Every Month is Black History Month, but, Okay, It’s Black History Month, 2021
This special Black History episode starts with a brief history of Dr. Carter G. Woodson, the “Father of Black History,” and the founder of “Negro History Week,” which commenced in 1926, and is now Black History Month. Dr. Woodson was the second Black person to earn a Ph.D. (Class of 1912; doctorate in history) at Harvard. Dr. W.E.B. DuBois, who earned his doctorate in 1895, was the first. An intellect of the highest order, what Dr. Woodson did in founding and promoting Negro History Week, was, quite simply, necessary, profound, and forward thinking at a time when America simply did not want to acknowledge that Black people are the backbone of this society, culture, and economy.
The second part of episode three is devoted to a discussion of why we should study the extraordinary history of Black people. More specifically, at this point, it is obvious that, like Dr. Woodson did, it is time to elevate again and deliver a more honest, accurate, and comprehensive curriculum to our students in public institutions—from kindergarten through graduate and professional school! There is not a single subject to be learned that Black people have not been at the center of—from literature and science, to math, architecture, engineering, art, music, and, of course, history. We do, indeed, need discrete classes in Black literature, history, scientists, music, etcetera, but it is imperative that the whole public school curriculum is updated to be more accurate and inclusive.
Ignorance is not bliss, and it is slowly eroding the advances we have made and killing our society—as anyone who is paying attention to what is unfolding in the country today can plainly see. The truth is a necessary ingredient for the health of a great society; and, right now, society is far from healthy.
Resources:
**A few books by Dr. Carter G. Woodson
The Miseducation of the Negro (1933), The Education of the Negro Prior to 1861 (1915), The Negro in our History (1922), African Heroes and Heroines (1939), The History of the Negro Church (1921), The Rural Negro (1930) The Negro Professional Man and the Community, with Special Emphasis on the Physician and the Lawyer (1934)
**The Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH) (www.asalh.com):
—Dr. Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Professor of History and of African and African American Studies at Harvard, is the President. She is the author of Righteous Discontent: The Women’s Movement in the Black Baptist Church 1880-1920 (1994) and several other publications.
—Dr. Lionel Kimble, Associate Professor of History at Chicago State University, is the Vice President. His research interests are Black Chicago, US Labor and Working Class History, and World War II. He is also the president of the Chicago chapter of ASALH. He is the author of A New Deal for Bronzeville: Housing, Employment, and Civil Rights in Black Chicago, 1935-1955 (2015).
**Other founders of the ASALH, along with Dr. Woodson, Dr. George Cleveland Hall, William B. Hartgrove, Alexander L. Jackson, and James E. Stamps.
For More Information pertaining to this Episode, please visit our website at www.survivinghealingandevolving.com
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