Why Kwanzaa | Maulana Karenga | Pan-African Holidays

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Until lions tell their tale, the story of the hunt will always glorify the hunter

– African Proverb

Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will

– Frederick Douglass

Ugly is ignorance worn with pride

– Owen 'Alik Shahadah

The most pathetic thing is for a slave who doesn't know that he is a slave

– Malcolm X

WHY KWANZAA

The Pan-African Diaspora Holiday

Dr. Maulana Karenga

We must carve out of the hard rock of reality the place we want to stand on and leave as a legacy for those who come after us

Dr. Maulana Karenga

As an African American and Pan-African holiday celebrated by millions throughout the world African community, Kwanzaa brings a cultural message

which speaks to the best of what it means to be African and human in the fullest sense. Given the profound significance Kwanzaa has for African Americans and indeed, the world African community,

it is imperative that an authoritative source and site be made available to give an accurate and expansive account of its origins, concepts, values, symbols and practice.

Umoja (Unity): To strive for and to maintain unity in the family, community, nation, and race.
Kujichagulia (Self-Determination): To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves, and speak for ourselves stand up.
Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility): To build and maintain our community together and make our brothers' and sisters' problems our problems, and to solve them together.
Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics): To build and maintain our own stores, shops, and other businesses and to profit from them together.
Nia (Purpose): To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.
Kuumba (Creativity): To do always as much as we can, in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.
Imani (Faith): To believe with all our heart in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders, and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.

IDEOLOGICAL FATHER

If ever there was a living African-American philosopher on par with all those in antiquity it would be Dr. Maulana Karenga. Such an influential figure in Africanizing the descendants of the enslaved Diaspora he is can be considered a human cultural landmark. And all great men are controversial but that does not diminish his contributions to as he would put it "the forward flow of human civilization."

In the African-American struggle the legacy of Malcolm X was realized by moving what was a "black struggle” to an African-American struggle and with this a connection to the Pan-African world.

Maulana Karenga on Kwanzaa

Malcolm continued the legacy of Garvey when he made the profound declaration of crimes against humanity. But since Malcolm most have been concerned with a local revolutionary outlook; disconnected from the broader Pan-Africanism. However, for much of Karenga’s career as a public intellectual he has carried forward the virtues of Malcolm’s mission culturally and politically. And when we reflect on the core of the conflicts with the Black Panther party and the disagreements with the late Hakim Jamal it was linked to the African cultural argument. While most were content for a better sized crumb Karenga wanted a complete cultural paradigm change: A profound move for a person born into the harsher side of the American racist system.

So no loner would we look to the ideology of Europe, but to Africa. No longer will we model our humanity on Greece, but back to Ancient Egypt. No longer would English be our lingua franca, but Swahili. No longer would our culture be located in America, but in Africa. And on all of these issue history has vindicated Karenga while he is still with us as an elder.

Karenaga and the Black Panthers were also victims of the FBI's COINTELPRO program. A program which was to "expose, disrupt, misdirect, or otherwise neutralize" groups that the FBI believed were "subversive - Create dissension between groups (e.g. by spreading rumors that other groups were stealing money or bad mouthing each other). And it is sad that despite the stark lesson of history many continue to extend the success of COINTELPRO by letting ego and Myopicy spoil good relations and good work.

We are not cultural orphans of White America only struggling for a better share of the American pie. Our journey must, if to be meaningful, take us back to our African path and the continuation of our cultural journey in modernity. Africa is our reference and Karenga has always articulated this reconnected us not to 50 years ago, or to “black identity” created in a 1960’s reactionary vacuum but right back to the Nile Valley civilization. Karenga has from this solid ethical rock formulated viable solutions for Africans everywhere. We are forever indebted to his wisdom and his dedication to creating real ethical institutions to carry on our African culture uninterrupted.

- By Alik Shahadah

The Black Candle : M.K. Asante, Jr.

The Black Candle is a landmark documentary that uses Kwanzaa as a vehicle to explore the African experience. Narrated by world-renown poet Maya Angelou, The Black Candle is an extraordinary, inspirational story about the struggle and triumph of African family, community and culture. Filmed across the United States, Africa, Europe and the Caribbean, The Black Candle is more than a film about a holiday, it's a celebration of a people.

MOTHERLAND: is an epic and unprecedented entry into the canon of African-owned cinema, which charts the glory and majesty of the Motherland (Enat Hager). Motherland is a film that unapologetically calls for African unity, self-determination and the African rebirth. ON DVD

Several things preserved us as an African people throughout the Holocaust of enslavement: The first and most important thing I think is our deep spiritual roots. Our capacity to believe in our humanity and to hold on in despite of the most dehumanising situation.

Dr. Maulana Karenga