Black History Importance

There were many gains earned after the Civil War seemed lost by the time of World War I because racial violence and lynching reached an all time high. However, both the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and the National Urban League (NUL) were founded by blacks and whites during this time. Both of these major civil rights organizations make efforts on the part of blacks and their white allies to insure that the United States provides "freedom and justice to all". The year of Washington's death marked the beginning of the Great Migration from the rural South to the urban North. He is known as one of the best civil rights leaders for the African American people in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s.

Knowing your roots does not only mean knowing the trials and tribulations that the black people had to crawl through. As an African American, I am delighted to see my history acknowledged but when information is not being broaden and explained correctly people are still left ignorant. If Black History Month is going to be celebrated, then present it the right way. It doesn’t have to always be about killing, depression, and what occurred fifty years ago. African Americans should continue to update their presentations on black achievements every year.

Du Bois way of helping African Americans, but Booker T. Washington’s way was the Tuskegee Institute. The Tuskegee helped to educate the black people with skills so that in the future the whites would accept them seeing that they work hard. Although many may think this was a great way to get civil rights, Du Bois did not. Du Bois founded the NAACP and used it for the power to have a say. “Through the publication Du Bois reached an increasingly large audience- one hundred thousand by 1919- with powerful messages that argued the need for black development and white social enlightenment” (Du Bois 884).

In the early 16th century, African Americans were stripped from their natural rights as they were sold as property and used for labor. Throughout history, they have acquired rights as individuals and have gained equality as members of the nation. Because of the cruelty guided toward them in earlier centuries, their fellow African Americans and people in other races have served their responsibilities to help free them by revolting, and have now turned into heroic figures because of their courage. This time marks the struggles to accomplishing The Civil right Movement, which worked to end racial segregation, and provide Africans with constitutional rights to vote. Throughout all the history of the U.S, the most common topic is the one relating to the rights and responsibilities of the nation and the people.

They started a declaration “I Am a Man!” as their motto. Estes states that the strikers chose this motto because “manhood” was more than what it seemed a long tradition that started from the days of slavery. On (page 4), this strike known as, The Memphis Sanitation Strike shows that one cannot appreciate the fullness of the African American struggles for freedom and showing the relationship and ideas about gender relationships and also identity. The book then shows different ways of how manhood has always played a part in black freedom struggles. Estes starts to explore the participation of black men in World War II, and where the beginning of the civil rights movement began.

Woodson’s Negro Achievement Week received a lo... ... middle of paper ... ...ca in African American college students helped lead to the formation of Black History Month. The increase of younger activists allowed the ASALH to cultivate into a more modern association. Fifty years after the first celebration, the ASALH was able to develop the week long celebration of Negro Achievement Week into Black History Month. Every president since 1976 has made some sort of endorsement of Black History Month. No one can quite say how Woodson would feel about about the way black history is commemorated today.

Martin Luther King, Jr. I HAVE A DREAM! In an era when racial discrimination and public bigotry towards African Americans in the United States was becoming more evident, this simple, but powerful statement by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a beacon of hope for all African Americans in the country. In his speech, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, Dr. King expresses his frustration that after a hundred years since the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, African Americans are still treated like second-class citizens. However, Dr. King also expresses his hope that the status quo will change and African Americans around the country will be “free at last.” Dr. King uses eloquent statements to appeal to his audience’s emotions and to see the difficulties and hardships that African Americans across the country suffer on a regular basis.

Brown remembers that she “had heard of Black men-men who were loving fathers and caring husbands and strong protectors.. but had not known any” until she was grown (105). The problems which disproportionatly affect Blacks were combatted by the Party in ways the White system had not. The Party “organized rallies around police brutality against Blacks, made speeches and circulated leaflets about every social and political issue affecting Black and poor people, locally, nationally, and internationally, organized support among Whites, opened a free clinic, started a busing-to prisons program which provided transport and expenses to Black families” (181). The Party’s goals were to strengthen Black communities through organization and education. The dominant culture perceived the Black Panther Party to be a threat, prevented their success whenever possible, and greatly contributed to their ultimate demise.

Similarly the advertisement, “Do you Know What Civilization Owes to the Negro? Can you give the names of the Negro men and women who helped to make this world’s History? The 2-foot Shelf of Negro Literature…” was inspiring the black community to rise by educating themselves in their great history. It was telling the blacks that you were once great and you can be great again. It challenged and questioned the mind; we were creators of civilizations, how are we now slaves to our very creation?

While monitoring the ongoing saga of Black progress, the magazine also put its resources to work to show its readers that Blacks had a history to be proud of and that even during slavery, there were Black men and women whose heroic deeds helped in the freedom struggle and paved the way for future generations of Blacks. As the Freedom Movement gained momentum in the late `50s and early `60s, Ebony became the mirror of the struggle of rights activists, both North and South, to desegregate rail and bus transportation, lunch counters, public schools, hotels and motels, the armed forces and housing. Frequently at the risk of their own safety, Ebony writers and photographers braved the menacing presence of racist sheriffs in order to bring readers firsthand accounts of the valiant battle for racial equality waged by Blacks in a recalcitrant South.