Black History Is American History

 

Black History Is American History: Why Knowing Our Past Matters More Than Ever

Know Thyself — A Lesson in History We Cannot Afford to Forget

By Butch Gray | Juneteenth Handbook Blog

What Happens When a Nation Begins to Forget Its History?

There is something deeply troubling happening in America today.

At a time when we should be making greater efforts to understand our nation's past, we are witnessing efforts to remove historical displays, restrict educational programs, and change how some of the most important chapters of American history are presented to the public.

And much of the history being challenged involves African Americans.

I find myself asking a simple question:

How can we expect future generations to understand the world they live in if we refuse to teach them the truth about the world that came before them?

History should not belong to a political party, a particular race, or whoever happens to hold political power.

History belongs to all of us.

It includes our accomplishments, our failures, our discoveries, our injustices, and the lessons we should have learned along the way.

And that is why I believe Black History Month and Juneteenth are more important today than ever before.

Not because Black history should be separated from American history, but because, for far too long, it was left out of the American story.

Black History Is Not Separate History. It Is American History.

Think about it for a moment.

What if children were taught American history as one complete story?

A story that included the contributions of Native Americans, Africans, Europeans, Asians, and the countless others who helped build this country?

What if we stopped treating the accomplishments of African Americans as something that should be discussed only during February?

What if the history of slavery, emancipation, Reconstruction, segregation, the civil rights movement, and the struggle for equal opportunity were taught with the same seriousness as the American Revolution or the signing of the Constitution?

Wouldn't our children receive a better education?

Wouldn't they be better prepared to understand the society in which they live?

I believe they would.

Teaching accurate Black history is not an attempt to rewrite American history. It is an effort to complete it.

For generations, too many Americans were educated using textbooks and historical accounts that minimized African achievements, overlooked African American contributions, or presented slavery and racial discrimination through a distorted lens.

The result was not simply a lack of information.

It was a lack of understanding.

And when we deny children an accurate understanding of the past, we deny them the opportunity to learn from it.

The Backlash Against Progress

American history reveals a troubling pattern.

Whenever meaningful advances toward racial equality occur, those advances are often followed by resistance.

Consider the election of Barack Obama in 2008.

For millions of Americans, the election of the nation's first African American president represented a remarkable moment in our history. It demonstrated how far America had come from the days when African Americans were denied the right to vote, attend certain schools, or even sit beside white Americans in public places.

But Obama's election did not mean racial inequality had disappeared.

In the years that followed, political opposition to programs intended to expand opportunity became increasingly visible.

On June 29, 2023, the United States Supreme Court struck down the race-conscious admissions programs used by Harvard University and the University of North Carolina, ending a longstanding approach to affirmative action in higher education.

Although that decision did not eliminate every affirmative action program in America, it represented a major change in how colleges could consider race in admissions.

The debate continues over whether these policies promote fairness or whether eliminating them ignores generations of unequal opportunity.

We have also witnessed controversies surrounding the removal of Confederate monuments.

To some Americans, these monuments represent heritage. To others, they represent a period of American history built upon slavery and racial oppression, particularly when monuments were erected during the Jim Crow era.

But the removal of monuments has been followed by broader political battles over how race, slavery, and American history should be taught.

In some states, restrictions on particular courses, instructional materials, and classroom discussions have made educators increasingly cautious about addressing difficult subjects.

More recently, historical exhibits and displays concerning slavery, civil rights, and other sensitive chapters of American history have faced removal or revision at federally managed historic sites.

One can debate the appropriate place for a monument or how a museum should present a particular event.

But removing historical evidence or limiting access to well-documented history does not change what happened.

It only makes it harder for future generations to understand.

We cannot erase yesterday simply because remembering it makes us uncomfortable today.

Know Thyself: The Importance of Understanding Our Origins

There is an ancient saying that has always appealed to me:

"Know Thyself."

The phrase is famously associated with the ancient Greek sanctuary at Delphi, although the broader pursuit of understanding oneself and one's place in the world was also important to ancient African civilizations, including Egypt.

To me, those two words describe one of the greatest purposes of studying history.

How can you know yourself if you know nothing about the people who came before you?

How can you understand your culture, your traditions, or your place in the world if the history of your ancestors has been hidden, distorted, or ignored?

For many African Americans, tracing family history becomes particularly difficult when we reach the period of slavery.

Names were changed.

Families were separated.

Birth records were incomplete or never created.

Languages and traditions were suppressed.

And in many cases, the very information needed to identify our African ancestors was lost.

But African history did not begin with slavery.

Long before European ships carried enslaved Africans across the Atlantic, the African continent was home to civilizations that made extraordinary contributions to architecture, mathematics, astronomy, medicine, trade, government, and the arts.

Ancient Egypt, Nubia, Kush, Aksum, and the great kingdoms of West Africa are all part of that history.

African history is much larger than the history of enslavement.

And the African American story is much larger than the struggle for freedom.

We should know the suffering.

But we should also know the achievements.

We should know the tragedies.

But we should also celebrate the triumphs.

Knowing who we are requires knowing the whole story.

Was the Transatlantic Slave Trade the Beginning of the African Presence in America?

This is another historical subject I believe deserves careful examination.

Many Americans were taught a simplified version of history in which the presence of Africans in the Americas begins with enslaved people arriving in English North America in 1619.

But the history is much more complicated.

Africans were present in the Americas during the earliest centuries of European exploration and colonization, well before 1619.

Some arrived enslaved, while others came as free individuals, explorers, soldiers, sailors, and settlers.

One documented example is Juan Garrido, a free West African who participated in Spanish expeditions in the early sixteenth century, including expeditions associated with Juan Ponce de León.

There are also theories suggesting African voyages to the Americas before Christopher Columbus. These claims deserve examination, but they have not been established by conclusive archaeological and historical evidence.

That distinction is important.

If we are demanding accurate history from our schools and museums, we must be equally willing to distinguish documented facts from historical possibilities.

The transatlantic slave trade was an enormous human tragedy that forcibly transported millions of Africans to the Americas. Yet it was not the only circumstance under which people of African descent became part of the American story.

That broader history deserves to be taught.

And it deserves to be taught accurately.

Whitewashing, Blackwashing, and the Search for Historical Truth

Today, when new information challenges familiar historical narratives, some people quickly dismiss it as "Blackwashing History."

But I have often wondered:

Would there even be a reason for these accusations if accurate, inclusive history had been taught in the first place?

For generations, much of the history presented to Americans emphasized European achievements while giving comparatively little attention to the accomplishments of African civilizations and African Americans.

We now recognize many of those omissions as forms of historical whitewashing.

But the solution to whitewashing is not another form of distortion.

It is historical accuracy.

We should not have to exaggerate African achievements to appreciate them.

Nor should we minimize the contributions of others to recognize the importance of Black history.

The evidence should guide the story, whether we are studying an African kingdom, an American president, an archaeological discovery, or a chapter in the history of slavery.

History does not need to be made Blacker or Whiter. It needs to be made more truthful.

And when that happens, everyone benefits.

President Ronald Reagan Understood the Purpose of Black History Month

One of the most interesting reminders of the importance of Black history came from President Ronald Reagan.

On February 24, 1986, President Reagan issued Proclamation 5443, recognizing National Black (Afro-American) History Month.

In that proclamation, he identified the central purpose of the observance as making all Americans aware of the struggle for freedom and equal opportunity.

He also recognized that African American achievements in science, the arts, politics, religion, and other fields were essential to understanding the American experience.

Think about that.

A Republican president, speaking forty years ago, recognized that the history of African Americans belonged in our nation's schools, scholarship, and public understanding.

Black History Month was not intended simply to make Black Americans feel good about their heritage.

It was intended to help all Americans develop a more complete understanding of their country.

That is a purpose worth defending today.

How Black History Month Began

The roots of Black History Month reach back to 1915, approximately fifty years after the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery in the United States except as punishment for a crime.

That year, historian Dr. Carter G. Woodson helped establish the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History.

Woodson understood that the contributions of African Americans had been largely neglected in the nation's historical scholarship and educational materials.

He wanted to change that.

In February 1926, he established Negro History Week, selecting a week that included the birthdays of President Abraham Lincoln and abolitionist Frederick Douglass.

The observance eventually grew into Black History Month.

In 1976, during America's Bicentennial, President Gerald Ford called upon Americans to recognize the contributions of Black citizens, helping establish the monthlong observance nationally.

Today, Black History Month is celebrated in February in the United States and Canada.

In countries such as the United Kingdom, Ireland, and the Netherlands, celebrations take place in October.

What began as an effort to correct historical omissions has grown into an international opportunity to recognize Black achievement, examine historical injustice, and encourage a more complete understanding of the past.

And yet, more than a century after Woodson began his work, we are still debating whether some of that history should be taught.

That should concern every American.

Some of the Black History Heroes I Celebrate

When I think about Black history, I think about the men and women whose accomplishments helped change the world.

People like:

• Ruby Bridges, who, as a six-year-old child, demonstrated extraordinary courage while helping integrate an all-white elementary school in New Orleans.

• James Baldwin, whose writing challenged Americans to confront uncomfortable truths about race, identity, and society.

• Maya Angelou, whose poetry, memoirs, and unmistakable voice inspired generations.

• Arthur Ashe, whose achievements in tennis and commitment to humanitarian causes demonstrated that greatness extends far beyond sports.

• Jackie Robinson, who broke Major League Baseball's modern color barrier and endured enormous hostility with remarkable courage.

• Frederick Douglass, who escaped slavery and became one of America's most influential abolitionists, writers, and advocates for equality.

• Booker T. Washington, who helped establish Tuskegee Institute and promoted education and economic opportunity for African Americans.

These are only a handful of the people whose lives deserve to be remembered.

And I would add Dr. Carter G. Woodson himself.

Without his determination to preserve and promote Black history, countless Americans might never have learned about many of these individuals.

Their stories are not simply Black stories.

They are American stories.

And every student deserves an opportunity to learn them.

Why Juneteenth Matters to Me

My interest in Juneteenth and Black history is not something that began when Juneteenth became a federal holiday in 2021.

I began researching Juneteenth in 1992, long before the celebration received the national recognition it enjoys today.

What fascinated me was how such an important event in American history could remain unfamiliar to so many Americans.

On June 19, 1865, Union General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas, and announced the enforcement of emancipation through General Order No. 3.

The Emancipation Proclamation had taken effect more than two years earlier, on January 1, 1863.

Yet freedom had not reached everyone it was intended to protect.

Juneteenth reminds us that the announcement of freedom and the experience of freedom are not always the same thing.

It also reminds us that progress does not automatically reach everyone at the same time.

The celebration is about freedom, certainly.

But it is also about remembrance.

It is about education.

It is about community.

And it is about making sure future generations understand the struggles that made their opportunities possible.

For me, Juneteenth and Black History Month share a common purpose.

They help us know ourselves.

And they invite the rest of America to know us, too.

What Happens When We Stop Teaching History?

There is an old warning that people who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat it.

That warning becomes especially meaningful when historical education is restricted or neglected.

What happens when a generation grows up without understanding slavery?

Without learning about segregation?

Without knowing why civil rights legislation became necessary?

Without recognizing how ordinary people challenged injustice and changed the country?

We risk raising generations who recognize the names of historical events but do not understand their meaning.

We risk allowing old prejudices to return under new names.

And we risk losing the lessons purchased through generations of struggle, sacrifice, and courage.

History is not always pleasant.

It was never intended to be.

The study of history should challenge us to ask difficult questions and seek truthful answers.

We can celebrate the founding principles of America while acknowledging the ways those principles were denied to millions.

We can honor great national achievements while recognizing serious national failures.

And we can teach children about injustice without teaching them to hate one another.

An accurate history education does not make children responsible for the mistakes of the past. It gives them the knowledge to avoid repeating those mistakes.

That is what education should accomplish.

Where Can You Learn More About Black History?

Fortunately, opportunities to study African and African American history extend well beyond the classroom.

I encourage readers to explore the Juneteenth Day 1 Blog and follow the Juneteenth Handbook Facebook page for information about Juneteenth, African American history, and the people and events that shaped our nation.

Other excellent resources include:

• NAACP Online — Historical information about civil rights, educational equality, and the continuing struggle for justice.

• Google Arts & Culture: Black History & Culture — Digital exhibits, photographs, biographies, and historical collections.

• Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture — Research, educational resources, and historical exhibits.

• Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH) — The organization founded by Dr. Carter G. Woodson, whose work led to Black History Month.

And don't overlook your local library.

Libraries, archives, family records, oral histories, and historical societies can help bring to life the experiences of people whose names never appeared in our school textbooks.

Sometimes the most fascinating historical discovery begins with a simple family question:

"Where did we come from?"

My Final Thoughts: History Should Be Remembered, Not Removed

When I look at the current debates surrounding Black history, I cannot help thinking about what we are leaving behind for our children and grandchildren.

Will they inherit a more complete understanding of the world?

Or will they inherit a version of history carefully edited to avoid uncomfortable truths?

I hope it is the former.

Black History Month should never be viewed as a threat to American history.

Juneteenth should never be viewed as a celebration belonging only to African Americans.

Both are opportunities for America to understand itself more completely.

After all, how can we celebrate the promise of liberty without remembering those who fought to make that promise real?

How can we understand progress without acknowledging the obstacles that had to be overcome?

And how can we know who we are if we refuse to remember where we came from?

Black History is American History. African History is World History. And accurate history belongs to everyone.

The more we know about our past, the better equipped we become to shape our future.

That is why I continue to write about Juneteenth.

That is why I continue to research and share African and African American history.

And that is why I believe the words Know Thyself should be more than an ancient expression.

They should be an educational responsibility passed from one generation to the next.

Because a nation that knows its history has a better chance of learning from it.

And a nation that forgets its history risks making the same mistakes all over again.

Let us remember. Let us learn. And most importantly, let us make certain that the next generation knows the truth.

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Butch Gray is the author of the Juneteenth Handbook and other books exploring African history, African American heritage, and the importance of preserving stories that deserve to be remembered.

Join the Conversation

Do you believe Black history is being adequately taught in our schools today? What historical figures or events do you believe every American student should know about?

Share your thoughts, explore the Juneteenth Handbook Blog, and help keep the conversation about our shared history alive.

History belongs to all of us. Let's make certain it is never forgotten.