Understanding some salient things about the African origin brings us to the 10 essential things people should know about black history. Africans or the black people originated from east Africa according to history. The earliest known recorded history arose in Ancient Egypt, and later in Nubia, the Sahel, the Maghreb, and the Horn of Africa.
Following conceptualizations of Africa developed by Leo Africanus and Hegel, European Africanists conceptually separated continental Africa into two racialized regions – Sub-Saharan Africa and North Africa. Sub-Saharan Africa, as a racist geographic construction, serves as an objectified, compartmentalized region of “Africa proper”, “Africa noire,” or “Black Africa.”
The African diaspora is also considered to be a part of the same racialized construction as Sub-Saharan Africa. North Africa serves as a racialized region of “European Africa”, which is conceptually disconnected from Sub-Saharan Africa, and conceptually connected to the Middle East, Asia, and the Islamic world.
These Africans are therefore understood as Blacks. These in turn forms the history which we are about to look into:
Prominent Black Contributors to Black History
Here are some of the black personalities that contributed one way or the other to the development of the black history:
- Historian Carter G. Woodson. Often referred to as the “Father of Black History,” he was notably the second African American to graduate from Harvard University with a doctorate degree, and is credited with being one of the first scholars to study and research the history of African Americans.
- William Tucker was the first known Black person to be born in the 13 colonies. He was born in Jamestown, Virginia, in 1624. According to BlackPast.org, his parents were indentured servants and part of the first group of Africans brought to colonial soil by Great Britain.
- After years of remarkable work as an attorney, Thurgood Marshall became the first African American to serve in the U.S. Supreme Court. Officially nominated by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1967, he served as a justice until 1991.
- In 1854, John Mercer Langston notably became the first African American lawyer in the state of Ohio. He went on to serve as the dean of the law department and vice president of Howard University. He’s also remembered as the first African American from Virginia to be elected to public office, specifically to the U.S. Congress.
- Anthony Benezet, a white Quaker, abolitionist, and educator, is credited with creating the first public school for African American children in the early 1770s.
- After graduating from Oberlin College in 1850 with a literary degree, Lucy Stanton became the first Black woman in America to earn a four-year college degree.
- Martin Luther King, Jr. started as a freshman at Morehouse College at the young age of 15.
- James McCune Smith was the first African American person to earn a medical degree. He also started the nation’s first pharmacy under Black ownership, and was the first African American to have their work published in a peer-reviewed medical journal.
- After attending Barnard College, Lila Fenwick graduated from Harvard Law School in 1956, becoming the first African American woman to graduate from the prestigious legal institution. She also later studied at the London School of Economics and worked at the United Nations.
- Hiram Rhodes Revels was sworn in as the first Black U.S. senator in 1870.
- Guion Bluford became the first Black person in space in 1983, and would spend 688 hours there over the course of his career as an astronaut.
10 Essential Things People Should Know About Black History
Some important facts you should know about the African or the black history in the whole universe are outlined below for your perusal:
Unfortunately, the long sordid history of the African-American experience leads many to misconstrue the trans-Atlantic slave trade as the beginning of Black history.
Seneca Village Existed in Central Park in New York City Today
A predominantly Black neighborhood of around 200 residents existed in the Upper West Side from 82nd Street to 89th Street. The village was the largest community of Black homeowners pre-Civil War. Black Americans were able to live there and experience voting rights as property owners. They enjoyed their schools, churches, and gardens until they were forced out of the area for the building of Central Park.
Protest and Movements
While it’s certainly more romantic to believe that civil rights advances happened naturally simply with the passage of time because society just grew more moral, that world view is simply not supported in fact. Gains were only won through centuries of relentless, indefatigable resistance and protest—from slave rebellions to the Underground Railroad to Sit-Ins, Freedom Rides, March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, Montgomery Bus Boycott, the March from Selma to Montgomery marches and more.
Why Black History Month is in February
Black History Month isn’t celebrated in February due to pure coincidence. It was decided upon to coincide with President Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass’s birthdays. Both have long been aligned and celebrated in the Black communities for their efforts as abolitionists. What started as one week known as “Negro History Week” parallel to their birthdays was expanded into a month-long celebration formally declared Black History Month by President Gerald Ford in 1976.
On April 16, 1862 President Lincoln signed the District of Columbia Compensated Emancipation Act, a law that prohibited slavery within the district and also compensated previous slaveholders an average of $300 (approximately $8,000 in 2021 dollars).
Across the country slaves themselves, their families and descendants received nothing. The simple truth is that at every progress juncture when government finally passed legislation to ostensibly rectify systems of oppression, mistreatment and outright theft, they conspicuously omitted any tangible remuneration for the black.
Disabled Black Americans are Part of Black History
Though Black History Month has been celebrated for many years, the contributions of those Black people with disabilities are rarely recognized or celebrated. Yet, 5.6 million Black Americans live with a disability. Meanwhile, it’s not widely known or mentioned that Harriet Tubman experienced epilepsy or that Muhammad Ali had dyslexia. Failure to mention or recognize the disabilities of Black achievers contributes to erasure and works against inclusivity.
Many people assume that simply because laws changed at different points in history discrimination and oppression immediately ceased. That assumption is not just misguided and dangerous; it’s completely ahistorical. History is replete with examples of laws either unenforced, completely disregarded, subverted or even overruled by the Supreme Court, rendering them fairly meaningless in the day-to-day lives of most Black people.
Throughout history white resistance was forceful and relentless and as a result, new legislation rarely if ever translated into swift and enduring justice.
Harsh Complexities
Slavery may have ended in 1865, but many systemic issues continue to make surviving and thriving as a Black American difficult. For example, redlining in the 1930s outlined color-coded maps to show risky investment areas which not-so-coincidentally aligned with predominantly Black neighborhoods. This continues to make home ownership and wealth-building through home ownership for Black people difficult today.
Rosa Parks Not the First Black Person Seat Problem
Rosa Parks was famously credited for sparking the civil rights movement and Montgomery bus boycott when she refused to give up a seat to a white man in Alabama in 1955. However, it was Claudette Colvin who was arrested for failure to give up a seat on the bus several months prior to Rosa Parks.
Color Problems
While all Black people are people of color, all people of color are not Black. The term “people of color” encompasses anyone who doesn’t identify as white or of European descent. When speaking specifically to Black issues or triumphs, it’s important to use the word Black. Referring to people of color when you really mean Black people may only contribute to the erasure of complexities experienced by Black people.
