Black people have a long history of philanthropy. We can trace this back to when our ancestors lived on the African continent, and worked as a community to obtain and share resources.
Black American philanthropy dates all the way back to 1700s when many enslaved Blacks were able to practice a trade outside of their master’s home and keep the earnings. These earnings were sometimes used to buy their freedom and the freedom of relatives.
Throughout our history in America, our giving has been rooted in efforts to overcome oppression and make a difference in the daily lives of other African Americans.
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Despite a lack of wealth, Black people are actually one of the most giving groups, particularly when it comes to churches, social service organizations, and schools. In fact, it has been reported that nearly 70 percent of African American households make donations totaling a staggering 11 billion dollars each year.
But to be clear, our philanthropy extends beyond simply financial gifts and encompasses how we use our time, voice, and skills to contribute to meaningful causes.
In this article, we highlight 5 pioneering Black female philanthropists who were predecessors to women like Oprah, Beyonce, Michelle Obama, Serena Williams, Rihanna, and probably even your own grandmother to use their resources to benefit African Americans as a collective. Check them out below!
Bridget “Biddy” Mason
Born in 1818 in Mississippi, Mason was a nurse and midwife who sued her master for her freedom and won before moving to Los Angeles.
Making $2.50 a day, she lived frugally and saved up enough money to purchase real estate and a commercial building that would propel her to amassing $300,000.
While she donated generously to charities, Mason’s is most well known philanthropic efforts were financing the First African Methodist Episcopal church and founding an elementary school for Black children in LA.
Annie Malone
After reaching multi-millionaire status from selling cosmetics and hair care products, Malone used her wealth to uplift other African Americans across the nation. For several years, she provided full-tuition for two students at every Black land-grant college in the U.S.
Additionally, she donated $25,000 to Howard University Medical Center and another $25,000 to help build a YMCA and support several orphanages in the St. Louis area.
When she passed away in 1957, her remaining fortune was gifted to her nieces, nephews, and multiple charitable organizations.
Madam C.J. Walker
As a protege of Annie Malone, Walker became a tycoon in the hair care industry and integrated philanthropy into the moral fabric of her business persona. She was a staunch supporter of anti-lynching programs run by the NAACP and National Association of Colored Women.
More than her money, she donated her time to causes that she believed were advancing the race. Throughout her career, she gave speeches on the value of education, invested in training Black women to be entrepreneurs, and advocated for the rights of Black soldiers who had fought in America’s wars.
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Mary Church Terrell
One of the first African-American women to earn a college degree, Terrell dedicated her time and talents to endeavors that directly improved the lives of Black women.
Although she was not wealthy, it was her social activism and personal investment in the Black community that shined through her philanthropic work.
She was a founding member of the NAACP and the National Association of Colored Women in addition to her frontline efforts in the women’s suffrage movement organizing picket-lines and boycotts.
Oseola McCarty
Upon dropping out of sixth grade to take care of her aunt and grandmother, McCarty took up the family profession as a washerwoman and began saving just about every dime she made.
Her modesty and contentment with a simple life enabled her to accumulate nearly $300,000 by the time she retired in 1995.
Given her thwarted education, she was passionate about other African Americans having the opportunity to go to college so she made a $150,000 donation to The University of Southern Mississippi and lived off the rest of her savings.
As you can see, philanthropy is not just for the wealthy. These stories show Black women of varying financial levels giving back to their communities in a multiplicity of ways whether it be with their money, time, or talents.
It is imperative that we start relying on each other and encouraging giving to one another in order to strengthen our communities and begin the path to generational wealth.
If you are interested in learning more about how you can get involved in philanthropic work, check out The Give Black Foundation, the Association of Black Foundation Executives, and the Black Philanthropic Network.
Everybody has “that one uncle” in their family. You know, the one that wears the two-piece suit to the family picnic and makes his second to-go plate before folks finish eating; or, the uncle who always come through for you in the clutch. In Black communities, uncles are often like second fathers to their relatives’ kids and play a crucial role in supporting the family.
Though not related by blood, there are some famous uncles from American pop culture that we all know and share in the Black community. While Uncle Phil from Fresh Prince of Bel-Air is probably the most well-known and respected among the group, Uncle Tom, Uncle Ruckus, and Uncle Ben are also household names. Let’s take a deeper look at the fascinating stories behind these three men.
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Contrary to popular belief, Uncle Tom was not an excessively subservient Black man who groveled at the white man’s feet. It turns out that Harriet Beecher Stowe completely mischaracterized the story of a man named Josiah Henson in her book “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” which led to the derogatory stereotype associated with the name. Henson was actually an enslaved African who escaped to become an abolitionist and minister. He later went on to open up a 200-acre settlement and laborer’s school in Canada for other fugitive slaves who escaped America’s brutality. All of that is to say he was far from the docile submissive man that Stowe portrayed him to be.
Now, Uncle Ruckus from The Boondocks is a completely different story. If you have an uncle like him in the family, he just might not get invited to the cookout. The infamous old angry man claimed to have a disease that turned his skin from white to Black when he was a baby because he has an intense hatred for all things African American. He believes Black people should never have existed at all. Unfortunately, Ruckus acquired this mindset from his mother who was extremely poor and claimed her life would have been completely better if she was born white. If you are interested in some of Ruckus’s most outlandish statements about Black folks, click here.
Uncle Ben’s rice is a staple in many Black homes, but how many people actually know who the man is on the box? It turns out that the face and name, “Uncle Ben,” come from two entirely different people. Ben was a Texas rice farmer known for delivering high-quality rice to food buyers in the 1940s. The word “Uncle” was attached because it was a common trend in the South to refer to older Black servants or slaves by the term. The face of Uncle Ben’s rice originated from a man named Frank Brown, who was a maître d’ at a Chicago restaurant frequented by the rice company’s top execs before WWII. The combination of Ben’s name and Frank’s face thus birthed one of today’s most iconic food brands.
While the names of these Black uncles may be famous, their backstories aren’t as well known. Can you spot them at this summer’s family cookout? What about the Mack Daddy Uncle, the Preacher Uncle or the Baller Uncle? If you do, let us know and check out more profiles of famous Black uncles.
The post Would You Invite Your Uncle to the Cookout? appeared first on PushBlack.
Black Mamas need love too: whether in front of or behind iron bars.
Whether rightfully or wrongfully accused. And even if their alleged crime was violent. So long as our Mamas are eligible for bail,Southerners On the New Ground (SONG) and its partners are gonna bail them out in time for Mother’s Day.
The National Mama’s Bail Out Day is happening on Saturday, May 11th, 2017 in Oakland, Los Angeles, Miami, Montgomery, Jackson, New Orleans, Memphis and Atlanta. Join over a dozen local base-building and national organizations in freeing Mothers from bars and detention centers by donating your dollars to the cause.
When our Black mamas are locked in cages, our families and communities suffer. Until we abolish bail and mass incarceration, we have to free ourselves. – SONG
We hear a lot about racial bias these days, due much to the work of groups like Black Lives Matter and our collective unrest with the state of the criminal justice system.
However, gender bias even plagues our own people – often making us discount the very real and disparate impact of mass incarceration on our own Mothers and Daughters. According to the ACLU, women are the “fastest growing segment of the incarcerated population increasing at nearly double the rate of men since 1985.”Black women, particularly, represent 30% of all incarcerated women in the U.S., but only 13% of the female population generally. Among female state prisoners, 2/3rds are mothers of a minor child.
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The money bail system is just one aspect of a convoluted entanglement of inequality that’s imbedded in our criminal justice system. Every day, about 450,000 Americans sit in jail because they are too poor to post bail.
With a system that targets the Black and poor, it keeps them there by a bail-system which requires payment of an arbitrary amount of bail money to secure release before trial. Ironically, the trial is what determines guilt or innocence – not the arrest. So why are our Mothers behind bars?
Let’s bring some of them home this Sunday.
We believe in Black collective freedom – and we always have. We know the stories of Black freedmen buying their families and loved ones out of slavery.
We know that it takes a village to raise a child, and we know how our grandmothers, aunties, neighbors and friends step in – time and time again – to cover the absence of a loved one. Community support without question or judgment is what we as a Black family do. And it’s what we will continue to do amidst a system that continues to fail US.
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So what and whom are you celebrating this Mother’s Day? Maybe you now or previously have had an incarcerated mother and wish to donate in her honor. Maybe you’ll get to spend Sunday with your mom, and hope to share the blessing with another deserving child.
Or, maybe, you believe in the power of collective action and want to put your money where your mouth is. Whatever your reason, you should show your support and donate to the Bail Fund. Let’s bring these Mothers home, welcome them in celebration and provide them with direct services to navigate this complicated system of inequality.
Happy Mother’s Day.
With Love,
PushBlack
The post You Can Bail Out Black Mothers For Mother’s Day appeared first on PushBlack.
Detroit was once a booming city that attracted Blacks who migrated from the South during the Great Migration. The promise of jobs and less racial tension brought waves of Blacks to what some would describe as “the land of milk and honey.”
Detroit is known as the automotive city. Automotive companies were based in the city and created a booming industry for most of the 1900s. The Big Three automotive manufacturers – General Motors, Ford and Chrysler – employed a significant number of the Detroit population.
Though Detroit was mostly white, and mostly white people lived in the suburbs, the black-middle class was burgeoning thanks to the booming auto industry. Detroit used to boast the nation’s most affluent Black population and the largest percentage of Black homeowners.
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The auto industry began to falter, and that shift greatly affected the black middle class. Many people were laid off or took payouts. The high foreclosure rate, early retirement and lost jobs lead to the decline of Detroit, now known as a dying city.
Race riots and closing small businesses hurt Detroit’s economy as well. The social climate and discrimination in housing kept some Blacks from achieving dreams of living in the suburbs. Drugs and violence soon overran the city.
White people moved out of Detroit en masse during the riots, while Blacks were left to deal with the fallout. In the 1990s, there was renewed optimism with the election of Coleman Young, the city’s first black mayor. However, the optimism didn’t last long. Soon, Blacks moved out of Detroit to neighboring cities and townships.
Currently the unemployment rate is touching 30 percent. As The Big Three dodges bankruptcy, Detroit is a shell of its former self. As the coal industry disappears, and we talk about how it affects those living in coal country, what about how the decline of the auto industry affects those living in Detroit, particularly Black people?
“While African Americans are more likely to experience many cardiovascular diseases, in particular strokes and heart failure, they are also more likely to die from cardiovascular diseases.” - Dr. Mercedes R. Carnethon
Unfortunately, health has always been a topic of concern in our community--from the food we eat to the quality of affordable healthcare. Today, we still see disparities in Black healthcare.
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This is not a new conversation. In 1914, Booker T. Washington presented data regarding declining health in African American communities; particularly in the rural south. He noted how cost and lack of information affected our ability to properly diagnose and monitor our health.
This prompted the government to institute National Negro Health Week (NNHW). People observed NNHW was for the next 35 years, and many positives came as a result: it set the stage for the formation of the National Negro Health Movement and encouraged Black women to enter the healthcare profession, primarily as nurses.
NNHW also brought about detailed reporting and analysis of Black health. For instance, the movement was instrumental in detecting how perverse tuberculosis was within our communities.
Perhaps we should reinstate a week like NNHW to shine a light on the factors impeding our health. While we know there are basic steps that everyone must take to ensure a healthy lifestyle, such as clean eating, hydration, regular doctor visits, and exercise, we still need answers.
Knowing why our community is so heavily impacted by certain ailments and diseases will help us make strides in the right direction. If you’d like to learn more about this topic, pick up a copy of Inequality and African-American Health: How Racial Disparities Create Sickness.
While the military was one of the first institutions to integrate back in 1948, it wasn’t until 2017 that U.S. Army grooming policies were changed to permit a common hairstyle amongst Black women soldiers: the loc.
Army Regulation 670-1 details the regulations for “Wear and Appearance of Army Uniforms and Insignia.” In updating the grooming policies for women soldiers, the directive sought to clear a previous discrepancy that differentiated between locs, cornrows, and twists -- allowing some while barring others.
Now, locs are permitted so long as they are “of uniform dimension; have a diameter no greater than a half-inch; and present a neat, professional and well-groomed appearance.”
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Under the old rules, hairstyles that “twist[ed] two distinct strands of hair around one another to create a twisted ropelike appearance” were previously banned.
The change was a long overdue and welcomed accomplishment by women soldiers who were forced to resort to harsh chemicals or expensive treatments in order stay within regulations.
The Army is not the only division of the military that has delayed just and fair treatment through regulating Black hair. It wasn’t until late 2015 that the Marine Corps approved loc and twist hairstyles.
However, its regulation of those styles still creates challenges for Black women. For example, according to the Marine Corps’ Hair Regulation video, “entwined” hairstyles (meaning braids, twists or locs) can be no more than 3/8ths of an inch in diameter (or the size of a standard paperclip), can be spaced no more than 3/8ths of an inch apart, and locs must be parted with only a square or rectangular shape.
If you want to pull your “entwined” hairstyle into a bun, that bun cannot extend more than three inches from the scalp nor be wider than the wearer’s head.
But the regulation of Black women’s hair is nothing new. Couched in a narrative that favors straight, blond tresses over coarse coils, Black women have sought to chemically straighten, heat-damage or otherwise alter their natural form in order to ascribe to a Eurocentric style of beauty.
In recent years the natural hair movement has transformed this - resulting in hundreds of thousands of Black women relinquishing the ‘creamy crack’ and opting to wear and style their hair in ways similar to those of our ancestors past.
However, even within this movement, there is still debate over a “preferred curl pattern” or texture that places a hierarchy on certain hair types. Like colorism for hair, these debates and preferences reinforce Eurocentric standards of beauty that are counterproductive to our collective identity.
While our military sisters have more freedom to rock their hair in its natural glory, let us continue to celebrate Black beauty in its many forms and textures; styles and lengths; coils and coarseness. 
The global electronic music industry is worth $7.1 billion. From house clubs to international music festivals, the industry has amassed millions of fans and cemented itself as an industry soundhouse. Few know the roots of this genre in Black America.
One of the largest subsets of the genre, techno, can trace its origins to a geographic location: Detroit, Michigan (well, the suburbs).
To some accounts, three middle-class African-American DJ-producers are the brains behind techno: Derrick May, Juan Atkins, and Kevin Saunderson. However, other accounts delineate Juan Atkins as the sole originator.
Either way, they eventually would come together to enhance European “synth-pop” tracks with African-American sounds such as Chicago house, funk, electro, and electronic jazz creating a new, completely electronic and fast-paced sound.
Techno encapsulated afrofuturism through sounds that were primarily all-instrumental and with beats more complex than the syncopation of house music.
“We were just kids having fun. The technology allowed us to make this music. It just happened.” – Juan Atkins
The name “techno” was first used by Juan Atkins, who named his 1983 song “Techno City.” Atkins’ songs gained traction on local radio waves and eventually landed him a deal with Virgin Records.
Since the label was based in the U.K., Detroit’s new sound gained immense traction overseas and forever solidified the originators’ place in history.
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The dark side of this international attention was an emergence of what NPR calls “blackface DJs”. These DJs were white people who created fictional backstories and presented themselves as Black people to give their music more “authenticity”.
Blackface DJs would create names that “sounded Black”, like DJ Marques, and claim to come from places with high Black populations such as Gary, IN, Harlem, NY, or the Cabrini Green housing projects in Chicago.
Techno’s influence helped spur the development of later musical sounds. As techno and house music seemed to bounce ideas off of each other, artists like DJ Deeon and DJ Slugo developed a distinct sound through “ghetto house.”
Techno music continues to be both produced and enjoyed by diverse audiences across the globe. Some current top songs include “Remember Pig & Dan Remix” by Matador “System Hack Original Mix” by Carlo Ruetz, and “Zoo Project Pax Remix” by Dennis Cruz.
Though now a global music industry, techno will never completely detach from its rooted Black hands in Detroit, Michigan.
The post What Motown and Techno Have in Common appeared first on PushBlack.