Departments across Emory University will host numerous virtual activities during February in recognition of Black History Month, including panel discussions, a film screening and conversations with artists and authors, according to a press release.
“Our theme for Black History Month this year is ‘legacy and responsibility’ as we reflect on the loss of so many luminaries in 2020,” says Carol E. Henderson, Emory’s chief diversity officer, vice provost for diversity and inclusion, and adviser to the president.
From the deaths of civil rights icons like Rev. Dr. C.T. Vivian, Rev. Joseph Lowery and U.S. Rep. John Lewis to the senseless killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Rayshard Brooks and Ahmaud Arbery, among others, “given all this loss, coupled with the groundswell of people responding to a clarion call for change, Black History Month renews our interest in remembering those who laid the groundwork for such change,” Henderson says. “That is our legacy. It is our responsibility.”
How Black History Month began
What has now become Black History Month began in 1926 as Negro History Week, created by historian Carter G. Woodson, founder of the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History. Woodson, the second African American to earn a PhD from Harvard, timed the week to coincide with the birthdays of both Frederick Douglass and President Abraham Lincoln.
Fifty years later, in 1976, the organization, now known as the Association for the Study of African American Life and History, expanded the celebration from a week to a month.
President Gerald Ford issued the first national Black History Month proclamation in 1976, noting the relevance of 1976 as the bicentennial of the United States.
“Freedom and the recognition of individual rights are what our revolution was all about. They were ideals that inspired our fight for independence: ideals that we have been striving to live up to ever since. Yet it took many years before these ideals became a reality for Black citizens,” Ford noted.
“In celebrating Black History Month, we can take satisfaction from this recent progress in the realization of the ideals envisioned by our Founding Fathers. But, even more than this, we can seize the opportunity to honor the too-often neglected accomplishments of Black Americans in every area of endeavor throughout our history,” Ford continued.
Information: news.emory.edu/stories/2021/02/er_black_history_month/index.html
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