African American: an Identity Crisis Essay

For centuries Afri atomic number 50 Americans make got been indoctrinated to subsist in a cultural and diachronic vacuum by their oppressors who would hear to bar them from ever making the data link to their illuminating past. This systematic agenda of mis-education and lies by omission has made possible the seduction and enslavement, in body and mind, of the African American by his oppressors. In his essay The reflect of the blackness, Dr. Carter G. Woodson sets out to ruminate on wherefore the African American has been misled in his insurrection to human equality and dignity and how he can remedy the dismal ground of his affairs.A thorough reading of Woodsons pioneering work indicates that we should study the experiences of African-descended people to come upon knowledge about ourselves and opposite polishs as well as to portion out cover version accurate traditions and histories that have all solely been discredited or misrepresented. Further more, only with this systematic study of their important contributions to record can African Americans elevate themselves to appoint enlightenment. One reason to study the experiences of the African American is to instill in him a sense of purpose and place in a world that otherwise intends to animation him perpetually in the dark.Undoubtedly the bring forth of his oppressors has been to convince him that his account statement is unimportant so as to deprive him of the sense of overcharge that is so necessary to feel alone human. By espousing that he has no worthwile past, that his travel has done nonhing significant since the base of time, and that there is no evidence that he will ever achieve anything enceinte (Woodson 6), his oppressors can be sure that the African American will continue crop up the path of mis-education that so allows for his subservience to a system that cares nothing for him.However, if you teach the blackness that he has accomplished as some(prenominal) good as a ny other hunt he will place to equality and justice without regard to race. (Woodson 6) The event purpose of African American studies is to take O.K. from obscurity that piece of the historical puzzle without which the African American would be amidst an endless identity crisis. By studying the origin of his people, the African American, who has not except learned to think and plan for himself as others do for themselves (Woodson 7), can take date of his own destiny rather than victorious as truth anabundance of culture which others have made accessible to the oppressed. (Woodson 7) The culture of indoctrination cultivated by the oppressor would have that the Negro should cease to remember that he was one time held a slave, that he has been oppressed, and even that he is a Negro. (Woodson 7) Thus, it is plain to see that the African Americans oppressors have in any case much to lose by promoting the truth. Indeed, it would take aim them to admit their transgressions an d to concede the countless meaningful contributions made by the African American to modern society.Without a serious interrogative sentence of the fundamentals of education, religion, literature, and philosophy as they have been expounded to him (Woodson 7) by his oppressors, the Negro joins the opposition with the remonstrance that the study of the Negro keeps alive questions which should be forgotten. (Woodson 7) Perhaps the most essential lesson to be learned from an effective, systematic study of African American history is that the contributions made by African Americans are far more numerous than any oppressor could ever know.It is with a pig-headed overcharge that they conceal the fact that the history of the modern world was made, in the main, by what was taken from African people. (Clarke) Without knowledge such(prenominal) as this, it would be impossible for the African American to take pride in himself and to seek the true identity he has been in search of for centur ies. A race is like a man. Until it uses its own talents, takes pride in its own history, and loves its own memories, it can never fulfill itself completely. (Clarke) African American studies can help in thought other cultures as well as our own by challenging and correcting the misrepresentations of Africa and western sandwich Europe and their cultural legacies. What has been laid aground as history by the oppressor does not serve to benefit the African American but instead to keep him aquiline on a system predominate with underlying prejudice against his people.History is compose in the image of the writer so, consequently, the African American must take up the reins of authorship himself and guide his own destiny. That is only why we should study the African American experience, to produce a platform on which he can take back what is innately his. After all, to be assured of where one is going, it is necessary to be sensible of where one has been.