The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man

What up World!!! Today I will like to share with you a paragraph out of James Weldon Johnson famous novel “The Autobiography Of An Ex-Colored Man”. While on a train he encounters a racist Texan who believes The Anglo-Saxon race has always been the masters of the world. Read how this Texan gets put in his place by a white northerner.

“Can you name a single one of the great fundamental and original intellectual achievements which have raised man in the scale of civilization that may be credited to the Anglo-Saxon? The art of letters, of poetry, of music, of sculpture, of paintings, of the drama, of architecture; the science of mathematics, of astronomy, of philosophy, of logic, of physics, of chemistry, the use of the metals, and the principles of mechanics, were all invented or discovered by darker and what we now call inferior races and nations. We have carried many of these to their highest point of perfection, but the foundation was laid by others. Do you know the only original contribution to civilization we can claim is what we have done in steam and electricity and in making implements of war more deadly? And there we worked largely on principles which we did not discover. Why, we didn’t even originate the religion we use. We are a great race, the greatest in the world today, but we ought to remember that we are standing on a pile of past races, and enjoy our position with a little less show of arrogance. We are simply having our turn at the game, and we were a long time getting to it. After all, racial supremacy is merely a matter of dates in history. The man here who belongs to what is, all in all, the greatest race the world ever produced, is almost ashamed to own it. If the Anglo-Saxon is the source of everything good and great in the human race from the beginning, why wasn’t the German forest the birthplace of civilization, rather than the valley of the Nile?” [1]

References

[1] Gates Jr. Henry L., and Nelie Y Mckay. eds. "African American Literature" 2nd ed. New York: WW Norton & Company, 2004.



The Souls of Black Folk



What up World!!!! Today I want to share with you a couple of paragraphs out of W.E.B Du Bois famous novel” The Souls of Black Folk”, describing what the function of college should be for us African American males.

 “The function of the Negro college, then, is clear: it must maintain the standards of popular education, it must seek the social regeneration of the Negro, and it must help in the solution of problems of race contact and co-operation. And finally, beyond all this, it must develop men. Above our modern socialism, and out the worship of the mass, must persist and evolve that higher individualism which the centres of culture protect; there must come a loftier respect for the sovereign human soul that seek s to know itself and the world about it; that seeks a freedom for expansion and self-development; that will love and hate and labor in its own way, untrammeled alike by old and new. Such souls aforetime have inspired and guided worlds, and if we be not wholly bewitched by our Rhine-gold, they shall again.
Herein the longing of black men must have respect: the rich and bitter depth of their experience, the unknown treasures of their inner life, the strange rendings of nature they have seen, may give the world new points of view and make their loving, living, and doing precious to all human hearts. And to themselves in these the days that try their souls, the chance to soar in the dim blue air above the smoke is to their finer spirits boon and guerdon for what they lose on earth by being black. I sit with Shakespeare and he winces not. Across the color line I move arm in arm with Balzac and Dumas, where smiling men and welcoming women glide in gilded halls. From out the caves of evening that swing between the strong-limbed earth and the tracery of the stars, I summon Aristotle and Aurelius and what soul I will, and they come all graciously with no scorn nor condescension.  So, wed with Truth, I dwell above the Veil. Is this the life you grudge us, O knightly America?  Is this the life you long to change into the dull red hideous of Georgia? Are you so afraid lest peering from this high Pisgah, between Philistine and Amalekite, we sight the promised land?” [1]

References

[1] Gates Jr. Henry L., and Nelie Y Mckay. eds. "African American Literature" 2nd ed. New York: WW Norton & Company, 2004.





Book of the Month

What up World!!!! Today I want to share with you a book I believe is inspiring. This book is the tale of how our African brothers and sisters resilience and determination to stand for a cause could not be broken. In a time we live in now where us as African Americans are facing some of the most disastrous situations, let this book inspire you and let you know that if we come together we cannot be stopped. Sembene Ousmane wrote a masterpiece that should be passed on from generation to generation.

  

 Sembene Ousmane