I must admit that February has been a challenging month. Yes, it has been designated Black History Month and as such it has a long and notable history. While it generally is a challenging month, 2019 has been exceptionally difficult.
We live in perilous times. There are so many extremes. We have those who "see no color." We see those who see color in everything, and why not? We have people who want to run from the issue of race. We have amongst us people who are overt racists or covert racists. And we have those who may not be racist but who carry discriminatory attitudes and behaviors. We have those amongst us who will say that we don't have issues like that in our town or in our church or our community.
From the current occupant of the White House with his inflammatory rhetoric and failure to condemn white nationalists to the offensive behavior of the congressman in the Cohen hearing this week who pulled the card of calling in an African American woman as a prop. Yes, he did say inflammatory things about President Obama years ago. We can run but we cannot hide these days.
How shall we do any better if our leaders do not do any better than our people.
The birther issue, Charleston church massacre, and Charlottesville are now deeply embedded parts of our narrative.
On the other hand, I have been stirred and informed and coached up by numerous people, some I know personally and some I know only because of cyberspace, those I've never met. Without giving up any names, you may know who you are. You have posted informative blogs or information on Facebook. Some of your material I have re-posted. Some of you have been able to nail "on this date this happened here," and that drives home the issues. Some of you have provided information about people, places, events, firsts, and those have been meaningful.
All together, I think I am like many of us in the US. I am uninformed. I have been uninformed. I will go to my grave uninformed. Certainly, we studied in school the history of the US and we did the same in our college and university classes. However, we missed the Trail of Tears and we missed the Middle Passage, the brutality of enslavement, the utter despicable treatment of people during Reconstruction and Jim Crow, and even today. We are clueless, America, about the devastating effects of poverty and its links to slavery in our cities and rural areas. As we stand now, Black America will not catch up because White America got such a huge head start.
We know the history of white America. White Americans write and tell stories of white America. White America is taught by white American teachers. I am pretty familiar with white American history.
I have been uninformed about the amazing contributions of black citizens in all areas including agriculture, science, chemistry, leadership, literature, economics, art, education, community development, banking, and the number of inventions that we gloss over including something as simple as the golf tee. It takes movies to bring things to the awareness of white America.
My knowledge of Black History has a narrow path. That path is via farming while black under the scrutiny of the United States Department of Agriculture. I have been schooled in this area since 1994 and will likely be schooled in perpetuity. I have heard stories of mistreatment of black farmers and I have heard stories of advantages of white farmers. I have heard stories of families of black farmers and I have heard family stories of white farmers. They are two distinctly different sets of stories.
I feel cheated. I was clueless about the literal presence of Westside High School in Trinity, Texas, just a few blocks from Trinity High School. I was ignorant of the way in which black citizens of my rural town were treated, other than an exception or two.
I was clueless of the role and treatment of black soldiers until my wife interviewed them during her masters work at Abilene Christian University.
I was clueless about so many different things that influence the history and lives of folks I know and those I do not.
That is why on my desk this morning are a wide range of books: Black Cowboys of Texas, W. E. B. Du Bois, The Collection of Poems by Langston Hughes, Blues from the Delta, God of the Oppressed, Reaping a Greater Harvest, Remembering Tillery's Historical Archives, The Essential Writings of the American Black Church, Show Us How to Do It, White Terror, Free at Last, We Shall Not Be Moved, African American History for Dummies, John Hope Franklin: Mirror to America, The Promised Land, In the Matter of Color, Bullwhip Days, Beyond Forty Acres and a Mule, Divided by Faith, Black Theology and Liberation, Conversations with God, Up From Slavery, Myths America Lives By: White Supremacy and the Stories That Give Us Meaning, and many, many more.
I am uninformed but I shall not remain so. I have been lax in appreciating black America. I will remain so no longer.
Will you join me?
I will join you! I did not realize how little I knew of black history. I thought it was because I had grown up in another country or I had forgotten some of my history lessons. But I was taught through the American school system curriculum. The things you mentioned just were not taught sadly. White America we have so much to learn and a lot we need to change.
ReplyDeleteMy opinion is that those who do not know or who do not want to know, will keep their silence to themselves, and then students who deserve to know will not be taught by those who could teach. Good people keep the barriers and silence going by ignoring our people. This system, in my opinion, goes from elementary schools all the way up to colleges and universities. Many have responsibility to make change. For instance, I had a minor in history as a college student and not one word, as I recall, about African American history. Many of us are making up for lost time.
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