Page 32 - 1619 Project Curriculum

The 1619 Project

undemocratic Constitution that They say our people were born on of all individuality — to exert their attendance, as if these conditions in

excluded women, Native Ameri- the water. own identity. Enslaved people would a country built on a racial caste sys-

cans and black people, and did not When it occurred, no one can wear their hat in a jaunty manner or tem are not utterly predictable. But

provide the vote or equality for say for certain. Perhaps it knot their head scarves intricately. crucially, you cannot view those sta-

was in

most Americans. But the laws born the second week, or the third, but Today’s avant-garde nature of black tistics while ignoring another: that

out of black resistance guarantee surely by the fourth, when they had hairstyles and fashion displays a black people were enslaved here

the franchise for all and ban dis- not seen their land or any land for vibrant reflection of enslaved peo- longer than we have been free.
crimination based not just on race so many days that they lost count. ple’s determination to feel fully At 43, I am part of the first gen-

but on gender, nationality, religion It was after fear had turned to human through self- expression. The eration of black Americans in the

and ability. It was the civil rights despair, and despair to resigna- improvisational quality of black art history of the United States to be

movement that led to the passage tion, and resignation to an abiding and music comes from a culture that born into a society in which black

of the Immigration and Nation- understanding. The teal eternity because of constant disruption could people had full rights of citizenship.

ality Act of 1965, which upended of the Atlantic Ocean had severed not cling to convention. Black nam- Black people suff ered under slavery

the racist immigration quota sys- them so completely from what had ing practices, so often impugned by for 250 years; we have been legally

tem intended to keep this country once been their home that it was as mainstream society, are themselves ‘‘free’’ for just 50. Yet in that brief-

white. Because of black Americans, if nothing had ever existed before, an act of resistance. Our last names est of spans, despite continuing to

black and brown immigrants from as if everything and everyone they belong to the white people who once face rampant discrimination, and

across the globe are able to come to cherished had simply vanished owned us. That is why the insistence despite there never having been a
the United States and live in a coun- from the earth. They were no longer of many black Americans, particular- genuine eff ort to redress the wrongs

try in which legal discrimination Mbundu or Akan or Fulani. These ly those most marginalized, to give of slavery and the century of racial

is no longer allowed. It is a truly men and women from many diff er- our children names that we create, apartheid that followed, black

American irony that some Asian- ent nations, all shackled together in that are neither European nor from Americans have made astounding

Americans, among the groups able the suff ocating hull of the ship, they Africa, a place we have never been, progress, not only for ourselves but

to immigrate to the United States were one people now. is an act of self-determination. When also for all Americans.

because of the black civil rights Just a few months earlier, they the world listens to quintessential What if America understood,

struggle, are now suing universities had families, and farms, and lives American music, it is our voice they finally, in this 400th year, that we

to end programs designed to help and dreams. They were free. They hear. The sorrow songs we sang in have never been the problem but

the descendants of the enslaved. had names, of course, but their the fields to soothe our physical the solution?

No one cherishes freedom more enslavers did not bother to record pain and find hope in a freedom When I

was a child — I must

than those who have not had it. And them. They had been made black by we did not expect to know until have been in fifth or sixth grade — a

to this day, black Americans, more those people who believed that they we died became American gospel. teacher gave our class an assignment

than any other group, embrace the were white, and where they were Amid the devastating violence and intended to celebrate the diversity
democratic ideals of a common heading, black equaled ‘‘slave,’’ and poverty of the Mississippi Delta, we of the great American melting pot.

good. We are the most likely to slavery in America required turn- birthed jazz and blues. And it was in She instructed each of us to write a

support programs like universal ing human beings into property y the deeply impoverished and segre- short report on our ancestral land

b

health care and a higher minimum stripping them of every element gated neighborhoods where white and then draw that nation’s flag. As
wage, and to oppose programs that made them individuals. This Americans forced the descendants she turned to
write the assignment

that harm the most vulnerable. For process was called seasoning, in of the enslaved to live that teenag- on the board, the other black girl in

instance, black Americans suff er which people stolen from western ers too poor to buy instruments used class locked eyes with me. Slavery

the most from violent crime, yet and central Africa were forced, old records to create a new music had erased any connection we had

we are the most opposed to capital often through torture, to stop speak- known as hip-hop. to an African country, and even if we

punishment. Our unemployment ing their native tongues and practic- Our speech and fashion and the tried to claim the whole continent,

rate is nearly twice that of white ing their native religions. drum of our music echoes Africa but there was no ‘‘African’’ flag. It was

Americans, yet we are still the most But as the sociologist Glenn Brac- is not African. Out of our unique iso- hard enough being one of two black

likely of all groups to say this nation ey wrote, ‘‘Out of the ashes of white lation, both from our native cultures kids in the class, and this assignment

should take in refugees. denigration, we gave birth to our- and from white America, we forged would just be another reminder of

The truth is that as much democ- selves.’’ For as much as white people this nation’s most significant origi- the distance between the white kids

racy as this nation has today, it has tried to pretend, black people were nal culture. In turn, ‘‘mainstream’’ and us. In the end, I walked over to

been borne on the backs of black not chattel. And so the process of society has coveted our style, our the globe near my teacher’s desk,

resistance. Our founding fathers seasoning, instead of erasing iden- slang and our song, seeking to picked a random African country

may not have actually believed in tity, served an opposite purpose: In appropriate the one truly Ameri- and claimed it as my own.

the ideals they espoused, but black the void, we forged a new culture can culture as its own. As Langston I wish, now, that I could go back

people did. As one scholar, Joe R. all our own. Hughes wrote in 1926, ‘‘They’ll see to the younger me and tell her that

Feagin, put it, ‘‘Enslaved African- Today, our very manner of speak- how beautiful I am/And be ashamed her people’s ancestry started here,
Americans have been among the ing recalls the Creole languages that —/I, too, am America.’’ on these lands, and to boldly, proud-

foremost freedom-fighters this enslaved people innovated in order For centuries, white Ameri- ly, draw the stars and those stripes

country has produced.’’ For genera- to communicate both with Afri- cans have been trying to solve the of the American flag.

tions, we have believed in this coun- cans speaking various dialects and ‘‘Negro problem.’’ They have ded- We were told once, by virtue of

try with a faith it did not deserve. the English-speaking people who icated thousands of pages to this our bondage, that we could never

Black people have seen the worst enslaved them. Our style of dress, endeavor. It is common, still, to be American. But it was by virtue

of America, yet, somehow, we still the extra flair, stems back to the point to rates of black poverty, out- of our bondage that we became the

believe in its best. desires of enslaved people — shorn of- wedlock births, crime and college most American of all.•

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