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I recently spent the past holiday with my family, and used the opportunity to talk with as many of my nieces and nephews as possible. This conversation was with my nephew Raymond who is graduating high school in a years time and saw me identify myself as “Black” on a survey someone handed to me. Raymond wanted to know “why?”, since everyone is calling themselves “African American”. Our conversation turned into a oral history lesson that lasted about an hour between myself and my two brothers. What I said to Raymond went like this.
“ When my brothers and I were growing up the word black was an easy word to use against black people as a put down. It seemed that we would do anything not to be called black, including fist fights, straightening our hair, listening to the “safe Negroes” who would tell us that if we would just “behave” we could go far in life. We might have gone on believing in this lie had it not been for a few activist, namely Adam Clayton Powell, the Black Panthers, Malcomb X and the Nation of Islam, as well as many others who taught us that black is not a color. Black as it applies to the American experience is about a way of thinking, how you see and interact with the world around you.
Your everyday relationships with friends and family, your walk, your ability to find something to live for in the face of bleak prospects. Now if people want to call themselves “African American” they can, that the great thing about this country is that you can define yourself anyway that you like, however, I suspect that this new terminology is another clever way to avoid a word that many people worked hard to legitimize as a positive term. The word “African” is a European invention and didn’t exist in the minds of the people who inhabited the continent. Africa is a generic term slapped onto a continent by people who were only there to steal and exploit land as well as people. The word Africa doesn’t tell me whether your talking about Youroba, Tuitsi, Zulu, Bantu, Hutu, Senegalese, or any number of black ethnic groups living on the continent.
The word Black People at least makes me a person and not a continent, and I’ve spoken to more than a few “Africans” who have said politely and quietly that “you’re an American, not African.”
I don’t know how my nephew will identify himself when filling out the various applications that will ask him about his race. What I hope I have done is given him a perspective that seems to be missing from the discussion about “who we are.”
“ When my brothers and I were growing up the word black was an easy word to use against black people as a put down. It seemed that we would do anything not to be called black, including fist fights, straightening our hair, listening to the “safe Negroes” who would tell us that if we would just “behave” we could go far in life. We might have gone on believing in this lie had it not been for a few activist, namely Adam Clayton Powell, the Black Panthers, Malcomb X and the Nation of Islam, as well as many others who taught us that black is not a color. Black as it applies to the American experience is about a way of thinking, how you see and interact with the world around you.
Your everyday relationships with friends and family, your walk, your ability to find something to live for in the face of bleak prospects. Now if people want to call themselves “African American” they can, that the great thing about this country is that you can define yourself anyway that you like, however, I suspect that this new terminology is another clever way to avoid a word that many people worked hard to legitimize as a positive term. The word “African” is a European invention and didn’t exist in the minds of the people who inhabited the continent. Africa is a generic term slapped onto a continent by people who were only there to steal and exploit land as well as people. The word Africa doesn’t tell me whether your talking about Youroba, Tuitsi, Zulu, Bantu, Hutu, Senegalese, or any number of black ethnic groups living on the continent.
The word Black People at least makes me a person and not a continent, and I’ve spoken to more than a few “Africans” who have said politely and quietly that “you’re an American, not African.”
I don’t know how my nephew will identify himself when filling out the various applications that will ask him about his race. What I hope I have done is given him a perspective that seems to be missing from the discussion about “who we are.”