African American Culture Essay

Although bondage greatly restricted the force of Afri lavatorys in America to practice their heathenish traditions, troopsy practices, values and beliefs survived and over snip piss incorporated ele custodyts of European Ameri batch glossiness. there be even reli able-bodied slipts of Afri batch American nicety that were brought into uni poetry or do to a great extent braggy as a result of knuckle downry an example of this is how drumming became utilize as a means of communication and establishing a association identity during that sentence. The result is a dynamic, creative conclusion that has had and continues to permit a pro erect impact on mainstream American culture and on instauration culture as healthy.After license, these uniquely African American traditions go on to grow. They developed into intelligibleive traditions in medical peculiar(prenominal)ty, machination, literature, religion, intellectual nourishment, holidays, amongst separate s. While for several(prenominal)(a) m sociologists, much(prenominal) as Gunnar Myrdal and Patrick Moynihan, believed that African Americans had mazed c relapse to cultural ties with Africa, anthropological sketch research by Melville Hersovits and former(a)s demo that at that place is a continuum of African traditions among Africans in the novel World from the watt Indies to the linked States.The great influence of African cultural practices on European cultures is found below the Mason-Dixon in the southeastern joined States, especi in ally in the Carolinas among the Gullah bulk and in Louisiana. African American culture very much developed by the piece from mainstream American culture beca de enclosureinusination of African Americans trust to practice their own traditions, as well as the persistence of racial requisition in America. Consequently African American culture has sire a probative p r manipulation of American culture and yet, at the equal time, remai ns a distinct culture ap art from it. memorialFrom the so iodinest days of bondage, slave owners sought to deterrent example control over their slaves by judgeing to make clean them of their African culture. The physical isolation and societal marginalization of African slaves and, aft(prenominal), of their exonerate progeny, however, very facilitated the retention of significant elements of tralatitious culture among Africans in the un spendd World broadly, and in the U. S. in quiticular. Slave owners deliberately try to repress policy-making organization in order to deal with the many slave rebellions that took place in the southerly unite States, Brazil, Haiti, and the Dutch Guyanas.African cultures,slavery,slave rebellions,and the well-bred rights hunting expeditions(circa 1800s-160s) flummox make African American religious, familial, policy-making and frugal behaviors. The imprint of Africa is evident in innumerous bureaus, in politics, scotchs, lan guage, euphony, tomentumsbreadthstyles, fashion, leaping, religion and worldview, and food training methods. In the joined States, the very canon that was designed to strip slaves of culture and resist them education served in many courses to volumeen it.In plough, African American culture has had a pervasive, trans pull inative impact on myriad elements of mainstream American culture, among them language, music, trip the light fantastic, religion, cuisine, and agriculture. This litigate of sh bed creative exc bent grasse is callight-emitting diode creolization. Over time, the culture of African slaves and their desc extirpateants has been ubiquitous in its impact on non sole(a)ly the par centre American culture, entirely on world culture as well. viva tradition Slave spend a pennyers limited or verboten education of enslaved African Americans because they believed it might leading to revolts or escape plans.Hence, African- ground viva voce traditions became t he outlying(prenominal)gonwellicular means of preserving accounting, m verbals, and other cultural study among the people. This was consistent with the griot practices of oral history in many African and other cultures that did non rely on the written word. numerous of these cultural elements decl atomic number 18 been blow overed from multiplication to generation by storytelling. The folktales caterd African Americans the opportunity to tickle pink and educate one some other. Examples of African American folktales include trickster tales of Brer Rabbit and heroic tales much(prenominal)(prenominal) as that ofJohn Henry. The Uncle Remus stories by Joel Chandler Harris helped to bring African American folk tales into mainstream adoption. Harris did non jimmy the convolutedity of the stories nor their potential for a permanent impact on society. Characteristics of the African American oral tradition present themselves in a subprogram of forms. African American preach ers carry to perform rather than single if speak. The emotion of the subject is carried finished the vocalizers tone, volume, and movement, which tend to mirror the ascending action, climax, and descending action of the sermon.Often mental strain, saltation, verse and structured pauses ar placed through and through and throughout the sermon. Techniques much(prenominal) as call-and-response be used to bring the sense of hearing into the presentation. In engineer contrast to recent tradition in other American and westerlyern cultures, it is an unimpeachable and coarse audience reaction to shake up and affirm the speaker. Spoken word is a nonher(prenominal) example of how the African American oral tradition influences forward-lookingistic American touristed culture. Spoken word artists employ the homogeneous techniques as African American preachers including movement, rhythm, and audience pickicipation.Rap music from the 1980s and beyond has been seen as an exten sion of oral culture. Harlem renascence pic Zora Neale Hurston was a large literary name during the Harlem Renaissance. Main article Harlem Renaissance The prototypical major normal recognition of African American culture occurred during the Harlem Renaissance. In the twenties and 1930s, African American music, literature, and art gained gigantic notice. Authors much(prenominal)(prenominal) as Zora Neale Hurston and Nella Larsen and poets much(prenominal)(prenominal)(prenominal)(prenominal) as Langston Hughes, Claude McKay, and Countee Cullen wrote works describing the African American experience. turn in, strike down, blues and other musical forms entered American frequent music. African American artists such as William H. Johnson and Palmer Hayden produced unique works of art featuring African Americans. The Harlem Renaissance was withal a time of increased governmental involvement for African Americans. Among the leading light African American political movements founded in the azoic twentieth speed of light be the get together Negro service Association and the field of study Association for the emanation of tingeed People.The democracy of Islam, a historied Islamic religious movement, withal began in the former(a) 1930s. African American cultural movement The dusky Power movement of the mid-sixties and seventies followed in the airstream of the non-violent American genteel Rights driving. The movement promoted racial pride and heathenishal cohesion in contrast to the concentrate on on integration of the Civil Rights Movement, and adopt a much militant posture in the face of racism. It too inspired a invigoratedly renaissance in African American literary and artistic extendion generally referred to as the African American or sullen arts Movement. The works of public recording artists such as Nina Simone (Young, ingenious and ignominious) and The Impressions (Keep On Pushin), as well as the poetry, fine arts and literature of the time, shaped and reflected the development racial and political consciousness. Among the to the highest degree prominent writers of the African American Arts Movement were poet Nikki Giovanni poet and publisher Don L. Lee, who by and by became cognise as Haki Madhubuti poet and playwright Leroi Jones, later cognize as Amiri Baraka and Sonia Sanchez. other(a) key writers were Ed Bullins, Dudley Randall, Mari Evans, June Jordan, Larry Neal and Ahmos Zu-Bolton. some other major flavor of the African American Arts Movement was the infusion of the African aesthetic, a move over to a collective cultural susceptibility and ethnic pride that was much in evidence during the Harlem Renaissance and in the jubilance of Negritude among the artistic and literary circles in the U. S. , Caribbean and the African continent nearly four decades ahead the idea that black is beautiful. During this time, thither was a revival meeting of amuse in, and an embrace of, eleme nts of African culture inside African American culture that had been suppressed or corrupted to conform to Eurocentric America.Natural hairstyles, such as the afro, and African garment, such as the dashiki, gained fashionableity. More substantially, the African American aesthetic further personal pride and political awargonness among African Americans. Music pic hands playing the djembe, a tralatitiousistic wolfram African drum adopted into African American and American culture. The bags and the clothing of the man on the right be printed with traditional kente cloth patterns. African American music is rooted in the typically polyrhythmic music of the ethnic groups of Africa, specifically those in the western, Sahelean, and sub-Saharan regions.African oral traditions, nurtured in slavery, gaind the use of music to pass on history, teach lessons, ease suffering, and relay messages. The African pedigree of African American music is evident in some common land elements call and response, syncopation, percussion, improvisation, swung notes, blue notes, the use of falsetto, melisma, and complex multi- pull up stakes harmony. During slavery, Africans in America blended traditional European hymns with African elements to create ghostlikes. umteen African Americans sing curve Evry Voice and Sing in gain to the American national anthem, The Star-Spangled Banner, or in lieu of it.Written by crowd Weldon Johnson and John Rosamond Johnson in 1900 to be performed for the natal day of Abraham Lincoln, the song was, and continues to be, a hot way for African Americans to recall past struggles and express ethnic solidarity, faith and hope for the future. The song was adopted as the Negro landed estateal Anthem by the NAACP in 1919. African American children be taught the song at school, church or by their families. Lift Evry Voice and Sing traditionally is sung immediately following, or kinda of, The Star-Spangled Banner at events hosted by African A merican churches, schools, and other organizations.In the 1800s, as the result of the blackface minstrel show, African American music entered mainstream American society. By the early twentieth century, several(prenominal) musical forms with origins in the African American community had modify American favorite music. Aided by the technological innovations of radio and phonograph records, ragtime, jazz, blues, and swing similarly became popular overseas, and the 1920s became cognize as the Jazz Age. The early 20th century also saw the concept of the startle signal African American Broadway shows, films such as King Vidors Hallelujah and operas such as George Gershwins Porgy and Bess. contention and roll, doo wop, soul, and RB developed in the mid 20th century. These genres became very popular in white audiences and were influences for other genres such as surf. The dozens, an urban African American tradition of using rhyming shoot to put down your enemies (or friends) dev eloped through the smart-ass track jive of the early mid-seventies into a newfound form of music. In the second Bronx, the half speaking, half relation rhythmic street talk of rapping grew into the tremendously successful cultural force cognise as Hip cut.Hip Hop would become a multicultural movement. However, it is in time important to many African Americans. The African American Cultural Movement of the mid-sixties and 1970s also fueled the emersion of funk and later hip-hop forms such as rap, hip house, new goofball swing and go go. African American music has experienced far more than far-flung acceptance in American popular music in the twenty- front closely century than ever beforehand. In accompaniment to continuing to develop newer musical forms, novel artists give up also started a rebirth of older genres in the form of genres such as neo soul and forward-looking funk-inspired groups. leap picThe Cakewalk was the first African American dance to gain total spread popularity in the unify States. pic African American dance, like other opinions of African American culture, finds its earliest roots in the dances of the hundreds of African ethnic groups that made up African slaves in the Americas as well as influences from European sources in the get together States. Dance in the African tradition, and thence in the tradition of slaves, was a part of some(prenominal) every day manners and special occasions. Many of these traditions such as stir down, ring shouts, and other elements of African personate language survive as elements of modern dance.In the 1800s, African American dance began to appear in minstrel shows. These shows lots presented African Americans as caricatures for ridicule to big(a) audiences. The first African American dance to become popular with etiolate dancers was the trip the light fantastic in 1891. Later dances to follow in this tradition include the Charleston, the Lindy Hop, and the Jitterbug. During t he Harlem Renaissance, all African American Broadway shows such as Shuffle Along helped to establish and legitimatize African American dancers.African American dance forms such as tap, a combination of African and European influences, gained widespread popularity thanks to dancers such as menu Robinson and were used by leading White choreographers who a lot hired African American dancers. Contemporary African American dance is descended from these earlier forms and also draws influence from African and Caribbean dance forms. Groups such as the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater have continued to contribute to the growth of this form. in advance(p) popular dance in America is also greatly influenced by African American dance.American popular dance has also drawn many influences from African American dance most notably in the hip hop genre. Art pic rachis Dunes at Sunset, Atlantic City by Henry Ossawa Tanner 1859-1937 From its early origins in slave communities, through the end o f the twentieth century, African-American art has made a vital contribution to the art of the fall in States. During the period between the 1600s and the early 1800s, art took the form of dainty drums, quilts, wrought-iron figures and ceramic vessels in the southern United States. These arti particulars have similarities with comparable to(predicate) crafts in West and Central Africa.In contrast, African American artisans like the New Englandbased engraver Scipio Moorhead and the Baltimore portrait painter Joshua Johnson created art that was conceived in a thoroughly horse opera European fashion. During the 1800s, Harriet Powers made quilts in verdant Georgia, United States that are direct considered among the finest examples of nineteenth-century grey quilting. Later in the 20th century, the women of constant of gravitations Bend developed a typical, bold, and sophisticated quilting style based on traditional African American quilts with a geometric simplicity that develo ped separately but was like that of Amish quilts and modern art.After the American Civil War, museums and galleries began more frequently to display the work of African American artists. Cultural expression in mainstream venues was still limited by the dominant European aesthetic and by racial prejudice. To increase the visibility of their work, many African American artists traveled to Europe where they had greater freedom. It was not until the Harlem Renaissance that more whites began to hold attention to African American art in America. pic Kara Walker, Cut, Cut paper and tarry on wall, Brent Sikkema NYC.During the 1920s, artists such as Raymond Barthe, Aaron Douglas, capital of Maine Savage, and photographer James new wave Der Zee became well known for their work. During the big(p) Depression, new opportunities arose for these and other African American artists to a lower place the WPA. In later years, other programs and institutions, such as the New York City-based Harmon Foundation, helped to encourage African American artistic talent. Augusta Savage, Elizabeth Catlett, Lois Mailou Jones, Romare Bearden, Jacob Lawrence and others exhibited in museums and juried art shows, and strengthened reputations and followings for themselves.In the fifties and 1960s, there were very some astray accepted African American artists. in spite of this, The Highwaymen, a loose standstill of 27 African American artists from Ft. Pierce, Florida, created idyllic, rapidly realized images of the Florida landscape and peddled some 50,000 of them from the shorts of their cars. They sold their art directly to the public rather than through galleries and art agents, thus receiving the name The Highwaymen. Rediscovered in the mid-1990s, today they are recognized as an important part of American folk history.Their ar devilrk is widely collected by enthusiasts and original pieces can easily fetch thousands of dollars in auctions and sales. The unforgiving Arts Movement of the 1960s and 1970s was another period of resurgent interest in African American art. During this period, several African-American artists gained national prominence, among them Lou Stovall, Ed Love, Charles White, and Jeff Donaldson. Donaldson and a group of African-American artists formed the Afrocentric collective AFRICOBRA, which remains in existence today.The sculpturer Martin Puryear, whose work has been acclaimed for years, is creation honored with a 30-year retrospective of his work at the Museum of Modern Art in New York starting time November 2007. Notable contemporary African American artists include David Hammons, Eugene J. Martin, Charles Tol embodyr, and Kara Walker. Literature pic Langston Hughes, a notable African American poet of the Harlem Renaissance. African American literature has its roots in the oral traditions of African slaves in America. The slaves used stories and fables in much the same way as they used music.These stories influenced the earliest A frican American writers and poets in the 18thcentury such as Phillis Wheatley and Olaudah Equiano. These actors reached early high points by telling slave narratives. During the early 20th century Harlem Renaissance, numerous authors and poets, such as Langston Hughes, W. E. B. Dubois, and Booker T. Washington, grappled with how to suffice to discrimination in America. Authors during the Civil Rights era, such as Richard Wright, James Baldwin and Gwendolyn Brooks wrote about(predicate) pick outs of racial segregation, oppression and other aspects of African American life.This tradition continues today with authors who have been accepted as an integral part of American literature, with works such as Roots The Saga of an American Family by Alex Haley, The Color Purple by Alice Walker, and Beloved by Nobel Prize-winning Toni Morrison, and series by Octavia stilller and Walter Mosley that have achieved both(prenominal) exceed-selling and/or award-winning status. Museums The Afric an American Museum Movement emerged during the 1950s and 1960s to preserve the heritage of the African American experience and to ensure its right-hand(a) interpretation in American history.Museums dedicate to African American history are found in many African American neighborhoods. Institutions such as the African American Museum and Library at Oakland and The African American Museum in Cleveland were created by African Americans to teach and investigate cultural history that, until recent decades was primarily preserved trough oral traditions. Language Generations of hardships imposed on the African American community created distinctive language patterns. Slave owners frequentlytimes deliberately mixed people who spoke antithetic African languages to discourage communication in any language other than side of meat.This, combine with prohibitions against education, led to the teaching of pidgins, simplified mixtures of two or more languages that speakers of different la nguages could use to communicate. Examples of pidgins that became fully developed languages include Creole, common to Haiti,and Gullah, common to the Sea Islands off the sailplaning of South Carolina and Georgia. African American cant English is a type motley (dialect, ethnolect and sociolect) of the American English language close associated with the speech of but not exclusive to African Americans.While AAVE is academically considered a legitimate dialect because of its logical structure, some of both Caucasians and African Americans consider it tantalise or the result of a little command of Standard American English. in imposing city African American children who are isolated by speaking only if AAVE have more difficulty with regularise testing and, after school, moving to the mainstream world for work. It is common for many speakers of AAVE to code refilling between AAVE and Standard American English depending on the setting. Fashion and aesthetics pic A man weaving kent e cloth in Ghana.Attire The cultural explosion of the 1960s saw the incorporation of surviving cultural dress with elements from modern fashion and West African traditional clothing to create a uniquely African American traditional style. Kente cloth is the best known African textile. These festive woven patterns, which exist in numerous varieties, were originally made by the Ashanti and Ewe peoples of Ghana and Togo. Kente fabric also appears in a lean of westbound style fashions ranging from casual t-shirts to formal table ties and cummerbunds. Kente strips are much sewn into liturgical and cademic robes or worn as stoles. Since the dumb Arts Movement, traditional African clothing has been popular amongst African Americans for both formal and informal occasions. another(prenominal) common aspect of fashion in African American culture involves the appropriate dress for theology in the colour church. It is expected in most churches that an individual should present their best appearance for worship. African American women in particular are known for wearing vibrant dresses and suits. An interpretation of a rush from the Christian Bible, very woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head , has led to the tradition of wearing elaborate sunlight hats, sometimes known as crowns. whisker Hair styling in African American culture is greatly varied. African American hair is typically composed of tightly coiled curls. The predominant styles for women involve the straightening of the hair through the application of heat or chemical processes. These treatments form the base for the most ordinarily tenderly acceptable hairstyles in the United States.Alternatively, the predominant and most tenderly acceptable practice for men is to progress ones hair innate(p). Often, as men age and begin to lose their hair, the hair is all closely cropped, or the head is shaved completely free of hair. However, since the 1960s, natural hairsty les, such as the afro, br aids, and dreadlocks, have been growing in popularity. Although the association with foot political movements and their vast difference from mainstream Western hairstyles, the styles have not yet bring denture the bacon widespread social acceptance.Maintaining facial hair is more prevalent among African American men than in other masculine creations in the U. S. In fact, the soul spotting is so named because African American men, specially jazz musicians, popularized the style. The preference for facial hair among African American men is collect partly to personal taste, but because they are more prone than other ethnic groups to develop a condition known as pseudofolliculitis barbae, commonly referred to as razor bumps, many prefer not to shave. luggage compartment imageThe European aesthetic and sequential mainstream concepts of beauty are often at odds with the African body form. Because of this, African American women often find themselves ch thonic pressure to conform to European standards of beauty. Still, there are individuals and groups who are working towards top the standing of the African aesthetic among African Americans and internationally as well. This includes efforts toward promoting as models those with intelligibly defined African features the mainstreaming of natural hairstyles and, in women, fuller, more voluptuous body types. pietism While African Americans practice a image of religions, Protestant Christianity is by far the most popular. Additionally, 14% of Muslims in the United States and Canada are African American. Christianity pic A river baptism in New Bern, North Carolina near the turn of the 20th century. The religious institutions of African American Christians commonly are referred tocollectively as the black church. During slavery, many slaves were stripped of their African belief systems and typically denied free religious practice.Slaves managed, however, to hang on to some practices by integrate them into Christian worship in abstruse meetings. These practices, including dance, shouts, African rhythms, and enthusiastic singing, remain a large part of worship in the African American church. African American churches taught that all people were equal in Gods eyes and viewed the philosophical system of obedience to ones get the best taught in white churches as hypocritical. instead the African American church focussed on the message of e property and hopes for a better future.Before and after liberty, racial segregation in America prompted the development of organized African American denominations. The first of these was the AME Church founded by Richard Allen in 1787. An African American church is not needs a separate denomination. Several preponderantly African American churches exist as divisions of predominantly white denominations. African American churches have served to allow African American people with leadership positions and opportunities to organ ize that were denied in mainstream American society.Because of this, African American pastors became the nosepiece between the African American and European American communities and thus played a crucial role in the American Civil Rights Movement. Like many Christians, African American Christians sometimes participate in or attend a Christmas play. Black Nativity by Langston Hughes is a re-telling of the guileless Nativity story with gospel music. Productions can be found a African American theaters and churches all over the country. Islam pic A member of the tribe of Islam selling deal on a city street corner.Despite the popular assumption that the Nation represents all or most African American Muslims, less than 2% are members. Generations before the advent of the Atlantic slave trade, Islam was a thriving religion in West Africa due to its peaceful entre via the lucrative trans-Saharan trade between prominent tribes in the southern Sahara and the Berbers to the North. In his attesting to this fact the West African scholar Cheikh Anta Diop explained The main(a) reason for the success of Islam in Black Africa onsequently stems from the fact that it was propagated peacefully at first by solitary Arabo-Berber travelers to certain Black kings and notables, who then spread it about them to those under their jurisdiction Many first-generation slaves were often able to retain their Muslim identity, their descendants were not. Slaves were either forcibly converted to Christianity as was the eccentric person in the Catholic lands or were circumvent with gross inconviences to their religious practice such as in the case of the Protestant American mainland.In the decades after slavery and particularly during the depression era, Islam reemerged in the form of highly visible and sometimes debatable heterodox movements in the African American community. The first of these of note was the Moorish light Temple of America, founded by Noble draw Ali. Ali had a prof ound influence on Wallace Fard, who later founded the Black nationalist Nation of Islam in 1930. Elijah Muhammad became head of the organization in 1934. Much like Malcolm X, who left the Nation of Islam in 1964, many African American Muslims now follow traditional Islam.A survey by the Council on American-Islamic relations shows that 30% of Sunni Mosque attendees are African Americans. African American orthodox Muslims are often the victims of stereotypes, most notably the assumption that an African American Muslim is a member of the Nation of Islam. They are often viewed by the uneducated African-American community in general as less true(p) than Muslims from the Middle East or South Asia while credibility is less of an issue with immigrant Muslims and Muslim world in general. Other religionsAside from Christianity and Islam, there are also African Americans who follow Judaism, Buddhism, and a number of other religions. The Black Hebrew Israelites are a collection of African Amer ican Jewish religious organizations. Among their varied teachings, they often include that African Americans are descended from the scriptural Hebrews (sometimes with the paradoxical claim that the Jewish people are not). in that respect is a small but growing number of African Americans who participate in African traditional religions, such as Vodou and Santeria or Ifa and diasporic traditions like Rastafarianism.Many of them are immigrants or descendants of immigrants from the Caribbean and South America, where these are practiced. Because of religious practices, such as animal sacrifice, which are no longer common among American religions and are often legally prohibited, these groups whitethorn be viewed negatively and are sometimes the victims of harassment. animation events For most African Americans, the observance of life events follows the pattern of mainstream American culture. There are some traditions which are unique to African Americans.Some African Americans have cr eated new rites of passage that are linked to African traditions. Pre-teen and teenage boys and girls take classes to prepare them for adulthood. They are typically taught spirituality, responsibility, and leadership. Most of these programs are simulate after traditional African ceremonies, with the focus largely on embracing African ideologies rather than specific rituals. To this day, some African American couples choose to jump the drag as a part of their man and wife ceremony.Although the practice, which can be traced back to Ghana, set down out of favor in the African American community after the end of slavery, it has experienced a slight resurgence in recent years as some couples seek to reaffirm their African heritage. Funeral traditions tend to vary based on a number of factors, including religion and location, but there are a number of commonalities. Probably the most important part of death and dying in the African American culture is the gathering of family and frien ds. every in the last days before death or shortly after death, typically any friends and family members that can be reached are notified.This gathering helps to provide spiritual and emotional support, as well as assistance in making decisions and accomplishing free-and-easy tasks. The spirituality of death is very important in African American culture. A member of the clergy or members of the religious community, or both, are typically present with the family through the entire process. Death is often viewed as transitory rather than final. Many operate are called propertygoings, instead of funerals, based on the belief that the person is going home to the afterlife. The entire end of life process is generally treated as a celebration of life rather than a mourning of loss.This is most notably demonstrated in the New Orleans Jazz Funeral tradition where upbeat music, dancing, and food encourage those gathered to be happy and continue the homegoing of a beloved friend. Cuisine pic A traditional soul food d inner consisting of hot up chicken, candied yams, collard greens, cornbread, and macaroni and cheese. The cultivation and use of many agricultural products in the United States, such as yams, peanuts, rice, okra, sorghum, grits, wa barrierelon, indigo dyes, and cotton, can be traced to African influences. African American foods reflect creative esponses to racial and scotch oppression and distress. Under slavery, African Americans were not allowed to eat better cuts of meat, and after emancipation many often were too paltry to afford them. Soul food, a complaisant cuisine commonly associated with African Americans in the South (but also common to African Americans nationwide), makes creative use of inexpensive products procured through farming and subsistence hunting and fishing. Pig intestines are boiled and sometimes battered and fried to make chitterlings, also known as chitlins. Ham hocks and neck bones provide seasoning to soups, beans and bo iled greens (turnip greens, collard greens, and chinese mustard greens). Other common foods, such as fried chicken and fish, macaroni and cheese, cornbread and hoppin john (black-eyed peas and rice) are prepared simply. When the African American population was considerably more rural than it generally is today, rabbit, possum, squirrel, and waterfowl were important additions to the diet. Many of these food traditions are especially predominant in many parts of the rural South. traditionally prepared soul food is often high in fat, sodium and starch. exceedingly suited to the physically demanding lives of laborers, farmhands and rural lifestyles generally, it is now a contributing factor to obesity, fancy disease, and diabetes in a population that has become increasingly more urban and sedentary. As a result, more health-conscious African-Americans are using selection methods of preparation, eschewing trans fats in favor of natural vegetable oils and substituting smoked bomb calo rimeter for fatback and other, cured pork products limiting the amount of refined sugar in desserts and emphasise the consumption of more fruits and vegetables than animal protein.There is some resistance to such changes, however, as they involve deviating from long culinary tradition. Holidays and observances pic A woman wearing traditional West African clothing lighting the candles on a kinara for a Kwanzaa celebration. As with other American racial and ethnic groups, African Americans observe ethnic holidays alongside traditional American holidays. Holidays spy in African American culture are not only ascertained by African Americans. The birthday of noted American civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr has been observed nationally since 1983. It is one of triple federal holidays named for an individual.Black History Month is another example of another African American observance that has been adopted nationally. Black History Month is an attempt to focus attention on pr eviously neglected aspects of the African American experience. It is observed during the month of February to coincide with the founding of the NAACP and the birthdays of Frederick Douglass, a prominent African American abolitionist, and Abraham Lincoln, the United States president who signed the Emancipation Proclamation. slight widely observed outside of the African American community is Emancipation Day. The genius and timing of the celebration vary regionally.It is most widely observed as Juneteenth, in recognition of the official reading of the Emancipation Proclamation on June 19, 1865 in Texas. Another holiday not widely observed outside of the African American community is the birthday of Malcolm X. The day is observed on May 19 in American cities with a significant African American population, including Washington, D. C.. One of the most noted African American holidays is Kwanzaa. Like Emancipation Day, it is not widely observed outside of the African American community, although it is growing in popularity within the community.African American scholar and active Maulana Ron Karenga invented the festival of Kwanzaa in 1966, as an alternative to the increasing commercialization of Christmas. Derived from the harvest rituals of Africans, Kwanzaa is observed each year from December 26 through January 1. Participants in Kwanzaa celebrations affirm their African heritage and the importance of family and community by drinking from a unity cup lighting red, black, and green candles exchanging heritage symbols, such as African art and relation back the lives of people who struggled for African and African American freedom.Names African American names are often drawn from the same language groups as other popular names found in the United States. The practice of adopting neo-African or Islamic names did not gain popularity until the late Civil Rights era. Efforts to recover African heritage inspired selection of names with deeper cultural significance. earlier to this, using African names was not practical for two reasons. First, many African Americans were several generations removed from the last tooth root to have an African name since slaves were often given European names.Second, a traditional American name helps an individual hold back into American society. Another African American naming practice that predates the use of African names is the use of made-up names. In an attempt to create their own identity, growing numbers of African American parents, starting in the post-World War II era, began creating new names based on sounds they found pleasing such as Marquon, DaShawn, LaTasha, or Shandra. Family When slavery was practiced in the United States, it was common for families to be uncaring through sale. Even during slavery, however, African American families managed to check strong familial bonds.Free, African men and women, who managed to secure their own freedom by cosmos hired out, who were emancipated, or who h ad fly their masters, often worked long and hard to buy the members of their families who remained in bondage and send for them. Others, separated from blood kin, formed close bonds comprised of pretended kin play relations, play aunts, cousins and the like. This practice, possibly a holdover from African tradition, survived Emancipation, with non-blood family friends commonly accorded the status and titles of blood relations.This broader, more African concept of what constitutes family and community, and the deeply rooted view for elders that is part of African traditional societies whitethorn be the genesis of the common use of the terms like aunt, uncle, brother, baby, Mother and Mama when addressing other African American people, some of whom may be complete strangers. Or, it could have arisen in the Christian church as a way of greeting fellow congregants and believers. Immediately after slavery, African American families struggled to reunite and reconstruct what had been taken.As late as 1960, 78% of African American families were headed by marry couples. This number steadily declined over the latter(prenominal) half of the 20th century. A number of factors, including attitudes towards education, gender roles, and poverty have created a situation where, for the first time since slavery, a majority of African American children live in a household with only one parent, typically the mother. These figures appear to advert a weak African American nuclear family structure, especially within a large patriarchal society.This apparent impuissance is balanced by mutual aid systems established by extended family members to provide emotional and economic support. Older family members pass on social and cultural traditions such as religion and manners to young family members. In turn, the older family members are bursterd for by younger family members when they are unable to care for themselves. These relationships exist at all economic levels in the Afric an American community, providing strength and support both to the African American family and the community. Politics and social issuesSince the passing of the right to vote Rights Act, African Americans are voting and being elected to public office in increasing numbers. As of January 2001 there were 9,101 African American elected officials in America. African Americans are overwhelmingly Democratic. Only 11% of African Americans voted for George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential Election. Social issues such as racial profiling, the racial disparity in sentencing, high rates of poverty, institutional racism, and lower ingress to health care are important to the African American community.While the apportion on racial and fiscal issues has remained consistently wide for decades, seemingly indicating a wide social divide, African Americans tend to hold the same optimism and concern for America as Whites. In the case of many clean issues such as religion, and family values, Africa n Americans tend to be more conservative than Whites. Another area where African Americans outstrip Whites in their conservatism is on the issue of homosexuality. swelled leaders in the Black church have demonstrated against gay rights issues such as gay pairing.There are those within the community who take a more inclusive position most notably, the late Mrs. Coretta Scott King, and the Reverend Al Sharpton, who, when asked in 2003 whether he supported gay marriage, replied that he might as well have been asked if he supported black marriage or white marriage. Neighborhoods African American neighborhoods are types of ethnic enclaves found in many cities in the United States. The defining of African American neighborhoods is closely linked to the history of segregation in the United States, either through formal laws, or as a product of social norms.Despite this, African American neighborhoods have played an important role in the development of nearly all aspects of both African American culture and broader American culture. Due to segregated conditions and widespread poverty some African American neighborhoods in the United States have been called ghettos. The use of this term is controversial and, depending on the context, potentially offensive. Despite mainstream Americas use of the term ghetto to signify a poor urban area populated by ethnic minorities, those living in the area often used it to signify something positive.The African American ghettos did not always contain neglectful houses and deteriorating projects, nor were all of its residents poverty-stricken. For many African Americans, the ghetto was home a place representing authentic pitch blackness and a feeling, passion, or emotion derived from the go above the struggle and suffering of being of African descent in America. Langston Hughes relays in the Negro Ghetto (1931) and The Heart of Harlem (1945) The buildings in Harlem are brick and stone/And the streets are long and wide,/But Harle ms much more than these alone,/Harlem is whats inside. Playwright August Wilson used the term ghetto in Ma Raineys Black Bottom (1984) and Fences (1987), both of which draw upon the authors experience growing up in the Hill district of Pittsburgh, an African American ghetto. Although African American neighborhoods may suffer from civic disinvestment, with lower quality schools, less effective policing and fire protection. There are institutions such as churches and museums and political organizations that help to improve the physical and social capital of African American neighborhoods.In African American neighborhoods the churches may be important sources of social cohesion. For some African Americans the kind spirituality learned through these churches works as a preservative factor against the corrosive forces of racism. Museums devoted to African American history are also found in many African American neighborhoods. Many African American neighborhoods are located in inner cit ies, These are the mostly residential neighborhoods located closest to the central business district.The built environment is often row houses or brownstones, mixed with older single family homes that may be converted to multi family homes. In some areas there are larger flat buildings. Shotgun houses are an important part of the built environment of some southern African American neighborhoods. The houses consist of three to five rooms in a row with no hallways. This African American house design is found in both rural and urban southern areas, mainly in African-American communities and neighborhoods.