February was first officially recognized as Black History Month by President Gerald Ford in 1976. Black History Month has become a recurring celebratory month of African American history in the United States.
According to the National Park Service, Africans were unwillingly taken to the United States by Europeans in 1619. As a result, the Africans brought with them their unique cultures. Sophomore Lily Salmans said African American culture has played a big role in shaping modern day American culture.
“[African Americans] brought a lot of things to the United States … people should recognize the contributions that they made,” Salmans said.
According to NPR News, Carter G. Woodson was the first to celebrate Black History. He originally designated a single week in February to festivities in 1926, but celebrations have grown to the entire month of February. Sophomore Tenley Ginavan said Black History Month creates acceptance of other cultures.
“Learning perspectives from other people who are unlike yourself empathy in people,” Ginavan said.
Free State offers a variety of social studies classes, many of which involve African American history. Ginavan said that people are at a risk of making false assumptions if they fail to listen to multiple opinions.
“If we think about our history classes, and who we are learning about, it’s not a minority at all,” Ginavan said. “It’s not Black people, it’s not Native American people, it’s not Asian people. That’s a problem because we are only understanding history from our perspective.”
The African American community is not the only group with a dedicated history month, over six other ethnicities have months dedicated to their history in the United States. Salmans said knowing multiple standpoints will provide a more accurate view of history.
“It’s important to know the full story of what the U.S. was like,” Salmans said. “How it’s changed, and how we can make it better still, because I still think we can improve a lot.”
Black History celebrations in the United States began before Black History Month, and are nearing their 100th year anniversary. Head of the Social Studies Department, Kellie Lang, said it is important to accurately teach all events tied to African American history.
“There is so much that’s been left out and whitewashed. We have to go back, and we have to teach the ugly history,” Lang said.
Lang said that being able to teach sensitive subjects requires teachers to be vulnerable. Lang said that despite the subjects being hard to teach, they are necessary lessons.
“It plays a role of a reminder of the past, and what mistakes we’ve made, and what progress we’ve made, and where we come from,” Lang said. “We have to learn from history, and these are lessons of the past.”
Lang said she places an emphasis on African American history throughout the school year, rather than focusing on a single month. Lang said one month is not appropriate to focus on African American history, but rather it needs to be included constantly.
“It’s wonderful that they have a month to recognize certain populations in history, but I don’t think it’s enough,” Lang said. “Why is it separate history? To me, Black history is American history.”
