Why Is Black History Month Necessary?

This morning, I woke up, looked at the icy roads outside of my building, and found out my office was opening late. I logged on to racialicious.com to get my daily fix of how race impacts pop culture.

However, I was not prepared for the lead article this morning.

Apparently, a woman named Lisa Stallings, from Leonardstown, MD was incensed enough at the utter injustice that is black history month to write a letter to the Enterprise (a Southern MD newspaper), calling parents to action.

Stallings writes:

"Many children in the schools are not black and therefore have absolutely no reason whatsoever to celebrate Black History Month. This is the exact same thing as many children are not Christian and therefore are not required to celebrate Christian holidays."

She continues:

"I no longer want my child to be forced to do a report about a famous black person just because of the month.

I do not want my child to have to listen to stories about Harriet Tubman and George Washington Carver every single year during February.

The whole idea of Black History Month is for black people. There is no Asian History Month or English History Month or Middle East History Month or Russian History Month or Australian History Month.

Therefore, none of these groups has the chance to celebrate their heritage or famous people from their heritage."

I wanted to puke. Not only is she wrong (Asian - Pacific American History Month takes place in May) and a bit off base in her assessments of the situation (England, the Middle East/UAE, Russia, and Australia are OTHER COUNTRIES and hence covered in other courses like Modern World History) but her logic is completely skewed.

Her children are not black, and they should not be "forced" to learn about black history?

I'm not white - should that exempt me being "forced" to learn about White History? I didn't see any black people in the pictures of the Boston Tea Party. The Founding Fathers were not black. Am I exempted from learning about Susan B. Anthony? She wasn't black. There were not many black suffragettes - does that mean that her contributions have no impact on my life, as a woman who exercises her right to vote?

I am not Jewish, yet I know most of the major Jewish holidays, the name of their holy book, and how and why Hanukkah is practiced. I am not a Muslim, but I know who Muhammad is, what Ramadan is, and how the Nation of Islam differs from the traditional Islamic practice. I do not identify as a Christian, but know of the traditions and the basic story of the bible. And I was not alive in the Greco-Roman era, but I know the mythology of their Gods and Goddesses. All these things I learned IN SCHOOL. When I was growing up, learning about different cultures was simply something that educated people were expected to do. You learn about others different than yourself.

Why a parent would want to advocate for her children's ignorance of other cultures is beyond my ken.

What scares me the most is that this woman believes she is doing the right thing by her children. That this woman believes that black history can be encapsulated in Harriet Tubman and George Washington Carver. It scares me to think that in a global society, there are still people who would advocate for the segregation of education by ethnicity.

That's right - the segregation of education by ethnicity.

That is what Lisa Stallings has advocated. If her white children are exempted from learning about black people - since "black history month is for black people" - then logically, my black children would not have to learn about white history. We'll just start from the kingdom of Kush and move on. And I suppose that means Asian children can get their own history class as well - hmm, but how would that work? Would Chinese-American children sit in a different class from Japanese-American children? Would Filipino kids split their history lessons between the Spanish (from Spain) kid's class and the Asian history course? Would Latin Americans be required to take an African history class, based on the color of their skin? Would mixed kids have to take extra history courses?

I also wonder if Stallings is just ignorant of the historical whitewashing that went on with the story of American history, and how black history month (and the subsequent additions of Hispanic Heritage Month, American Indian Heritage Month and Asia Pacifc Heritage Month) was created to rectify the willful editing of historical fact to minimize the achievements of people of color. Or maybe, just maybe, she believes that all this black history is detracting from "real" history.

My stomach is still turning.

However, I must admit that I too am sick of black history month.

I am sick of this band-aid solution to a long standing issue. People like Lisa Stallings need to realize that black history should not be confined to a month. Black history is AMERICAN history. I am sick of it being segmented out and highlighted in a month - as if the tumultuous history of African-Americans could be summarized with neat sound bytes and biographical information.

I want black history month scrapped. Done away with. Because it simply is not good enough.

American history needs to be rewritten. It needs to show an accurate portrayal the people and events that went into the foundation and creation of this country.

The history of Native Americans did not end with the settlement. The Trail of Tears did not kill them all. Where is the history of the Native Americans? Why are there still reservations? Why is their community plagued by alcoholism? What have they accomplished (besides casinos)? Those questions should be answered and recorded in our history books!

If Columbus is still getting shout-outs for "discovering" America, can we please add a section that discusses the Vikings and China landing here first? And can we also throw in some Latin American history, and their perspective on the Columbus situation?

Can we add in the section on Asian-Americans? Something beyond that one sentence "They helped build the railroad?" Can we talk about the issues and discrimination they encountered? Can we talk about the internment of Japanese-Americans in WWII, not as a historical "my bad" but as a time when the United States of America persecuted a section of its citizenry?

Can we really talk about the Louisiana Purchase, and what that meant for the indigenous people in that region? Can we really discuss the Alamo, and the Panama Canal, and how that impacts how other people around the world perceive us?

And can we please stop advocating the same five pinnacles of African-Americana - Slavery, Harriet Tubman, Jim Crow, MLK, and George Washington Carver? There was a bit more to things than that. Start asking people you know: Who was W.E.B. Dubois? What did Booker T. Washington contribute to African-American history? How do the positions advocated by Dubois and Washington equate to the modern African American? What did Ralph Ellison write? Why were the Black Panthers so militant?

This is all American history.

And even if Lisa Stalling and a few other members of her generation do not recognize that, it is up to us to ensure that the next generation will.