Why Don’t Americans Acknowledge That Black History Is American History, and How Can We Change That?

Episode Information
Thank you to everyone who helped bring this episode together. And thank you to Black Americans, past and present, whose labor, creativity, leadership, and perseverance have shaped this country from its beginning. They did not just influence the United States. They helped build it and continue to move it forward.

Featured Voices
Kevin Cook/Poison Waters
Deanna Smith 
Milo Reed

Recording and Production
Recorded at: XRAY.FM Studios
Original Music: Rainezra @rainezra and Vews @pointofvews
Audio Engineer/Editor: Kyle Gilmer @residual_audio

Learn More/Sources
The following materials were referenced or informed this episode. Links are provided for transparency and further reading.

Origins of Black History Month (Carter G. Woodson, 1926, Negro History Week)
https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/carter-woodson-black-history-month/

Why February (Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln birthdays)
https://www.britannica.com/story/why-is-black-history-month-celebrated-in-february

Overview of Black History Month history and evolution
https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/black-history-month

Presidential recognition of Black History Month (Gerald Ford, 1976)
https://ford.blogs.archives.gov/2024/02/01/recognition-of-black-history-month/

Carter G. Woodson biography and mission
https://www.naacp.org/find-resources/history-explained/civil-rights-leaders/carter-g-woodson/

Slavery as a central economic system in U.S. history
https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/slavery

Cotton and slavery’s role in building American wealth
https://www.britannica.com/topic/cotton-trade

Jim Crow laws as a legal system of segregation
https://www.history.com/topics/early-20th-century-us/jim-crow-laws

Black Codes and post-emancipation control systems
https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/black-codes

Convict leasing after the Civil War
https://www.britannica.com/topic/convict-lease-system

Redlining and federal housing policy (HOLC maps, 1930s)
https://www.history.com/news/housing-segregation-new-deal-program

Redlining and its impact on generational wealth
https://ncrc.org/holc-health/

Civil Rights Act of 1964
https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/civil-rights-act

Voting Rights Act of 1965
https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/voting-rights-act

Fair Housing Act of 1968
https://www.hud.gov/program_offices/fair_housing_equal_opp/fair_housing_act_overview

James Baldwin quote on history and the present
https://www.brainpickings.org/2013/08/14/james-baldwin-history/

African rice cultivation knowledge and Carolina economies
https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/the-gullah-geechee-and-rice-culture.htm

George Washington Carver and sustainable agriculture
https://www.britannica.com/biography/George-Washington-Carver

Henry Blair patents (seed and cotton planters)
https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/blair-henry-1807-1860/

Norbert Rillieux and modern sugar refining
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Norbert-Rillieux

Jan Matzeliger and shoe manufacturing automation
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jan-Ernst-Matzeliger

Garrett Morgan and the gas mask and traffic signal
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Garrett-A-Morgan

Sister Rosetta Tharpe and the origins of rock and roll
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/sister-rosetta-tharpe-godmother-rock-n-roll-180963600/

Harriet Tubman and the Combahee River Raid
https://www.nps.gov/articles/harriet-tubman-combahee-river-raid.htm

Hidden Figures and Black women at NASA
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/hidden-figures-the-women-who-helped-win-the-space-race/

Audre Lorde and “the master’s tools”
https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/lorde-audre-1934-1992/

Angela Davis on prisons, policing, and systemic racism
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Angela-Davis

bell hooks on education and liberation
https://www.britannica.com/biography/bell-hooks

Ida B. Wells and anti-lynching investigations
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ida-B-Wells-Barnett

Black Lives Matter movement origins
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Black-Lives-Matter