Today is the first day of Black History month. As I reflect on my history as a white American, I remember vividly conversations growing up questioning why there wasn't a "white history month," why we needed a separate month regaled to the history of black people. I can honestly say, I had no idea until my 40s what this meant, what the racist tone of these conversations implied. I did not know the cloud of white privilege and even ignorance I lived in...I believed that my history books, even loosely written and even more loosely taught, actually told the story of our country.
1619. Why did I first learn this date in 2019? I memorized the "Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492" from as early as I can remember. I memorized the tales of explorers, gave reports, dressed up, as these "explorers." Who were these "explorers?" They were exploiters, conquerors, and even murderers who committed genocide in search of their own freedoms and riches. What is 1619? "Slavery in America started in 1619, when the privateer The White Lion brought 20 African slaves ashore in the British colony of Jamestown" (History Channel). Slavery is American history. Destruction of First Peoples is American history. How much of this American history are we taught? If you're like me, we are not. We are not taught about slavery starting in the 1600's. We are not taught about genocide committed by Europeans. We are taught to revel in our history, in overcoming the British who were our oppressors. We are not taught of the European settlers as oppressors. We are even taught that the Civil War wasn't about slavery (spoiler alert, it was) but about state's rights. We are not taught about the destruction of thriving black communities and economic centers in the 1900s. I was taught that my family came after slavery, came after the genocide of the First People, that it had nothing to do with me. But it has everything to do with me. By being an American I absorb all her history. I am her history.
I am white and with that comes having a privilege. I didn't ask for that privilege but I inherited it from the very first white conquerors. I will no longer call them explorers and neither should any of our history books. They were not here out of curiosity - they were here to exploit - for trade routes, for riches, and to take over a land that wasn't theirs for the taking. The way we are taught American history paints a picture, a picture of Europeans as curious and savages as "uncivilized." Our white privilege begins in 1492.
It's Black History Month but black history is American history. Until we can see black history and First Peoples history as American history, teach all our children the real history of our country, without white washing it with our language of "explorers" and "pilgrims," we will never truly reconcile the past and heal to a future of racial equity.
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