Talk:African-American history

Segregation

Feel free to shut down this discussion if you feel it's too politically charged, but I just want to say that segregation was not only present in the South. It might only have been legally mandated in the South, but there were numerous segregated venues in the North too, perhaps one of the most famous being the Cotton Club in New York City. And speaking of which, the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles was also segregated, so if anybody knows about the story of Hattie McDaniel, the first black person to win an Oscar when she did so for "Gone With The Wind" in 1939, they made a special exception for her to attend the award ceremony, but confined her to a separate segregated table.

Also, I think we also need to address blockbusting and redlining which moved whites to the suburbs, and confined non-whites to the inner cities. Again, if you find it too politically charged, I will drop the subject, but I do think it is an important part of African-American history that needs to be addressed. I understand the WV community is sick and tired of me, and I'm sorry if I offended anyone by bringing this up, and if anybody feels that this is too politically charged for WV, please just drop a note here, and I promise I will drop the subject and never bring it up again. The dog2 (talk) 04:43, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I was hoping the frank feedback given by the community recently at User_talk:Ikan_Kekek#Civil_war_and_the_South would have motivated you to take some time out for quiet reflection and leave this subject alone.

This is a history article. Fine. If there are any relevant destinations for this article (north or south) then add, but please can we give up this obsession with race for a while? Otherwise I will nominate as a banned subject. Andrewssi2 (talk) 05:04, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Since the community has decided, I will henceforth drop the subject and avoid editing anything about the history of race relations until the community decides that I be re-instated. The dog2 (talk) 05:08, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

He's right, though. But I don't think we are hoping to recount a full history of African-American people. Anything even remotely approaching that would be exceedingly vast. So my feeling is that we should mention segregation in the North where's it's relevant. For example, the neighborhoods where African-Americans have lived in large numbers in Northern cities are those where they were allowed to live, as opposed to others where they were not (segregation, redlining). I think this is more an article about attractions related to African-American history than an article that actually has any hopes of even fairly summarizing that vast history. It is a daunting topic to try to do any kind of justice to. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:45, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

@Ikan Kekek:Could I please request that you add a summary of the stuff you feel is important regarded the points I raised in my first post. At this point, I think any edits I make to the Understand section of this page will automatically result in a User Ban for me on the basis of it being too political, so I'd rather not risk incurring the wrath of the community, and leave it to a knowledgeable senior editor like you. I will continue to add destinations where relevant as I think of them. The dog2 (talk) 05:56, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I'm not prepared to do that right now, but I'll think about it. I think it's probably best to focus on destinations, but I will say this off the top of my head: Some topics to focus on that have destinations associated with them are slavery, free labor, military service, music (ragtime, jazz, R&B, soul, hip hop, etc. and also classical music), literature, visual arts, education (historically black colleges), sports, historically black regions (e.g. the Black Belts in the South) and neighborhoods, inventors and business people - it really runs the gamut. But let's focus on "See" listings and tailor whatever potted history we eventually include to those. I believe there is an offline museum of Jim Crow, and if so, that gives us a very good basis to cover that subject. I would also include something about soul food and also the contributions of the Nation of Islam (bean pies, for example). Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:43, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Correct me if I'm wrong, but to my understanding, soul food is widespread throughout the South and not just an African-American thing, but it was to a large extent brought out of the South and popularised around the country by African-Americans due to the Great Migration. That's why in places like Chicago, soul food is strongly associated with the African-American community. The dog2 (talk) 14:38, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I created this travel topic to mention important destinations (for example, Tuskegee Institute) to expand Wikivoyage's history articles and celebrate them, and also because people said there were not enough Africa-related travel topics. There are plenty of interesting places to visit that are related to African-American history; the "Understand" section doesn't need to be a Wikipedia-length article about the topic. I really hope this article doesn't become a springboard for political arguments, because it doesn't need to be that way. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 15:59, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

My understanding is that soul food is specifically African-American, and to the extent Southern cuisine as eaten and cooked by white Southerners is or is related to soul food, it's largely because of hundreds of years of black folks being the paid - or under slavery, unpaid - cooks of white families. Some white Southerners also have Gospel services in a style related to African-American Gospel services, and that's certainly authentic to those congregations, but it doesn't make the mixture between European and African influences (and Middle Eastern, in terms of the scripture) integral to Gospel services less fundamentally African-American. Ikan Kekek (talk) 16:25, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

SelfieCity: In response to your remark above and also to a degree to Andrew's: Since this is an article that's specifically about a people who are treated as a race in the U.S., race is central to the topic and not something to even try to avoid, and given the history of African-Americans, racial discrimination and the way that the people have survived and been so vital in spite of it are central themes. But I'd like to hope these things are not controversial, and that we can focus on facts, and especially on specific sights travelers can visit. And of course I completely agree that we are not trying to duplicate Wikipedia. It's a total fool's errand to try to summarize the totality of the black experience in America in a single article in any event, and we don't have to; we just have to give a few relevant highlights and otherwise cover it as a travel topic. Ikan Kekek (talk) 16:32, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘And not to try to open a can of worms here, but I just want to say that it's not that I'm obsessed with race, and in fact, I've spoken out against excessive identity politics, but unfortunately, it is the case that the U.S. has a long history of state-sanctioned racism that even if we assume that racism does not exist today, the legacy of this racist past is still very apparent in modern American society (in the form of, among many things, the higher poverty rate among African-Americans). Of course, I'd rather have a society where race is irrelevant, but because of this history, it's unfortunate that cultural sensitivities and political views are often divided along racial lines. Anyway, what I was trying to do with this discussion is to try to hammer out what aspects of that history would be important enough and of enough interest to casual travellers to write about in the "Understand" section. Out of respect for the WV community, I will not add anything to the section until we have a consensus here on what is important enough to include. This is not about white guilt or white bashing, but you can't deny that the U.S. has a ton of racial baggage, and likewise, the African-American contribution to this melting pot that is American culture is something that is too significant to ignore. I understand this site is meant to be non-partisan, but I hope that it will be OK for us to still have discussions about the factual accuracy of our content, and regardless of everyone's political beliefs, I hope that we can all be in agreement that racism is wrong, and that we can all celebrate the progress that has been made as a society in the past few decades regardless of what everyone's political persuasion is. And as for the direction of this article, what I hope is that it will be is a listing of sites that commemorate significant events in this history, and while things are not perfect yet, these monuments can serve as a reminder of how far we have come since the days of the slave trade and colonialism. The dog2 (talk) 18:20, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I think America's doing pretty well nowadays when it comes to race considering that there was slavery here until well under 200 years ago. Unfortunately, skin color is very hard not to notice and in a country like America where there is a lot of diversity, identity based on race can only be expected. I also understand that (obviously) we can't avoid mentioning race in an article about the history of a race. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 19:19, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

And just one more point. Although some things are controversial, I hope WV continues to uphold the principle of staying true to scientific and historical accuracy, and that we never reach the stage where we start censoring factual information in the interest of political correctness or non-partisanship. The dog2 (talk) 19:32, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Agreed. Although I think sticking with non-partisanship on Wikivoyage is a good thing. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 19:40, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Yes, but I think that we should maintain non-partisanship only when something is a matter of opinion; in other words we don't take sides on these things. When something is a matter of fact, especially if it's something that has a broad consensus among experts in the field, then I think that factual accuracy should take precedence over political correctness. The dog2 (talk) 20:07, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

It is a blatant falsehood to suggest that Wikivoyage has been censoring The dog2 and equating that to avoiding historical accuracy. We have been trying to keep articles relevant to travel and away from prosecuting political views (either left or right). Despite declarations to the contrary, the pattern of contributions do appear obsessive about race and decidedly uninterested in the promotion of travel at all.

Wikivoyage should be a non partisan travel site with history articles that compliment travel. Andrewssi2 (talk) 20:14, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting that I'm being censored. Please don't extrapolate. I was simply stating an opinion about things in general. I don't think I've ever inserted any statement saying the "Politician X is bad" or "Policy Y is bad" in our articles. And in the context of this article, understanding this history of discrimination is key to appreciating the historical significance of the travel sites listed here, and I don't think there's anything controversial about that. The dog2 (talk) 20:25, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Let's all please try to avoid general remarks about the nature of races and racism or implications about the degree to which partisan differences are or are not based on facts. There's more than enough to cover in this travel topic without a long global meta-discussion. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:28, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I'm really fine with the community building fact based historical articles. I have done so myself in the past. I was disturbed however by accusations of censorship and inaccuracy which were disingenuous. Andrewssi2 (talk) 22:47, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Los Angeles

We just absolutely cannot list L.A. only for race riots (Watts in 1965 and South-Central in 1992). I'm tempted to take down the listing until we have something constructive to list, especially as it mentions no place to visit, nothing to see. When I think of African-Americans in L.A., I think of Karim Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson and also the famous movie actors, but I don't know how many of them live in L.A. But seriously, we need to mention something like the cultural center I remember going to to hear a poetry slam. Sorry, I don't remember its exact name or location, but I think I listed it at some point years ago. Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:52, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I was trying to come up with places where significant historical events happened but if L.A. is too contentious, go ahead and remove it. But speaking of which, there are online web-sites that tell you the important places for the 1992 riots, including his lawyer's office where Rodney King famously said his "Can well all just get along?" line to try to end the riots. The dog2 (talk) 14:35, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Those places should probably be mentioned somewhere, though not necessarily here. You could provide a link on this page if you like.

My point on L.A. is that focusing only on riots is no good, and that L.A., as a center of acting, music and sports, among other things, has hosted a large number of highly creative African-Americans, many of them famous. Ikan Kekek (talk) 16:20, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I see what you mean. I would have added a point about the Ambassador Hotel where Hattie McDaniel received her Oscar in 1940, except that it is no longer standing as it was demolished in 2005. Speaking of which, should we list the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium? That place is still standing, and was where Sidney Poitier received his Oscar in 1964. The dog2 (talk) 17:55, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Sure, why not? Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:21, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Speaking of which, this is an article about sites connected to the 1992 riots. Would there be anything useful there we can use? The dog2 (talk) 21:34, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Sites associated with Frederick Douglass, Booker T Washington or W.E.B. du Bois

Are there museums or sites associated with the life or work of those African American Civil Rights fighters and leaders? Hobbitschuster (talk) 21:55, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Tuskegee Institute for Booker T. Washington. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 21:59, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't read the title carefully just now, but come to think of it, there is the birth site of Malcolm X in Omaha, Nebraska. He is another civil rights activist, and while the house no longer stands, there is a marker at where his house used to be. The dog2 (talk) 22:23, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

The Audubon Ballroom is also now the Malcolm X and Dr. Betty Shabazz Memorial and Educational Center and covered in Manhattan/Harlem and Upper Manhattan. Ikan Kekek (talk) 01:50, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

There's also the mosque on 116th St. and Lenox, where he preached. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:33, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

No information for travellers here

Similar to the issues that Ground Zero brought up in Talk:American colonialism, and the issues I brought up in Talk:Mexican American history, there doesn't seem to be any information for travellers here. Sure, there's cities, but the only thing mentioned actually related to the subject here is Tuskegee Institute, but we don't write travel topics just for one institute. And listing cities is just as bad as listing countries. Also, is it just me, or does this article contain too much info on the understand section with large chunks of it completely unrelated to travel. I suppose we could do User:Yvwv's suggestion on trying to merge this into the chronological US history articles, but I'm not sure whether listing large unrelated travel info which is meant to go to Wikiversity really is worth merging. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 11:37, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

There is other travel-related info in this article. I would oppose deletion or merging. But it's clear that a lot of museums and other points of interest could be listed. Ikan Kekek (talk) 13:40, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

I started Black Belt for a more travel-oriented article on African-American history and contemporary culture. /Yvwv (talk) 18:04, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for starting that article, but there's also still plenty to cover in cities and outside the South. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:31, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

The issue with most of our history topic articles, especially history ones, is that we concentrate too much on the understand and the history section, and neglect the travel info section (aka Destinations). Topics that mainly focus on the understand section is just as bad as having nothing. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 21:23, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Wikivoyage is fundamentally experimental, and neither bound by the limitations of printed guidebooks, commercial travel sites, or Wikipedia. We have the opportunity to create something new. But we never see whether we can do it or not, until we tried. /Yvwv (talk) 23:00, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

We are not bound by it, but at the same time, we're not an encyclopedia (or what worse, an encyclopædia (The humor in that is encyclopædia is an archaic spelling, which is historical)). I'm not saying for our understand sections to be completely empty, infact, I'd prefer a good understanding section, but as User:Ground Zero and I have brought this time after time there still needs to be travel info. At least for the most part, this is in a much better condition than American colonialism, but such material like this goes in Wikiversity, not here with all three US history articles (this, American colonialism, and Mexican American history) which these issues have been brought up. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 23:11, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Many Wikivoyagers seem to have a drive for inclusive narration, in particular the history of minorities. Creating new articles is just one method; another is to add to the existing ones. Consider Charlottesville. The lenghty article omits the controversies around the Robert E Lee monument; a case study of history-related controversies which teaches more than a monument itself would do. The section about Monticello barely mentioned that Jefferson had slaves, without addressing the obvious dilemma it meant for a champion of liberty who outlawed slave trade. In many cases, we can make Wikivoyage more inclusive and reflective by improving on the existing material. /Yvwv (talk) 23:18, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Charlottesville has a catch though. And that is that there's travel content in it. African-American history does not and reads more an encyclopedic article.

Even comparing this to other historical travel topics. Travel topics like Presidents of the United States or Ned Kelly tourism both have places where a traveller can plan a trip, or learn more about the following, this does not. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 23:27, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

I briefly mentioned the Lee monument and Jefferson's slave dilemma in Black Belt. You can consider whether to add the material to Charlottesville, or to any travel topic. /Yvwv (talk) 23:30, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

cont. my earlier reply, even the topic which you started yesterday Black Belt, has numerous places where a traveller can visit and learn about African-American history. This does not seem the case. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 23:32, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

I'll do some work on this article. Don't move it anywhere. To give some examples, there is a National Museum of African American History and Culture in DC, the Studio Museum in Harlem, an African-American library in Oakland with an excellent museum on the 2nd floor...There's lots to cover. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:10, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks, Ikan Kekek. This is a subject on which we should have a useful travel article, rather than an unreferenced history article. Ground Zero (talk) 21:26, 7 October 2021 (UTC)

Most definitely. I think it needs to be restructured. I'm super-busy lately with a new job that's taking up a huge amount of my time plus another job I'm at often on other days, so it'll take some time, but I'll start probably some time over the weekend. Ikan Kekek (talk) 04:02, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks :) SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 04:06, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

Call for help

I've started restructuring and adding specific listings to this article, but I'm so busy with work that I don't know when I'll be able to do much more. Anyone who would like to help, even with such mundane tasks as alphabetizing the city names, would improve things. If no-one else has the chance to work on this, I can come back to it in December or during Thanksgiving break or something, I suppose. Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:26, 24 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks Ikan. It's looking much better now. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 10:56, 25 October 2021 (UTC)

Cool. Ground Zero has helped some. I can do a little here and a little there for now. Ikan Kekek (talk) 11:08, 25 October 2021 (UTC)

I've just alphabetized it, but left the civil rights movement on the bottom. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 11:15, 25 October 2021 (UTC)

In Los Angeles, Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, and the Dolby Theatre are only tangentially related to African American history. I don't think these belong here. Ground Zero (talk) 01:04, 28 October 2021 (UTC)