Celebration or Placebo?
The annual focus on African-American heritage generates questions about Black History Month observances.
By Crystal L. Keels
“I hate Black History Month.” Such reads the title of a 2001 essay posted on www.epinions.com. The author immediately attempts to assure readers that this is not racist sentiment. On the contrary, the writer insists, the issue is that Black History Month is relegated to the shortest month of the year. And once that month is over, Black history generally disappears from educational agendas. The author also admits that the aims of Dr. Carter G. Woodson, the second African-American to graduate from Harvard University and the founder of Negro History Week, were more than legitimate, but at this point in history, such “segregation” of Black history should be obsolete.
Yet the plethora of lectures, exhibits, film screenings and poetry readings that suddenly appear on university and college campuses across the nation every February suggest that Black History Month might be helping to fulfill Woodson’s goal. Woodson initiated Negro History Week in 1926 as a way to highlight the almost universally ignored contributions and history of people of African descent.
But in recent years, questions have been posed about the relevance of Black History Month and related celebrations, particularly those in institutions of higher education.
“Over the years, I have grown increasingly disenchanted with Black History Month, even as I reluctantly participate in some of the festive activities,” says Dr. Audrey T. McCluskey, associate professor of African and African American diaspora studies and director of the Black Film Center/Archive at Indiana University.
