Negro Digest - Freedom Archives

complete without dealing in a large
way with students .
If a summary of the arguments
can be attempted, the authors seem
to be saying that somewhere near
the heart of the problems confronting
the black community is what
Carter G. Woodson called "the
mis-education of the Negro." This
"mis-education" consists principally
in the education of black scholars
to feel contempt for themselves and
for the black community . By failing
to confront them with adequate
knowledge about themselves, both
to counter white stereotypes and to
bolster their self-confidence, the
Negro colleges have also failed to
develop meaningful helping relationships
between black scholars
and the balck community . Accustomed
to facile imitations of white
middle class life styles, Negro colleges
have failed to plumb the
depths of the black experience :
Thus, Stephen Henderson underlines
the contention that in the
search for identity, "the black experience
is not only relevant . . .
it is fundamental and crucial" .a
A strengthened sense of identity
will produce not only a black university
which serves the Black
American community ; it will create
the indispensable pre-condition for
new linkages with the entire Third
World . A unique internationalism
will be created in which, according
to Vincent Handing, "the uniqueness
of our approach to the world
would be found in our vision
through an unashamedly black-
76
oriented prism . In the academic
program and in a hundred other
less structured ways, the black university
would seek to explore, celebrate
and record the experience of
the non-western world." 4 Similarly,
Gerald McWarter views as a key
component of the very meaning of
Blackness the "affirmation of an
identity independent of the historical
human evils of modern nation
states ." 5
The significant problem encountered
here is not adequately stated
in terms of the simply dichotemy of
integration versus separatism . The
real question is whether this statement
of mission and strategy does
justice to the facts and the logic of
the very black experience it claims
to celebrate . This writer has no
quarrel with the objectives of a
Black University which seeks to
serve the needs of the black community,
nor with the concern for
more adequate study and dramatization
of events in the black experience,
nor with the desire to
create unquestionably intelligent
and competent centers of learning
for black people .
Nonetheless, as is well known,
agreement on specific objectives
and even on particular tactical
points does not necessarily mean
agreement on underlying issues embedded
in the strategy itself. This
writer wishes to focus on but one
of such issues with the hope of
clarifying some of the strategic
questions raised .
The issue can be introduced by
March 1969 NEGRO DIGEST