One of the wonderful things about Black history is that you learn things that no-one else really knows. And the longer you study it, the more opportunities you have to reflect on it and realize the contrast between Black History and the standard perception of Americans, that does not include Black history.
This may seem all very abstract, but it is very real.
Now, about 5 years into my study of Black History in earnest, I've had a very simple, yet profound realization.
When this nation has come to the point where every person, studies Black history like a Black history expert, then we'll know that the U.S. has experienced an essential, and needed psychological/philosophical epoch.
The point is, that Black history, is United States history. The experience of Africans in America, is a vital and important story in how this nation functions, and operates. It's hypocrisy, it's unfairness, it's failings in providing security, liberty, justice, basic rights, and it's active contribution to disparity and injustice.
Every failure and discrimination today; against women, gays, "enemy combatants" unregistered immigrants, has shared roots in the precedence set by the treatment of the American African.
When elementary, high school and college curriculum includes African American history, not by name, rather, included in it's rightful position as American history, then we'll know, that this nation has not only experienced the needed philosophical change, but that it's also begun to address, in earnest, the disparities and logical conclusions for how this nation needs to change to fulfill it's promise to provide liberty and justice for all.
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