Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, February 2, 1995 TAG: 9502030005
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-14 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Well, not against the people themselves. Wilder's quarrel, rather, is with the use of the hyphenated form to identify and divide Americans by ethnic roots. The trend focuses on our differences rather than our commonality, may be exacerbating racial tensions, and in any event is nourishing ``them vs. us'' thinking.
``I hope that we could learn one thing,'' he told listeners on the holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr. ``That is, that we are all Americans. Not hyphenated Americans. ... I am an American of African descent. But I am an American.''
On Wednesday began Black History Month, celebrated with considerable fanfare every February. How applicable is Wilder's point to it?
Criticism of the observance is not limited to a few whites grousing that no month is set aside to honor white history. Some black scholars and educators are critical as well. A year ago in Newsweek magazine, Wayne J. Joseph, the black principal of a middle school in Diamond Bar, Calif., wrote:
``Black History Month is a thriving monument to tokenism which, ironically, has been wholeheartedly embraced and endorsed by the black community. ... Black contribution to American history is so rich and varied that attempting to confine the discussion and investigation to four weeks a year tends to trivialize the momentous impact that blacks have had on American society. There is also a tendency to somehow feel that `black' history is separate from `American' history. `Black' history is American history - they are not mutually exclusive.''
This seems much like the point made by Wilder, a man of no small ```black' history" note himself. In 1989, he became the first American of African heritage in more than a century to become a governor, and the first in the history of the republic to win election to that post. He ran, however, not as an African-American but as an American - a ``son of Virginia,'' as he stressed in his inaugural address - who happens to be black. His election is significant as a piece of American history, and not solely as a milestone for Americans with African ancestors.
Still, a fundamental reason for Black History Month is no mystery: to set the record straight. For too many years, the history books had downplayed or ignored the substantial contributions of black Americans to the development of this nation. It's also worth remembering that separating and discriminating against people on the basis of ethnic background was an invention not of Americans of African descent but of Americans with Western European forebears.
To the extent it promotes the ``different'' culture and interests of one group of hyphenated Americans, the value of Black History Month is limited. Its greater worth depends on how well it serves an inclusive rather than exclusive purpose, on how well it is a reminder that, as Wilder says, we are all ``as American as apple pie ... pledged to being one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.''
by CNB