he and the organization he’d founded 11 years earlier, the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (now called the Association for the Study of African American Life and History, or ASALH) launched “Negro History Week.”
Believing “those who have no record of what their forbears have accomplished lose the inspiration which comes from the teaching of biography and history” (naacp.org), Woodson lobbied schools and organizations across the country to encourage the study of Black history, with Negro History Week as the center of his project. Woodson, a son of former slaves, selected February for the initial week-long celebration, in honor of the birth month of abolitionist Frederick Douglass and President Abraham Lincoln. In 1976, the designation was extended to a month, and Black History Month continues to be observed every February in the United States.
Another definition
To be clear – Woodson hoped the time would come when Negro History Week would be unnecessary. He saw the evolution of the idea as leading toward a time when all people simply recognized “the contributions of Black Americans as a legitimate and integral part of the history of this country” (naacp.org) – all of which begins to suggest another working definition of Black history.
“Black history is really just history, especially in the U.S.”
This definition was offered by Harold Walehwa, then a junior at Coe College majoring in African American Studies with a minor in history, when interviewed for this article in 2020. The interview took place in the gift shop at the African American Museum of Iowa in Cedar Rapids, where Walehwa was working at the time.
“Even though it’s a really great thing to have a Black History Month, I think there’s sometimes too much focus on the same things – slavery or MLK or Rosa Parks – and too much emphasis on a history of trauma and hurt,” he said. “I also think it’s important to highlight the inventors, the artists, the authors.”
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A definition of Black History that considers it to be “really just history” brings attention to some important truths about this country. Marcia Fudge, who served as the U.S. representative for Ohio’s 11th congressional district from 2008 to 2021 and serves now as the United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, identified some of these truths in an opinion piece for thehill.com in 2019.
“Our history deserves recognition every day because Black History is America’s history,” she wrote. “Dr. Woodson recognized that generations of African Americans have strengthened our country by urging reforms and breaking down barriers. We see the greatness of America in those who have risen above injustice and enriched our society, a greatness reflected in the perseverance of Jackie Robinson, the intellect of W.E.B. DuBois, and the talent of Louis Armstrong. We also gain a deeper appreciation for African American history in the writings of James Baldwin, Ralph Ellison, and Zora Neale Hurston, or in the music of Mahalia Jackson, Billie Holiday, Duke Ellington and countless others.”
Or, as Richard Wright had earlier declared in “Twelve Million Black Voices” – a 1941 collection of Walker Evans photographs accompanied by Wright’s text: “We black folk, our history and our present being, are a mirror of all the manifold experiences of America. What we want, what we represent, what we endure is what America is. If we black folk perish, America will perish.”
Bottom line
In short: This second working definition of Black history suggests it is really not possible to understand the history of the United States without understanding Black history. It is not possible to understand the emergence and development of popular culture in this country without knowing about Black history and the African American Great Migration. It is not honest to claim an understanding of this country’s contributions to science, arts and letters, medicine, space technology, invention, without the study of Black history.
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In an interview with this writer for The Tapestry magazine and later published in Decorah Newspapers in 2010, Lou Bellamy – founder of Penumbra Theatre Company (renamed and reconceived in 2020 as Penumbra Center for Racial Healing) in St. Paul. Minn., — talked about what might well be considered a third working definition of Black history, when he elaborated on his artistic director’s statement, wherein he notes the capacity of theatre “to create an American mythology that includes African Americans and other people of color in every thread and fabric of our society.”
An “American mythology”
Describing what he means by an American mythology and how he sees theatre contributing to its creation, Bellamy said “I believe that the creation and maintenance of perceptions of self and community are influenced by the stories we tell. The stories we tell shape not only our relationships with others, but that which we call reality. As August Wilson says, ‘we are what we imagine ourselves to be.’ People of color have exerted a profound effect upon American government, history, culture, intellectual thought. Their participation in the building of this legacy is obfuscated – many times intentionally – by stories that do not include them. By exploring the human condition through an African American lens, it becomes clear that almost everything we consider ‘ours’ has been shaped and contributed to by multiple peoples. I want to tell stories that tell ‘all.’ Not stories that carry the pejorative connation of revisionism, but stories that include our entire society.”
In the end, putting the study and appreciation of Black history at the center of how we, particularly those of us who are not Black, think about this country and its history – whether for a week, a month, or all the time – might best be understood in terms of how Bellamy has described Penumbra’s mission: To make art that illuminates our shared humanity from an African American perspective.
Describing the importance of Penumbra’s mission, Bellamy said, “If we’re true to our hearts and are specific and honest in our portrayals – complete with warts and all the cultural nuances – we will create the universal. It’s my belief that you learn the most about yourself when you see that self reflected in others. The extent of your humanity may be the extent to which you’re able to see yourself in the eyes of people different from you. It’s always a wonderful thing to see the world in someone else’s eyes; that’s how we learn to care.”