Our concern with the connection to our African past is really future oriented. It is not merely for sentimental or aesthetic reasons that we return. While it is true that no one can or should live in the past, it is equally true that all futures are created out of some past. Ancient Africans not only existed, they developed a way of life, the remnants of which continue to influence world development. As we view competing designs for human institutions and competing philosophies, it is incumbent upon us to come to that process as fully disciplined, and especially as creative participants. A review of our past will reveal that no people has a better place from which to start. (pg. 83)
Written to provide strategies for the collective development of African people, Dr. Asa G. Hilliard’s fifteen essays address issues essential for socialization, self-determination, and cultural identity. Within the context of “community socialization,” Dr. Hilliard examines the economic, educational, spiritual, and political aspects of the reality of Africans in the United States. Dr. Hilliard’s insights are fresh and ripe with solutions to many of the problems that affect Black people in the United States and the world over.
We have a special opportunity and a special responsibility—an obligation. It is not enough for us to be bright and competent. We must also have purpose and direction. It is not enough for us to “make it” on our own—to save ourselves. As Abena says in Armah’s novel, Two Thousand Seasons, “There is no self to save without the rest of us.” (pg. 126-127)
It does no good for us to become preoccupied with counting the walking wounded or counting corpses just so that we can say, “Ain’t it awful!” Greater accuracy in presenting the statistics of “self-destructive behavior” will not give us insight into the causes of the behavior. It leads to victim blaming. We do not reject the numbers. However, we need the numbers on many of the causal factors or situations that have been overlooked. If we are to solve the problems that we and our children face, we must ask the right questions. If we only repeat the questions asked by strangers to our communities, we will have failed our people. (pg. 139-140)
There is so much more we could say about our distinguished elder Dr. Hilliard’s collection of essays, but why don’t you see for yourself today!
