Black History Month

1. Black History Month a reminder of what
we never had …..
I have never been a fan of black history month I get asked to speak at some event or
other I usually say no with a sense of guilt at having let the brothers and sisters
down..
..it’s not something I can articulate easily because it feels like being against
Christmas or not wanting to sing happy birthday at the party of an acquaintance I like
but not that much.
It feels like I’m in favour of sin amongst the innocent, every year it rolls round and the
events can range from speeches to, pro, statements and educational fairs. All
attempting to change something that hasn’t changed since the inception of the idea
of black history month, the fact that we only get a month. One month in which to say
hi, hello what about us the other eleven are a desert of ignorance in which history is
a preserve for those that own the means by which the narrative is told.
It’s not entirely all bad I know that for some people black history month is revelation
in a conversation with one of my friends it was pointed out to to me that but for BHM
educating their children to the fact that history included black people it was a first for
their kids. I could only agree, although I can’t help thinking that the fact that its once
a year underlines my point its something her kids forget for the other eleven months
so let me tell you what I think would really stick lets have a black history. Lets dump
the month it reminds me of the fact that the media, largely ignores it and everyone
else does the same except for those who are committed to remembering BHM. why
don’t we have black history give ourselves a chance to move the needle, give
ourselves the chance to remember what we forget and others have forgotten and
that history isn’t history unless we are in it black history month just reminds me of
what we should have and what history should be
https://www.blackhistorymonth.org.uk/article/section/opinion/black-history-month-reminder-never/

2. I’m proud of Britain’s Black History Month.
But now it needs a rethink
In the 30 years since I launched it there have been some excellent projects
– and also some rubbish. Here’s how I’d remedy that
Police arresta woman in the Brixton riots of 1981.‘In the 1980s police harassmentofblack people was rife,and
sparked three separate waves of massive civil unrest’.Photograph:Rex/Shutterstock
I was the politician responsible for introducing Black History Month to Britain exactly
30 years ago. The idea had originated within the Greater London Council, and I had
inherited it after the organisation’s abolition in 1986. At the time I was leader of
Lambeth council.
The 1980s was a time when the status of black people in this country was still being
openly questioned. The National Front, then still a political force, was demanding
that we be deported. Police harassment of black people was rife, and had
sparked three separate waves of massive civil unrest in cities across Britain. In our
schools black children were being stereotyped as low achievers and excluded at
shocking rates. And, as we now know, the closest aides of the prime minister
Margaret Thatcher believed black people had “bad moral attitudes”.
But four decades after the Empire Windrush had docked in Tilbury, bringing the first
postwar arrivals from the Caribbean, it was also a time when many of my generation
recognised that our parents were not going to return to the Caribbean, Africa, India,
Bangladesh or Pakistan. We, who had been born in the UK or lived here from
childhood, knew we were here to stay.
Some of us were concerned about the way our young people, especially men, were
facing high unemployment and criminalisation, and we wanted to provide another,
more positive, model of how things could be. I for one understood the frustration that
these young men endured and there was not much we had the power to do; but we
could offer a sense of history, achievement and continuity.
Black History Month provided an opportunity to show a history we knew existed but
which had been hidden. Few of us – and by us I mean British people of all ethnicities
– knew much about the role our nation had played in colonising and absorbing
some of these “native” countries and cultures. I myself often had to say “we did not
come to Britain for the weather” when questioned, but it was very clear that most
white British people did not know what positive contributions black people made, and
continue to make, to the UK.

3. For example the story of the actor Ira Aldridge, who played key Shakespearean roles
on the London stage in the 1820s. Or Harold Moody, who came to London to
become a doctor in 1904 and set up the League of Coloured Peoples. We wanted to
create a record of involvement and achievement in British life that went beyond the
Empire Windrush; to focus on what was missing from British life.
I believe we initially achieved this, in recognising and promoting the achievements of
Bishop Wilfred Wood, Lord Pitt, Dame Jocelyn Barrow, and Bill Morris – who had all
been recognised for their work singularly but who we celebrated as part of a legion of
achievers. They had made history, and we felt it vital to acknowledge their
contributions. In Lambeth alone, we were able to hold numerous information and
awareness-raising events.
One thing I have learned, though, and which I passed to those who have set up
the LGBT History Month, is to keep control. We did not try to steer or control Black
History Month, and that was a mistake – since what we have seen among all the
excellent projects, scholarship and drama has been some rubbish. We found schools
that highlighted black people who were in the news – but for breaking the law, not for
positive social achievements. One, in the late 80s, believed that all it needed to add
to its teaching was “a flavour of chilli peppers”.
Other schools felt they “ticked a box” by simply inviting children to come dressed as
pop stars or athletes – reinforcing another stereotype, that black people’s only
worthwhile contribution is in sports or entertainment. And this month an east London
school had to apologise after suggesting children dressed up as slaves. Now
something that reflected how Britain benefited from enslavement, and exploitation of
sugar and cotton, might be a good idea.
Another recurrent feature over these past 30 years is how often the work that we do
to capture that history goes missing: it seems to get lost one year to the next. It has
happened to my own work when I curated an exhibition of the contribution of African,
Caribbean and Indian (as was then) men and women to the British army from the
1880s to the 1990s. I do not believe this is deliberate, but I do think it reflects the
inequality of esteem for things that are not made by white upper-class men.
And each of these “disappearances” means that knowledge is lost, that it cannot be
shared with others, and that the task of researching and building a story of our
history starts from scratch each October.
My remedy for what has gone wrong with Black History Month is not to scrap it, but
for the Department of Culture Media and Sport to fund it, and to agree an annual
theme or topic, overseen by a diverse black committee.
In this way we might see what an extraordinary, diverse and rich nation Britain has
become. One that we might all be proud to admire, and that reflects to the rest of the
world its achievements of inclusion, equality and multiculturalism.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/oct/26/proud-black-history-month-30-years-rethink

4. Councils are scrapping Black History
Month – but every day the news reminds
us why we need it
Councils have been replacing the celebration of black people with
dodgy, diluted versions that result in the narrowing of difference, as
opposed to the embrace of it
Sarah O’Connor ... stories such as hers are putof why Black History Month is so important.Photograph:Martin
Godwin/The Guardian
We have the Bechdel test, for measuring the portrayal of women on screen, and
the Riz test, for evaluating the representation of Muslims – now we need to come up
with a gauge for diversity. True diversity. Not the ridiculed kind co-opted by defensive
white people who appear to see any welcoming of difference as yet another example
of diversity gone mad. Lionel Shriver diversity, you might brand it. No, Wide Awoke is
talking about actual, complex, intersectional, inclusive, yet-to-be-realised diversity.
Black History Month, which runs throughout October, isn’t perfect but it is a tiny
respite from the other 11 months of the year, which could be described as one long,
tasteless festival of white history … and, for that matter, white present and white
future. Even as the Windrush scandal rumbles on and the individual tragedies of
victims – such as Sarah O’Connor, who died last month still facing bankruptcy as a
result of being classified an illegal immigrant after living in the UK for 51 of her 57
years – are reported, a number of councils have scrapped the name Black History
Month. Or, another way of putting it: black experience has been deliberately erased.

5. But fear not, because Black History Month is being replaced with something even
more inclusive! In the Conservative-led London borough of Hillingdon, for example, it
has risen from the ashes as Culture Bite, featuring country dancing (which is, erm,
British), wine tasting, Indian classical painting and a screening of … Salmon Fishing
in the Yemen – a romcom about white people attempting to take fly-fishing to the
Arabian desert. A film selection for a culturally diverse festival doesn’t get more
parodic than that.
The rules of the diversity test must be: does it include the diverse cultures it claims to
celebrate/describe? Is the person making/curating it from a diverse background?
Does it erase the experience of a community? Replacing Black History Month with a
vague and tokenistic celebration of all ethnicities would surely fail the test. This is not
true diversity. It’s a dodgy, diluted kind, which tends to be dreamed up by straight,
white, privileged people. And it has a high chance of leading to cultural appropriation
– see the story about an east London primary school that asked parents to send
children dressed as slaves in “dirty and worn-out clothes” for a special assembly.
The kind of diversity that results in the narrowing of difference as opposed to the
embrace of it.
Every day, the news reminds us that we need Black History Month more than ever.
And we should all be participating in it. By drumming home the message that black
history is British history. By refusing to let the outrage surrounding the inhumane
treatment of the black British citizens in the Windrush scandal die. By listening more
to black people. By doing all this for more than a month.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2018/oct/01/councils-are-scrapping-black-history-month-
but-every-day-the-news-reminds-us-why-we-need-it