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Showing posts with the label #BlackAmerican

Today in black history: Smokey Robinson is born, John Singleton nominated for an Oscar, Tuskegee Airmen are here, and more

#BlackHistory, #AfricanAmerican ,  #BlackAmerican , #BlackHistorymonth 1940 – Happy birthday, Smokey Robinson. William “Smokey” Robinson is born in 1940 in Detroit. Robinson iss ranked 20th on Rolling Stone’s list of 100 Greatest Singers, and was once called America’s “greatest living poet” by Bob Dylan. He wrote some of rhythm and blues’ most classic love songs by groups such as The Temptations and The Supremes. He sang hits such as “Cruisin’,” “Tears of a Clown” and “Ooo Baby Baby.” 1942 – Tuskegee Airmen are initiated into the armed forces. They were the first African-American flying unit in the U.S. military, and flew 1,578 missions and won more than 850 medals. 1992 – John Singleton is nominated for an Oscar for Boyz n the Hood (1991). He was the youngest African-American and, at 24, the youngest person to be nominated for the Academy Award for best director. Singleton was also nominated for the Academy Award for best screenplay. 2002 – Bobsledder Vonetta Flowers win...

Meet the man who created Black History Month

  #African-AmericanHistory #BlackAmerican #Black History,#AmericanHistory #CarterGWoodson (CNN) February marks Black History Month, a federally recognized, nationwide celebration that calls on all Americans to reflect on the significant roles that African-Americans have played in shaping US history. But how did this celebration come to be -- and why does it happen in February? The man behind the holiday Carter G. Woodson, considered a pioneer in the study of African-American history, is given much of the credit for Black History Month. The son of former slaves, Woodson spent his childhood working in coal mines and quarries. He received his education during the four-month term that was customary for black schools at the time. At 19, having taught himself English fundamentals and arithmetic, Woodson entered high school, where he completed a four-year curriculum in two years. He graduated from Berea College in 1903 and went on to earn his master's degree in history from the University...

Published 50 Years Ago, 'I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings' Launched a Revolution

(Illustration by TS Abe; Photographic reference: Corbis Outline #MayaAngelou #IKnowWhyTheCagedBirdSings #African-American #BlackAmerican Maya Angelou’s breakthrough memoir forever changed American literature and helped carve a new space for black self-expression Maya Angelou published the first of her seven memoirs not long after she distinguished herself as the star raconteur at a dinner party. “At the time, I was really only concerned with poetry, though I had written a television series,” she would recall. James Baldwin, the novelist and activist, took her to the party, which was at the home of the cartoonist- writer Jules Feiffer and his then-wife, Judy. “We enjoyed each other immensely and sat up until 3 or 4 in the morning, drinking Scotch and telling tales,” Angelou went on. “The next morning, Judy Feiffer called a friend of hers at Random House and said, ‘You know the poet Maya Angelou? If you could get her to write a book...’” That book became  I Know Wh...

Family demands release of evidence in Breonna Taylor’s case

#BreonnaTaylor #GrandJury #Police #BlackWoman #BlackAmerican #Justice4Breonna By CLAIRE GALOFARO, PIPER HUDSPETH BLACKBURN and ANGIE WANG LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Breonna Taylor’s family demanded Friday that Kentucky authorities release all body camera footage, police files and the transcripts of the grand jury proceedings that led to no charges being brought against police officers who killed the Black woman during a raid at her apartment. The decision disappointed and angered those who have been calling for justice for Taylor for six months, and protesters vowed to stay in the streets until all the officers involved are fired or someone is charged with her killing. A diverse group, including Taylor’s mother, marched through Louisville on Friday evening. The protests were peaceful, though at one point, police in riot gear fired flash bang devices to turn back a crowd on a street. Two were arrested, authorities said. About a dozen people who were out past the city’s 9 p.m. curfew were ar...

The diverse history of Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

#JewishProfessors  #HistoricallyBlackColleges #CivilRights #African-American  #BlackAmerican #Black History While Jewish and African American communities have a tumultuous shared history when it comes to the pursuit of civil rights, there is a chapter that is often overlooked. In the 1930s when Jewish academics from Germany and Austria were dismissed from their teaching positions, many came to the United States looking for jobs. Due to the Depression, xenophobia and rising anti-Semitism, many found it difficult to find work, but more than 50 found positions at HBCUs in the segregated South. Originally established to educate freed slaves to read and write, the first of the Historically Black Colleges and Universities was Cheyney University in Pennsylvania, established in 1837. By the time Jewish professors arrived, the number of HBCUs had grown to 78. At a time when both Jews and African Americans were persecuted, Jewish professors in the Black colleges found the env...

Black History Facts -The earliest recorded protest against slavery and human trafficking was by the Quakers in 1688.

#AfricanAmerican  #BlackAmerican #BlackHistory #Quakers #TheSocietyofFriends Quakers, also known as “The Society of Friends,” have a long history of abolition. But it was four Pennsylvania Friends from Germantown who wrote the initial protest in the 17th century. They saw the slave trade as a grave injustice against their fellow man and used the Golden Rule to argue against such inhumane treatment; regardless of skin color, “we should do unto others as we would have done onto ourselves.” In their protest they stated, "Pray, what thing in the world can be done worse towards us, then if men should robb or steal us away, & sell us for slaves to strange Countries, separating housband from their wife and children….” Their protest against slavery and human trafficking was presented at a “Monthly Meeting at Dublin” in Philadelphia. The Dublin Monthly Meeting reviewed the protest but sent it to the Quarterly Meeting, feeling it to be too serious an issue for their own meeti...

Black History Month is an annual observance in Canada, Ireland, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States

#BlackHistorymonth #BlackHistory #African-American #BlackAmerican Black History Month, also known as African-American History Month in the U.S., is an annual observance in Canada, Ireland, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States. It began as a way for remembering important people and events in the history of the African diaspora. As a Harvard-trained historian, Carter G. Woodson, like W. E. B. Du Bois before him, believed that truth could not be denied and that reason would prevail over prejudice. His hopes to raise awareness of African American’s contributions to civilization was realized when he and the organization he founded, the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (ASNLH), conceived and announced Negro History Week in 1925. The event was first celebrated during a week in February 1926 that encompassed the birthdays of both Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass. The response was overwhelming: Black history clubs sprang up...

The Irony of the “Blackest Name in America” #Washington

  #African-American  #BlackAmerican #Black History #Emancipation,  #Slavery,            #BookerTWashington Washington may be the most important name in the United States of America. It is the name of the capital city, the 42nd state, and thirty counties (including Washington Parish, Louisiana) and fifty-one cities, towns, villages, and unincorporated communities with Washington somewhere in their names. All of these names are after George Washington, the first president of the United States. Among the nearly 39 million African Americans, the surname “Washington” is the most popular. In other words, there are more African Americans with the last name Washington than any other. This makes Washington the blackest name in America. How ironic. I found this out a few years ago when I read an article by Jesse Washington, then of the Associated Press, “ Washington: The Blackest Name in America .” Washington stated that there a...

The US medical system is still haunted by slavery

#BlackWomen #Medical #Slavery #BlackHistory #African-American  #BlackAmerican Black women's history matters in medicine.  Read ProPublica's feature piece on how the US is the most dangerous industrialized country in which to give birth, and racial disparities in maternal mortality make it even worse for women of color: https://www.propublica.org/article/nothing-protects-black-women-from-dying-in-pregnancy-and-childbirth And they're seeking your help in understanding the problem. If you nearly died during pregnancy or know someone who died due to childbirth-related causes, check out this page for more information: http://propub.li/2Ae5RMi At 0:54, a previous version of this chart mistakenly said "deaths per 1,000 live births," but it is "100,000" instead. The error has been fixed. UPDATE: On Tuesday, April 17, 2018 — New York removed the statue of J. Marion Sims as part of Mayor Bill de Blasio’s review of city markers that could be deemed “symb...

When White People Call the Police on Black People

Clockwise from top left: Kelly Fyffe-Marshall, via Instagram; Dave Sanders for The New York Times; Melissa DePino, via Twitter; Myneca Ojo, via Facebook #African-American #BlackAmerican #Police #whitePrivilege #WhitePeople What makes the police encounters chilling is  how routine they are . They happen while black people are going about their everyday lives, only to be interrupted by someone calling the police for the thinnest of suspicions. In the past month, more than a handful of such interactions have attracted widespread attention on social media — and, in turn, in national outlets like The Times, CNN and The Washington Post. “It happens so frequently to people of color that we don’t often think of it as a big deal or as particularly newsworthy,” said Paul Butler, a Georgetown University law professor who is the author of “ Chokehold: Policing Black Men .” He added, “It’s humiliating and aggravating and upsetting, but the idea that it’s national news i...

Of the 12.5 million Africans shipped during the Transatlantic Slave Trade, fewer than 388,000 arrived in theU.S.

#Slavery #SlaveTrade   #African-American  #BlackAmerican #Black History In the late 15th century, the advancement of seafaring technologies created a new Atlantic that would change the world forever. As ships began connecting West Africa with Europe and the Americas, new fortunes were sought and native populations were decimated. With the native labor force dwindling and demand for plantation and mining labor growing, the transatlantic slave trade began. The Transatlantic Slave Trade was underway from 1500-1866, shipping more than 12 million African slaves across the world. Of those slaves, only 10.7 million survived the dreaded Middle Passage. Over 400 years, the majority of slaves (4.9 million) found their way to Brazil where they suffered incredibly high mortality rates due to terrible working conditions. Brazil was also the last country to ban slavery in 1888. By the time the United States became involved in the slave trade, it had been underway for two hund...

For the first time, Miss America, Miss USA and Miss Teen USA are all black women

#MissUSA #MissTeenUSA #MissAmerica #African-American #BlackAmerican #BeautyPageants (CNN) For the first time, America's top beauty pageants --  Miss USA , Miss Teen USA and  Miss America  -- have   crowned black women as their winners at the same time. And that's a big deal if you know pageant history. Beauty pageants early in their histories, some dating back to the 1920s, barred women of color from participating. Even after organizations began changing their rules to accept women of all races, there was still a lingering frustration and opposition to join. Only in the last 50 years have black women become more prevalent in these competitions.  Vanessa Williams was the first black Miss America  in 1983, and  Carole Anne-Marie Gist , the first black Miss USA contestant, was crowned in 1990. The following year  Janel Bishop  became the first black Miss Teen USA. So when Cheslie Kryst was named 2019's Miss USA on Thursd...