Black people should have recognition for themselves and their backgrounds and their relationships with other people in the world and thus lose some of their alienation. This museum has certainly stood for that in this town.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
Wherever you go in the history of America, there have been Black people making contributions, but their contributions have been obscured, lost, buried.
It is a call for black people in this country to unite, to recognize their heritage, to build a sense of community. It is a call for black people to define their own goals, to lead their own organizations.
I think that black people, to a degree, need to have a certain level of dexterity. If we want to be at the highest level of whatever our field is, we have to be able to navigate both worlds. We all just know that you gotta be able to put that suit on and have a conversation with people that don't look like you or your family.
Like any group that has endured much, African Americans have created a strong and mutually reinforcing sense of group identity. That's not a bad thing in and of itself.
I think the black community is no different from any other community. We need to take responsibility for how we live together. We need to be personally responsible for keeping our streets clean, our schools safe, and our houses peaceful.
There are many positive things to say about the black community. No question about it.
The history of blacks is complicated, fragmented, disturbing to contemplate - not a neat trail of challenges met or of felled trees blocking the path to the mountain top.
We must never forget that Black History is American History. The achievements of African Americans have contributed to our nation's greatness.
Black history is American history.
When I was in school, I conceptually didn't want black people to have context, to take it out of all that history. I wanted nothing to indicate where they are or what time it is, to place them anywhere.