Many people claim to know Black culture, including some individuals who aren't Black and who've never been Black and/or just grew up around/went to school with/hung around some Black people. None of these demographics makes you an expert on Black people. If you're a Black person living in America, then you're an expert on Black people, plain and simple. However, if you're not a Black person living in America . . . Well . . . chances are you aren't an expert on Black people . . .
Black people, Afro-Americans, African-Americans . . . Today, these labels are all terms that are commonly used, some more than others, in mainstream contemporary American culture to describe a group of people who currently make up a part of the population now living in the United States that is descended from the African slaves who were imported from various parts of Africa, mainly West Africa and what is now the Congo and Angola, to what was called, in colonial times, the British colonies of North America and what eventually became to be known as, after theses colonies gained their independence, the United States of America.
The experiences of these slaves who arrived in a foreign land that was nothing like there own, where no one looked like them or spoke their language, forever changed their lives as individuals and as a people and they also changed the history and cultural landscape of the land we all so lovingly refer to now as America. In a word, America wouldn't be America without Black people and our experiences throughout American history helped bring about a new culture in a new world, Black culture, a culture in its own right, but also a very integral and influential part of mainstream American culture, ever since Black people began living in America.
Throughout American history, Blacks have contributed so much to American society and received so little in return that a line from the classic movie "Lean on Me" starring Morgan Freeman in which the main character, Joe Clark, principal of East Side High, refuses to tell his students to stop protesting, pretty much sums up the attitude at the core of contemporary Black culture in a nutshell: "I don't have to do anything but stay Black and die," an attitude adopted after the liberating acheivements of the Civil Rights Movement during the 1960s and which is still very pervasive today in virtually all areas of contemporary Black culture.
And speaking of "staying Black," I've compiled a list of favorite people, places, and things that Black people actually do like and also things that, if you're not a Black person in a America, you've probably only casually heard of or not heard of at all. This list is not necessarily in order or importance. Also, this list is not exhaustive, so I may have left some things out. . . .
