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Being Black “and” American
For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been watching the protests (and riots) over the killing of George Floyd, a black man. I was saddened to watch the video of this man pleading for his life, handcuffed with four police officers hovering above him. One of those police officers had his knee on George’s neck and left it there for nearly nine minutes, ultimately resulting in George’s death. The video is troubling, but what’s more troubling is the fact that as a black person in America, I’m no longer surprised when I see videos like this. Unfortunately, I feel like I’ve had to learn to get used to it.
I am a black man who was born and raised in America. I have had to learn how to navigate being black and American at the same time in order to succeed in a society that was erroneously structured to include my ethnic identity portmanteau with my national identity. Even though I was born and raised in America I am not just an “American.” Instead I am an African-American or Black-American. I understand the history of why black people (and people of color) were originally identified this way. However, what I don’t understand is why leaders in this country still choose to separate people first by cultural or ethnic identity instead of considering all of us as simply “Americans.”
If we changed the institutional and social dynamic to classify each other first by national identity, we…
