Black History Month is taking on a different meaning for me this year. I was fortunate enough to grow up in a household that taught me black history all year. I am half Ghanaian and half African-American and my parents made sure that I knew my history from both sides.
At an early age, I realized that African-American history had been scrubbed from the history books and I always make sure to spread as much education as I can to young kids who are yearning to learn about the numerous contributions that our ancestors have made to this society.
During the election, I saw what was once an undercurrent of hate come to the forefront. I had people actually feel comfortable enough to insinuate their reasons for believing the laughable myth that some people are superior to others. I use the term insinuate because people are rarely brave enough to say what they really feel when they have an inkling that their “secret” belief is wrong.
Despite the hate, I am so proud of my fellow Americans who are pushing back against it. I love seeing the sea of faces from different ethnicities, ages and sexes who are coming together for a common cause…humanity. We often talk politics but rarely do people discuss what it means to be a human being and how we should treat one another. That is why it is so important to learn about other cultures.
I recently saw the movie Hidden Figures and was blown away by the story. It was one that I had never heard before. The movie tells the story of Mary Jackson, Katherine Johnson and Dorothy Vaughan. Three African-American women who worked as “human computers” and did the calculations for the orbital trajectories of the NASA astronauts in the 1960s.
Look them up, their stories are fascinating. If that interests you, just know that there are countless stories about the groundbreaking work that African-Americans have done in this country.You won’t ever hear these stories unless you go looking for them.
As I watched the film, I wondered if people realized how much our society would change if we learned the same amount of information about each others’ cultures. It’s hard to hate someone that you feel you can identify with and feel pride in their accomplishments.
