You know a practice has achieved respectability when it invites the chagrin of those who benefit from it. Since its invention in 1926 by historian Carter G. Woodson, Black History Month has grown from the modest goal of preserving black history to seeing history being made by a black president. A sense of arrival at American destiny has led to wild claims of a post-racial society. In these conditions of presumed social perfection, BHM, so the logic goes, has outlived its usefulness and should be dismantled for a more inclusive national alternative. But since the jury is out on both of these idealized claims, it is worth looking at why BHM was thought necessary in the first place and if it really should be laid to rest.
Like most American public practices, BHM was rooted in a struggle waged at street level and then moved from the barricades to the ballot box. BHM grew out of an absence and a hunger and out of abject neglect of blacks in America. Black people, who were in society but not of society, were relied upon to build America but not credited for their contribution.
While in the U.K. in the ’70s and ’80s, I followed stories of African American success and struggle that always seemed innovative and indicative of what would come to the rest of the world because it originated in America. Blacks in America comprise the largest and most successful group of Africans located in the Western Hemisphere. This means America has a leadership responsibility. I saw nothing happening in the U.K. during that time that remotely resembled what American blacks were achieving here in the U.S.: the growth of a sizable middle class, the alteration of politics by widespread black inclusion and the transformation of culture by a focus on black creativity as an emblem of national cool.
Long after African Americans had settled the idea of their African heritage in relation to their American-ness, in the U.K. the convention was still to place a hyphen between “black” and “British,” as if the bridge between the two had to be made and unmade simultaneously.
But size can hinder and change can seem lumbering as a result. There is much lingering prejudice still to be dispelled (just look at the proportion of black poor and incarcerated compared with whites), and this is where a revitalized BHM may prove indispensable. By earmarking a time in the national calendar for black events the hope was to raise awareness of black contributions to the nation’s health and wealth. In a stubborn recession where resentments of all kind simmer just below the surface of the national body politic, cultural practices, such as BHM, take on heightened significance. In these hard times, college campuses and BHM can be ideal partners to foster links with the wider community of food banks, homeless shelters and pinched welfare budgets. A student community is better placed than most to spread the many positive messages associated with a vibrant BHM program of events (assuming healthy funding from the administration).
A post-racial America is a long way away and perhaps not even desirable if it means eliding blackness for a crass neutrality of cultural negation, and a post-racial America (where difference is celebrated rather than vilified) is dependent on the continued efforts on occasions such as BHM to spread the awareness of a neglected side of the American tableau.
As a black man of British birth and Caribbean heritage and upbringing, I’ve seen race on three continents (I grew up in Guyana) and I abhor the way race is used to malign the poor and the powerless for political gain or for continued dominance of the ruling groups. Skin color needs to be confined to aesthetics (to tan or not to tan) rather than tied to race as a negative marker for political exploitation and economic privilege.
I know the American experiment in nationhood is like no other on the planet; it is a special mix of politics, culture and history that led to the election of a black president, the first in a major economy. Blackness is not a single entity, which is why a month is needed to show the diversity within the black community in terms of class, politics, religious outlook and even sports.
Negative assertions of race continue to oxygenate the sense of blackness as a single entity at the expense of a complicated diversity among blacks. This should not surprise us. The examples of whites acting together to exclude blacks have come from corporations and institutions invested in groupthink with a small and powerful coterie of whites at the helm. The moment the decision-making becomes democratic among whites is when racism loses out to innovation and talent, as the last election aptly demonstrated.
BHM should continue to showcase the creativity of the various ethnicities within the clumsy, catch-all category of race and it must continue to point the way toward cross-cultural exchanges between the races. The responsible BHM model (see the Africana Studies speaker series) must include raising awareness among college students of the many factors that continue to hold back blacks, even as those same students find themselves locked in a personal struggle to succeed and contribute creatively to the nation in global recession.
The experiment of nation building is an unending one. BHM can continue to be a useful tool in raising awareness about the work that remains to be done for greater participation by the poor and disenfranchised in the largesse of the country.
I know race counts but it must stop being a negative marker of black being, it must be confined to aesthetics rather than rabid politics. I’ve had phone conversations with all manner of Americans who tell me that they did not realize I was black when I meet them because I did not sound black. How can such a stereotype (no matter how large a grain of truth to it) ever work to anyone’s advantage? This means that whether blacks like it or not they have been constructed in white consciousness in certain persistent unhealthy ways, rooted, no doubt, in a history of slavery. It is not simply a question of skin. Culture counts, but it is just part of the picture. Language denotes race to a certain extent but it includes class and location, education and religion, and, of course, power.
I’m interested in the extent to which blackness is performance in how far it is a mimetic identity and how far a matter of genealogy and being. That sounds heavy but is means that the humanity we hold in common must be foregrounded by all groups if race is to be less of a negative factor in the American psyche. Post-race may have nothing to do with blacks. Post-race may well mean that whites have to surrender the privilege and assumptions that come with white skin and enter a more neutral space of communality with other Americans.
Meanwhile let’s make Black History Month at Virginia Tech one step toward acknowledging one vital part of the American tapestry, devoting as we do most of the rest of the year to heralding the dominant group.
So what’s to celebrate? I think at the college level there is the usual mix of the arts and politics spread across concerts and panel discussions, but this BHM is extraordinary with the tragedy of Haiti. Perhaps it may call for a more international flavor to the month with a special look at our neighbor Haiti in need of a big helping hand.