Black History Month is a yearly celebration of accomplishments by Black Americans and a moment to recognize their prominent role in the history of the United States. February is Black History Month, which dates back to 1926, when the idea came to light. Black History Month’s initial rehearsal was Negro History Week, developed in February 1926 by Carter G. Woodson. The famous historian helped create an organization and events directed toward studying and promoting the accomplishments of African Americans. The Negro History Week changed into Black History Month during the 1960s civil right movement on various campuses. President Gerald Ford officially recognized it in 1976 to take hold of the chance to honor and respect the often-ignored achievements of African Americans in the country throughout history (Goodall). Learning about one’s culture and other people’s cultures helps people realize how much they are alike. They quickly eliminate barriers and start to connect in many ways genuinely. The reasons why individuals should celebrate Black History Month are lightly given by many, and research fails to get into details about the subject. Therefore, it is important to celebrate Black History Month since it brings people together, helps celebrate diversity, realizes the significance of the stories of Black people, and takes people over and beyond their history books. Also, people should celebrate black history month because it enables individuals to create plans for future change, retells Black people the challenges and disparities faced by predecessors, promotes education, and empower students.
Learning about Black History Month is vital since it brings people together as a community. Such a month helps people understand other individuals from diverse backgrounds and cultures and how people are all related. For instance, family events usually feel better when friends, family, neighbors, and co-workers come together to celebrate themselves and their accomplishments. Also, individuals build relationships when many people from every area of their lives come together to celebrate a promotion, birthday, or graduation. Such celebrations instigate joy and unity among them, especially when they look at persons from different ages, statuses, and regions putting aside their dissimilarities to celebrate. This is what Black History Month can do to a vast group of individuals since people commemorate the achievements of different African-Americans in the United States while putting aside their differences and opinions (Tedeneke). In this regard, they can understand how their variations unite rather than break them apart.
In his statement, American President Joe Biden on National Black History Month 2022 said that “Each February, National Black History Month Serves as both a celebration and a powerful reminder that Black History is American history, Black culture is American Culture, and Black stories are essential to the ongoing story of America – our faults, our struggles, our progresses, and our aspirations. Shining a light on Black History today is as important to understanding ourselves and growing stronger as a nation as it has ever been. That is why we must take time to celebrate the immeasurable contributions of Black Americans, honor the legacies and achievements of generations past, reckon with centuries of injustice, and confront those injustices that still fester today” (Black History Month). Black History Month, therefore, encourages and celebrates diversity. Encouraging diversity involves bringing awareness that everyone is diverse and has something to contribute (Stubbins 18). Also, when people rejoice about variety, they communicate the thought that diversity is lovely. Black History Month festivity goes beyond realizing the accomplishment of Black Americans. It publicly pays tribute to men and women who fought for the rights and freedoms of the Black population. In addition, it makes people understand the impact those men had on lives and how individual lives would have been different if those heroes did not take chances to achieve great things.
Celebrating Black History Month also helps one realize the significance of stories of the Black population and takes them over and beyond their history books. The month involves sharing and rejoicing the account of many women and men who brought a difference in the modern world (Goodall). Some successes are more notable than others; however, every story shows how they changed a situation or the world and how people can also. On the other hand, history books omit lesser-known individuals who succeeded in incredible things. Also, studies show that African American youngsters and youths get little information from schools and parents about the month. Black American youth, specifically those from low-income backgrounds, rarely receive accounts about Black History. Youths and teenagers today view more social media events and television programs than the past generations, and Black people are no exception to such a trend (Stubbins 24). While they enjoy more entertainment and social media than before, they also take in novel information and facts concerning the environment around them. Little is told about their historical pasts and how they came to be in America since the programs on television portray African American history negatively, and thus many take an opposing stand. Therefore, rather than allowing history books, television, and social media to portray imperative people, Black History Month can provide the opportunity to learn about such historical figures that impacted the world in one way or another.
Celebrating Black History Month enable peoples to create plans for future change. Every narration one hears regarding Black History Month has affected them and has modeled the world to be what it is today. Also, there are still many things to plan, change and improve so that Black people’s future is given a level performance field where they can get equal opportunities and benefits (Peek). If everybody desires fairness, there is a need to generate environments where disparity and discrimination are tolerated. It includes environments with an explicit pledge to inclusion and diversity in all its guises. In this case, inclusion can mean an environmental and cultural sense of belonging. It includes continuing awareness raising, where compromise may be essential.
When individuals come to celebrate Black History Month, people from other cultures interact and learn about the norms and customs of Blacks. As a result, this advances the idea of racial identity development. In the United States, ethnic or racial identity has solely engrossed the identity of white individuals, and it has been coined as the typical American culture (Settles et al. 250). Black Americans often lose out on what it signifies to be Black in the United States, which can impact the forthcoming African American generation. The people of color society have a robust heritage and tradition. However, when bombarded with Eurocentric norms and values, one can quickly lose vision of what importance African American contributions offer to the United States. Black History Month celebrations, therefore, provide a chance to encourage positive racial identity. Positive racial identity can be utilized to fight life challenges young Black Americans face; thus, many get to be protected from discrimination and racism when they embrace it.
Similarly, people should celebrate Black History Month since it retells Black people the challenges and disparities faced by their predecessors. Discourse about the issues and disparity experienced by Black persons can happen in diverse kinds of environments, such as the workplace. Such conversations occurred for individuals to give their opinions about their struggles and realize that there are considerable gaps in the working environment which still show the bias Blacks face today. The discrimination against Black people in America over the centuries has placed an enormous mental health crisis on the Black community. According to Ward and Mangesha, almost 7.5 million Black Americans agonize from a diagnosable mental illness (Ward and Collins 386). Depression is among the psychological health illnesses, impacting approximately 17 million individuals in the United States.
Urban Black Americans’ exposure to poverty, discrimination, and racism heightens the risk for psychological issues (Ward and Mangesha 387). Such risk factors that Black people continue to experience from childhood to adulthood, even after the promotion of cultural diversity, negatively affect African Americans, d few are believed to seek treatment. In the past, people of color, especially blacks, who looked for psychological health medication, tended to receive misdiagnosis and were taken to mental health establishments. Therefore, many sought traditional and trusted community health centers and family systems that were efficient and could facilitate quick healing. These might be uncomfortable discussions, but they are crucial to identifying and acknowledging the steps that may be taken toward filling the gap and doing away with the differences and struggles that Black people face.
Furthermore, celebrating Black History Month promotes the education of the young generation about the history of Blacks. During the month of Black History, talks must also happen in the education system. Youngsters learn about the core figures across the Black community throughout history and those who did invent, achieve, and succeed in different aspects and things. Usually, Black History is covered in the slavery topic in the education system and usually fails to appear in many other topics taught. Educating children on Black History is essential.
Nonetheless, given that studies claim that the current generation is mainly visually motivated, one should use an appropriate media form to reach them. Therefore, social media and mass media are the best ways to teach youngsters information and facts about Black History (Oddone 106). It exposes them to the victories of the black population and the remarkable contributions made to society that have improved people’s lives. Also, it highlights the disparities that exist in different countries, including the United Kingdom and Canada, in Black History. Thus, if people want change, they have to look to the youngsters in learning institutions who can model a better future for everyone.
Students are often left to deal with challenging different injustices without the wisdom, knowledge, and perspective history can give. For example, the Mississippi strategy, which the white democrats from the South designed in 1875 to suppress the political will of the country’s majority Black population with the application of organized violence, is not added in the high school system that the state needs for graduation (Yarborough). This undermines the capacity to live up to the nation’s ideals of the American founders, particularly the realization of equality. Some schools have begun, particularly in Mississippi, to teach and share a complete understanding of Black History and the experiences faced by Blacks. Students get the opportunity to perform a preliminary study to explore the history of Black people in their communities, improve their critical thinking skills and provide findings through public statements. When sharing their study findings, learners learn vital history, build their voices and find their leadership potential vial steering pertinent discussions of democracy, class, and race.
The advantages of discovering a more comprehensive and precise understanding of the history of Black people while achieving insights relevant to the nation’s past are apparent and intended. Learners are indeed empowered to dedicate fully to their ordinary community, and the community comes to know itself better (Yarborough). To opponents of a more all-encompassing history curriculum, nonetheless, revealing and sharing an inclusive display of the racial past somehow comprises a discriminated rewriting of history that is destructive to the critical values of the nation and state. That stance puzzles many history educators who acknowledge the need to precisely understand and teach the nation’s history. Thus, learners and educators studying history may look up to the legacy left to them by American Black heroes who struggled to make the nation great. Undoubtedly, people can see how African Americans fought and still resist oppression, violence, and racism to attain access to equality that is supposed to be already available.
In conclusion, Black History Month is an important day in our history and should be dedicated to remembering and celebrating the heroes in the Black community. Learning about the month brings everybody together and helps celebrate diversity. Also, Black History Month enables people to realize history’s and stories’ significance. The story of Black Americans in the United States depicts more about how people are as a country, the painstaking journey towards fairness, and the consistent racial sores that they refuse to get better. The omission of Black history in the school curriculum is worse for the Black population and dangerous and destructive for the entire nation. Without a shared foundational understanding of the country’s racial history, people cannot easily step gradually into a tomorrow of racial resolution. By broad-eyed clarity of purpose and commitment and vision to equity and justice, African Americans will rise nationally to create peace with their racial past. This process commences with narrating the truth and dedication to doing so to the youngsters of this generation during Black History month and each month annually. Celebrating Black History Month helps people understand beyond their history books and what they learn in school. Lastly, it enables individuals to develop strategies for future change and retell Black people of the challenges and disparities faced by predecessors. Also, Black History Month promotes education and empowers students.
Work Cited
“Black History Month Provides an Important Opportunity to Reflect on Inclusion.” Internationalwomensday.com, 2022, www.internationalwomensday.com/Missions/17206/Black-History-Month-provides-an-important-opportunity-to-reflect-on-inclusion. Accessed 12, 2022
Goodall, Frederick. “Black History Month is Important, Relevant and Necessary.” Bakerripley, 2021. https://blog.bakerripley.org/black-history-month-is-important-relevant-and-necessary/ Accessed November 12, 2022
Oddone, Cristina. “Using Videos from YouTube and Websites in the CLIL Classroom.” Studies about Languages, vol. 18, 2011, pp. 105–110.
Peek, Monica E. “Black History is America’s History.” E Clinical Medicine, 2021, Doi: 10.1016/j.eclinm.2021.100755
Settles, Isis H et al. “Racial Identity and Depression among African American Women.” Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, vol. 16, issue 2, 2010. 248 – 255, Doi: 10.1037/a0016442
Stubbins, Quentin L. “The Effects of Learning about Black History on Racial Identity, Self-efficacy, Self-esteem, and Depression Among Low-Income African American Youth.” Dissertations, Andrews University, 2016, Pp. 1–26, www.digitalcommons.andrews.edu/dissertations/1625
Tedeneke, Alem. “Black History Month: What is it and why do we need it?” World Economic Forum, 2022. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/01/black-history-month-what-is-it-and-why-do-we-need-it/ Accessed November 12, 2022.
Ward, Earlise and Mangesha Maigenete. “Depression in African American Men: A Review of What We Know and Where We Need to Go from Here.” The American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, vol. 83, no. 203, 2014, pp. 386 – 397, Doi: 10.111/ajop.12015
Yarborough, Chuck. “How Teaching Local Black History Can Empower Students.” Education Week, 2022, www.edweek.org/teaching-learning/opinion-a-more-complete-American-history-starts-with-local-black-history/2022/02 Accessed November 12, 2022.
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