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I was taught you don't tell your secrets to strangers - certainly not secrets that expose error, weakness, failure. My generation, like its predecessors, was taught that since our achievements received little notice or credit from white America, we were not to discuss our faults, lapses, or uncertainties in public.

My father grew up in an era when to be an American - a white American, at least - was to be yourself. In some respects, his generation was more ignorant, complacent, self-centered and parochial than mine.

White Americans, stop apologizing; we live in the greatest country in the history of mankind, and it's there because of our ancestors - those who came to this country and did their very best. And every generation has gotten better at what we're good at.

You can't control the fact that you are born a white man or born into wealth. When people say, 'Check your privilege,' they're saying, 'Acknowledge how these factors helped you move through life.' They're not saying apologize for it.

When I think of my work, I'm aware that I'm American and African at all points and times. And without a doubt, my experience and understanding of America was shaped by having immigrant parents.

Our generation was born during the turmoil following the First World War. That war marked the dividing line - at least for the Western World - between the comfortable security of the 19th century and the instability and flux of our own time.

I was born in San Francisco's Chinatown in 1948 but grew up in a black neighborhood. During elementary and middle school, I commuted to a bilingual school in Chinatown. So I did not confront white American culture until high school.

Not unlike our country's history, my personal history was founded upon an unfortunate history of racial conflict between black and white.

I was born and grew up in the greatest, the noblest achievement of the human race on this planet - which was called the United States of America.