Before I started college, I didn't give much thought to ethnic differences among peoples of African descent - I simply considered myself black. The fact that my family is from the Caribbean and Latin America never created a feeling of separation within me against my American born brethren and sistren. However, once at school I learned of the divisions and feelings of antipathy between what we at Amherst call the plain ole' blacks (African-American descendants of West African slaves), Africans and Afro-Caribbeans. These kinds of divisions are not only harmful but diverts our concentration from the "real enemy" to our people - systemic institutionalized racism.That's why I thought it was floored early in the election cycle when political pundits and regular black folks were debating whether Barack Obama was "black enough". The issue wasn't that the Illinois senator is biracial, the problem apparently was that his father is Kenyan and not bogged down by the shared historical memory of nearly 400 years of life in bondage. However this overly simplistic view negates the fact that black immigrants have been a presence in this nation for centuries (W.E.B was the son of a Haitian immigrant, Marcus Garvey was Jamaican and Stokely Carmichael who coined the term "black power" was Trinidadian like yours truly); moreover all blacks in this nation are united in a shared link back to Africa.
Happily, we have overwhelmingly thrown our support behind Sen.Obama and the real change he represents, as we divorce the tired Clinton politics of yesteryear. And this is a good thing for many reasons - a black president would present a seismic change in the American body politic and really change our notion of possibility for little black and brown children, but it would also allow us to create a new notion of "blackness". A more inclusive blackness that does not divide us into little boxes. Ethnic pride has its place; I'm Caribbean and proud, but I'm also indelibly linked in the struggle along with the other 25 million black Americans. We are a Diasporic people, lest we forget - linked to Africa and forged in the New World.
So in the words of the writer K.A Dilday lets go back to black, embracing our joint heritage with a unifed future.
2 comments:
Most of the young black professionals throughout the many Internet forums have very impressive profiles. For example: I am a MD, I am a graduate of, I am an alumnus of, I am a lawyer with, I am head of this, I represent that, and yet the Wichita Branch of the N.A.A.C.P. has the nerve and the audacity of no shame to hold a leadership summit.
The Wichita Branch of the N.A.A.C.P. has the wear-for-all to boldly and brazenly perpetrate the weak premise that:
Leaders are not born, they're developed. Either because of opportunity or necessity, someone takes charge and leads the way. Effective leadership is a destination achieved through careful thought, consideration and action. "Leadership By Design: Ensuring Our Legacy" "an army of sheep led by a lion will defeat an army of lions led by a sheep..." NAACP Wichita Branch
They promote the above premise as they prepare for a summit for the sole and ex pressed purposes of looking for Ideas, leadership and a means to ensure our legacy of chattel slavery and injustice.
In real-time every day, grass roots, blue collar African Americans are struggling to maintain in a global marketing equation that's intellectually driven, technologically enforced and African American un-friendly.
African Americans are struggling to hold on mentally and spiritually believing that our children we put through school represents the future for the least of us. While we are struggling to finance their education they are looking for ideas and leadership.
We have young black people with bachelors, masters, PhD's and doctorate's graduating after 4-6 years of intense, indepth studying looking for idea's and leadership. In the name of the (NAACP) National Association for the Advancement of Colored People how can this be?
It is a sad, sad day for the State of Black America that with all their education and knowledge they don't have a clue, idea or the intelligence to lead the way for themselves, let alone provide a blueprint for 38.3 million U.S.A. blacks and the millions more in Africa waiting, hoping and praying that the technologically advanced highly educated young African Americans get an idea for something, lead something or invent something.
Black America, trust Enoch Mubarak when I tell you this:
When you have young African Americans harboring bachelor degrees, science, math, industrial mechanic, business administration, masters, PhD's and doctorate degrees coming out of colleges, universities and graduate schools seeking to hold a summit for the expressed purpose of looking for ideas and leadership, we are in big, big, big, serious trouble.
When you have young educated African Americans coming out of colleges, universities and graduate schools looking to ensure our legacy of slavery and injustice in the name of the NAACP then know that I am speaking truth when I say that the Wichita NAACP creed is false, fake, hypocritical and based on an invalid premise
The NAACP Wichita Branch wishes to ensure your parents/grandparents legacy of slavery and injustice. To be black in your parents era was to be a "survivor" not a "educated black professional" Your parents struggled with a total different dilemma as young black people.
The inability to read and write with articulation and effectiveness was a life saver for your parents whereas the ability to read and write was a death sentence for them.
The legacy of civil rights was a legacy of slavery and injustice. The legacy of civil rights represented an era of moral dilemmas. The 21st century represents an era of intellectual dilemmas, not moral dilemmas.
Marching, protesting and boycotting are useless and obsolete. Your parents and mine did what they did for that time in history but it is evident by our current status in this country that the means and methods your parents employed are outdated, obsolete and unproductive.
Just like the invention of the cotton gin made manual cotton picking obsolete, intellectual rights have made ensuring our civil rights legacy obsolete. The civil rights strategy for your parents was to make their living by the sweat of their brow. Civil rights was all about overcoming a system designed for black failure.
The legacy for black Americans in the 21st century is much, much, much different. The situation you are currently in is new, fresh, and right out of the wrapper. The 21st century is an era of intellectual rights. The 21st century belongs to readers, writers and producers.
The ability to read and write in the 21st century is a life saver. The inability to read and write in the 21st century is a death sentence.
Stop looking to seminars and summits for leadership and new ideas. You are the leaders! Read, write and with articulation of thought and action think your way out of extinction with intelligent strategies or perish. The Wichita NAACP leadership summit surely evidences cowardliness, gross dereliction of duty and personal responsibility.
I hope the NAACP Wichita Branch first official act of intellectual leadership is to re-think that leadership summit.
Don't be fake,weak and hypocritical.
It staggers the imagination how young African Americans can complete high school, college and graduate school only to stand before the global community of the 21st century with their hands and pockets out looking for hand outs, ideas and leadership.
The NAACP, National Urban League and the Chicago Black Star Project target and hypocritically blame poorly uneducated African Americans for not living up to the highest and best use of the opportunities afforded them by this great country, when in all actuality it is the Young black professionals that are not living up to the highest and best use of the opportunities afforded them by their elite education and professional classifications.
Black professionals are guilty of cowardliness and gross dereliction of duty. Young black educated professionals in the name of black organizations shuck their responsible to provide a workable strategy for the inclusion and existence of the black race in and beyond the 21st century.
They shuck their responsibility by cowardly and hypocritically putting the responsibility and burden upon the shoulders of weak, poor, uneducated blacks and the elderly.
We have 1.1 million African Americans with advance degrees, plus a plethora of African American ministers/leaders, senators, congressman, representatives, councilmen and alderman but yet, African Americans have no verifiable evidence of a technology, infrastructure or industry.
African American organizations, political leaders and African American ministers/leaders concertedly lack the collective intelligence to create a foundation of inclusion for the survival of African Americans. How can this be?
If a hint is sufficient for the wise, below are 4 ideas from Enoch Mubarak to grow on:
Rule 1- Don't look for leadership
Rule 2- You are the leader
Rule 3- If you walk like a lion and talk like a lion, you had better darn well be a lion.
Rule 4- Don't ask for what you are not prepared to take.
The 21st century is yours to see, command and become a part of. The 21st century belongs to readers, writers and producers. Young African Americans have the education, what they need now is courage.
Enoch Mubarak
President & CEO Mubarak Inter-prizes
www.mubarakinter-prizes.com
I concur with the first speakers comment. I work in Brooklyn, New York and am fortunate to bear witness to regular collaboration between African Americans, Afro-Caribbean and African people. I live in Harlem where there is also unity between the African-American and Afro-Latino community. I dream a world where we are linked in a spirit of unit and collaborative action. I aplaud the sister's comments. I have one correction though -- Dubuois is the son of an African American mother and Dominican father. Peace.
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