I thought this was the perfect way to close out 2023’s Black History Month (although I have a few more posts that will appear throughout March – black history month is every month).
Their list begins in 1920 and goes through to 2022. They also include a list of the voters who helped create this list of the seventy-five greatest movies by Black directors. They also share where these great films can be viewed on streaming channels.
I have chosen to simply list a few books by Black authors for you to begin reading while we are still in Black History Month. Google them, Buy them, Check them out of your local or e- library. But however you get them, read them, and enjoy them.
The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James
The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
Go Tell It On the Mountain by James Baldwin
My Sister, the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite
And don’t forget the poetry: Langston Hughes, Maya Angelou, and Amanda Gorman
The photo at the top of this post is from the website: Book Source Banter. They have many books to get to know there.
I am trying to share Black History, especially if I can find it through Black voices. I saw this on my timeline on Spoutible (open to the public on Thursday – there will be a review coming then). As a studier of history, I am always surprised to discover something else that I didn’t know. It is so important to keep our minds open to learning new things. If you know of someone not on this extensive list, please add them in the comments.
Somehow it is expected to fit all of Black History into the shortest month, and the more we study Black History, we find that it encompasses all history, from the African continent to the New World. I usually post a link to a terrific Black History Resource, but unfortunately, it is coming up with a 404 error. I hope to find it again soon. I’m hoping it has just moved since it really covered so many aspects of the diaspora.
This post will share links to some online offerings to get everyone started.
First, beginning on February 6, you can sign up to join the Black-owned Tw*tter alternative, Spoutible. It is definitely having some growing pains, but as a pre-registrant I’ve been using it since yesterday and it looks like this could be the one. On the 6th, I’ll be creating an account linked to this website, so join me.
Second, this link highlights free online resources for kids, and while the website says, “It’s never too early to teach children about Black history,” I believe it is also never too late for anyone to learn what’s been missing from mainstream curriculums, and in the case of Florida, being eliminated.
This information was originally shared here a little more than a year ago. The compiler of the information at the links has continued to update and maintained it so all of us can learn more about Black History throughout the year.
Author and activist, Charles A. Preston maintains this Google doc on his own. I discovered him from a random Twitter post last year, and feel fortunate that I did.
The multi-folder Google doc is chock full of information about many aspects of Black History from Afro-Futurism to Zora Neale Hurston and many others in between. I believe he is continuing to update it. When using his folders, remember to give him credit as well as linking to his Twitter or website (linked below).
Mural on a building of WWI hero Henry Johnson and other WWI service members, on Henry Johnson Blvd. in Albany, NY. (c)2021
Henry Johnson was born in Virginia, but lived in Albany, the capital of New York, since his teens. He worked as a redcap (porter) at the Albany Union Station. He was also a sergeant in an all African American unit (the 369th Infantry Regiment, formerly the 15th Infantry Regiment of the National Guard during World War I and was awarded the Croix de Guerre with star and the Gold Palm from the French govenment for his heroism in fighting off a 20 person raiding party of Germans.
He was the first American to receive these awards, and yet there was no recognition from his own country.
Finally in 1996, he was awarded the long overdue Purple Heart and in 2003, the Distinguished Service Cross. In 2015, President Barack Obama awarded him the Presidential Medal of Honor, accepted by Command Sergeant Louis Wilson of the New York National Guard.
You must be bold, brave, and courageous and find a way… to get in the way.
– Congressman John Lewis, 1940-2020
A few years ago, I bought the book, The Children by David Halberstam, but I only read it recently. As an aside, David Halberstam was the commencement speaker when I graduated from college, so I always took a second look at his books.
I looked at this one often in my kindle library, but was never quite ready to sit down for such a serious book. In the last four years, I’ve been engulfed with politics, including racial justice, but I wasn’t ready for a history lesson.
I finally started it last summer, soon after George Floyd’s murder, and with all of Halberstam’s work, it did not disappoint.
I had misinterpreted the title to mean the literal children of the civil rights movement, the young people growing up in that time and after. What I discovered is that Halberstam’s implication that the civil rights movement was left to “the children” – the young adults who risked everything, including their lives to march, to sit at lunch counters, to register to vote, to do many of the things we take for granted, even today.
One of the very surprising things that stood out to me was the level of participation of John Lewis. John Lewis was a hero of mine, but more in an abstract way listening to his modern, inspirational speeches rather than his history, and I wondered why I hadn’t learned his name as readily as I learned about Martin Luther King, Jr. In school. I didn’t realize they were contemporaries, and met and worked together to build what they called the “beloved community.” As I thought about this missing piece in my childhood education, I realized that growing up in the seventies during busing, and my really formative years of middle and high school in the eighties, John Lewis wasn’t part of “history” as we think of it; for that matter, neither was MLK. Lewis’ beating on the Edmund Pettus Bridge was in 1965, one year before I was born, and King was assassinated in 1968 when I was a toddler. These events, and the bulk of the civil rights movement occurred a mere twenty years before I graduated high school; nineteen years to be more precise. In the time between Lewis and King’s assault and assassination, I hadn’t even reached adulthood. This book really brought that home to me. John Lewis would live in my kids’ history books, but for me, he was in my now.
I hadn’t even made it halfway through the book when John Lewis died, and I thought for several days of putting the book down and reading something else, but I didn’t. I finished the story, cringing and welling with tears, and sometimes gasping for air at the horror of it all and the idea that while we’ve come far, we have so much farther to go. When I finished The Children, I immediately read Jon Meacham‘s new book, His Truth is Marching On, and that bridged the short gap between Lewis’ civil rights activism and his congressional career all on that path to the beloved community.
One of the things that I found somewhat amazing, miraculous even, was the number of long-lasting activists all being in the same town at the same time. They didn’t travel to Nashville; they were already there from around the country attending school. John Lewis, Diane Nash, James Bevel, CT Vivian, James Lafayette, Kelly Miller Smith, Rev. James Lawson, who learned the non-violent method he taught them from his trip to India and learning from Gandhi, and of course as witness, David Halberstam, a local journalist with The Tenesseean in Nashville. Reverand Lawson described it as providential during his eulogy for John Lewis in 2020, and that just gave me chills.
If you do one thing, watch the Reverand James Lawson at the funeral of John Lewis in Atlanta, Georgia:
(c)2021Wearing a Mask is Good Trouble, Necessary Trouble. (c)2021
Today is February 1st, the traditional start of Black History Month. It would be good to remember, as Congressional Representative Hakeem Jeffries of NY’s 8th District tweeted this morning: “We’ve been here since 1619. Every month is Black History Month.”
I grew up in NYC in the 70s, at what seemed to be the height of bussing as well as a prominent Back to Africa movement. I didn’t understand why my Black friends didn’t live near me. One of them, Robert, moved with his family to Africa, although I don’t know if that was related to his father’s job or if they decided to “return” (I don’t know the proper term and I apologize for that).
In school, we learned about Harriet Tubman, Booker T. Washington, George Washington Carver, and of course Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr, but not nearly enough. No Medgar Evers, no Emmett Till; at least not that I remember. Thurgood Marshall, of course; he was currently on the Supreme Court at that time. As historic as their lives were, many were left out.
Malcolm X, for example was deemed too militant. It wasn’t until last year when I read his autobiography that I saw how little difference there was between him and the mainstream civil rights movement. Of course, no one agrees with anyone one hundred percent of the time, but students in school should be given all the information and use critical thinking skills to form their own opinions.
I can’t possibly make up for the lack of Black history within American history. As a country we can absolutely begin to try, and I do try in my small space of the internet. Since I am not part of the Black community, I try to draw on Black voices and offer links and some information to get you started.
What I had planned for today was postponed by another tweet I saw this morning; that of March for Our Lives activist, David Hogg who asked if anyone had the link to W.E.B. Du Bois PhD thesis on the history of slavery and abolition in the US, and so with the assistance of David Hogg and Carl Fonticella (who provided the link), I am sharing that to get us started.
Relatedly, the 1619 Project would be important reading as well. The pdf is provided through this link from The Pulitzer Center and begins with an introduction from New York Times journalist, Nikole Hannah-Jones, who provided the idea for the project.
Gwen Ifill was an extraordinary journalist, and someone who I followed for as long as I followed politics. She died too young in 2016 of breast and endometrial cancer. This year she has been honored with a United States Postal Service Forever stamp. You read her author’s page at The PBS Newshour and read some touching memories at Remembering Gwen Ifill. She will always be an inspiration to me.
USPS Forever Stamp, 43rd in a series for Black History, Gwen Ifill. (c)2020
Griffins and Ginger Snaps 