RBG Black History Introduction and Hotlist: "Black History Matters"

The education of any people should begin with the people themselves.... The chief difficulty with the education of the Negro is that it has been largely imitation resulting in the enslavement of his mind.
Dr. Carter G. Woodson, The Miseducation of the Negro(1933)

RBG Street Scholars Think Tank's Purpose: This Educational Program and Research Project is Dedicated to Further Building the Hip Hop--Black Liberation Movement Connection by Integrating Conscious Digital Edutainment with A Scholarly... [more]

From:
"RBG BLACK HISTORY MONTH IS 24/7/365" : 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and 365 days a year.
Of All the Disciplines of Study History Is Best Qualified To Reward All Research.

There is no true separation between the past, the present and the future. Those who don't change change will be change by change. Help us continue to write our history in real time by making a contribution.
Please be sure to follow the curriculum format in your contributions.

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By Daryl Michael Scott
for ASALH at www.asalh.org
The story of Black History Month begins a decade after the founding of the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History. When he conceived of the ASALH in 1915, Carter G. Woodson believed that publishing scientific history about the black race would produce facts that would prove to the world that Africa and its people had played a crucial role in the development of civilization. As a Harvard-trained historian, Woodson, like W. E. B. Du Bois before him, believed that the truth could not be denied and that reason would prevail over prejudice. He thus established a scholarly journal, The Journal of Negro History, a year after he formed the Association. Scientific history, he believed, would counter racial falsehoods, and the community of white scholars would alter its view of the black race. Eventually the truth would trickle down to the public, and the race problem would gradually disappear.

A decade into his labors, Woodson began to think differently about the inherent power of scholarship, the importance of the scholarly community in promoting the truth, and the place of the community in the Association's mission. Scholarship had not transformed race relations, and most white historians had not come to recognize the truth when it was placed before them.

As early as 1920, Woodson had urged black civic organizations to promote the achievements that researchers were uncovering. That year he prodded his fraternity brothers at Omega Psi Phi to take up the work.

In 1924 they responded with the creation of Negro History and Literature Week, which they renamed Negro Achievement Week. By 1925, Woodson decided that the Association had to expand its program. Henforth it would be an organization dedicated to discovering and popularizing the truth. The Association had to re~educate blacks as well as whites, and its doors had to be opened to all interested in history, not just historians and other scholars.

When the Association announced Negro History Week for 1926, Woodson was overwhelmed by the response. Black history clubs sprang up, teachers demanded materials to instruct their pupils, and progressive whites, not simply white scholars and philanthropists, stepped forward to endorse the effort. Woodson and the Association scrambled
to meet the demands of public history. For teachers, the Association published photographs and portraits of important black people. It published plays to dramatize black history. To serve the desire of history buffs to participate in the re~education of black folks, ASNLH formed branches to bring them into the organization.

Woodson selected the week of February that encompassed the birthdays of both Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass, two giants in the history of African Americans. Lincoln, of course, had issued the Emancipation Proclamation that moved the nation away from slavery, and Frederick Douglass had been the greatest leader of African Americans. Symbolically, the selection of Lincoln's and Douglass' birthdays as the week to study Black history reflected Woodson's belief that the history of African Americans was American history.

When Woodson passed in 1950, the Association continued the celebration of Negro History Week. By the time of his death, Negro History Week had become a central part of African American life and substantial progress had been made in bringing more Americans to appreciate the celebration. At mid~century, in cities across the country, mayors issued proclamations noting Negro History Week.

The Black Awakening of the 1960s dramatically expanded the consciousness of African Americans about the importance of black history. The Freedom Schools established during the civil rights era all included the study of Black history. As African Americans entered into mainstream colleges, they demanded Black Studies and Black history became a central feature. Increasingly there were cries for more than a week to study Black history.

The Association, the center of the study of Black life and history, underwent its own changes, including a recognition of the need to devote more time to Black History. In 1976, fifty years after the first celebration, the Association held the first Black History Month. By this time, the entire nation had come to recognize the importance of Black history in the drama of the American
story. Since then all American presidents, Republicans and Democrats alike have issued Black History Month proclamations.

In keeping with tradition, the Association, now known as the Association for the Study of African American Life and History, believes that Black history, like American history, should be studied 365 days a year. Yet as the Founders of Black History Month, ASALH continues to view February as the critical month for carrying forth the mission.
By Daryl Michael Scott
for ASALH at www.asalh.org

Black History Month

• Black History Month from Infoplease
• Biography - Black History Month from Biography.com on A&E
• History Channel's Black History Month
• Carter Godwin Woodson (1875-1950) from the Chicago Public Library
• Dr. Carter G. Woodson: Great African Statesman from the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League
• Issues in Depth: Black History Month from The New York Times Learning Network

Slavery and African American History

• Colonization: The Beginnings of the American Colonization Society
• Abolition: Abolition as a Social Movement
• Migration: Statistical & Geographical Patterns
• The WPA: Cavalcade of the American Negro & Authors and the Federal Writers' Project
• The African-American Mosaic: A Library of Congress Guide for the Study of Black History and Culture

Other Slavery Resources

• Africans in America: America's Journey through Slavery from PBS Online
• Sojourner Truth
• Sojourner Truth brief bio and links from the Lakewood Public Library
• Francis Henderson describes living conditions under slavery (1856)
• James Martin remembers a slave auction (1937)
• More Slave Narratives
• The Confessions of Nat Turner Website
• The Levi Jordan Plantation
• The Underground Railroad from National Geographic
• The Underground Railroad from the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center

African American & "Buffalo" Soldiers

• Sergeant Henry Parker
• Cathay Williams, Female Buffalo Soldier
• 1866: Congress Creates the First Peace Time African-American Units
• Telling what daily life was like for the "colored cavalry."
• The 54th. Mass. Volunteer Infantry, Co. I
• Buffalo Soldier, a song by Bob Marley

• Civil Rights Movement Veterans, "This website is of, by, and for Veterans of the Southern Freedom Movement of the 1960s."
• The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow explores segregation from the end of the civil war to the dawn of the modern civil rights movement
• Powerful Days in Black and White, images by Charles Moore (Eastman Kodak) Timeline of the American Civil Rights Movement, from CNN
• Examples of Hate Crimes Against African Americans, from civilrights.org
• The Movement, background from the Seattle Times includes Fighting for FairnessPhoto Gallery and
• Six Dead After Church Bombing, Washington Post
• The Meredith Mississippi March-June 1966, a set of sixteen photos by Jo Freeman
• Touchstone, an interactive visit to the Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery, Alabama from National Geographic

• Aerial shot of the Mall from Center for Remote Sensing at Boston University
• The Million Man March Pledge
• The Nation of Islam's "World's Day of Atonement"
• CNN article: "An Emotional Celebration for Thousands of Black Men"
• CNN article: "Celebrities Speak out at the Million Man March"
• Transcript of Louis Farrakhan's speech
• CNN Article on the march and Louis Farrakhan

African-American Leaders

• The Internet African American History Challenge ©, from Bright Moments
• The Life of Frederick Douglass, by Sandra Thomas
• Marcus Garvey, a Research Project of the James S. Coleman African Studies Center
• W. E. B. DuBois, from the W. E. B. Dubois Learning Center
• Jackie Robinson, by Henry Aaron
• Marian Anderson, from Afrocentric Voices
• Martin Luther King, Jr., from the Seattle Times
• Martin Luther King Online
• Citizen King from PBS
• The Official Web Site of Malcolm X
• Eldridge Cleaver, former Black Panther, a Frontline Interview
• Nelson Mandela, from the African National Congress
• Biographies of great African-American icons from Biography.com
• Profiles of Great African Americans You Should Know, from the Black Collegian Contemporary African-American History Makers, by Sonya Stinson
• Celebrating African American History, interviews with and about prominent African Americans from Jerry Jazz Musician

In Their Own Words

• Sojourner Truth: "Ain't I a Woman?"
• Marcus Garvey: "The Tragedy of White Injustice"
• Martin Luther King, Jr. :"Letter from a Birmingham Jail"
• Martin Luther King, Jr. :"I have a Dream"
• Senator Robert Kennedy: On Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Life and Death
• Malcolm X: Interview with Alex Haley (in PDF format)
• President Bill Clinton: Speech on Race Relations
• The Portsmouth, New Hampshire Black Elders, highlights from an oral history project

• One Internet, Two Nations, by Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
• The Importance Of Bridging The Digital Divide, from the Clinton White House
• The Christian Science Monitor's Black History Pages
• Wounds from L.A. Riots Still Sting, from CNN Interactive
• Tupac Shakur, from Wikipedia
• Photos of African-American Cowboys, by Ron Tarver
• Blues Highway Photo Gallery from National Geographic

Poetry

• Langston Hughes: "The Negro Speaks Of Rivers"
• Rita Dove: "Lady Freedom Among Us"
• Maya Angelou: "On the Pulse of the Morning"
• Etheridge Knight: "The Idea of Ancestry"
• Brief Guide to the Harlem Renaissance

Institutional Changes

• Congressional Black Caucus
• United Nations Statement on Slavery (7 Sep 1956)
• United Nations Statement on Minimum Age for Child Labor (26 Jun 73)

General Resources

• American Legacy Magazine - Celebrating African-American Culture and History
• Race Relations, from About.com
• MelaNet "The UnCut Black Experience" (includes the Kwanzaa Information Center)
• Black Press USA Network provided by the National Newspaper Publishers Association, Inc.
• Fathom Knowledge Network
• African American World
• Ontario Black History Society
• History and Culture from Nationalgeographic.com
• National Underground Railroad Freedom Center
• Footsteps Magazine
• The Image of Black: Discovering the Hidden History
• The African American Registry