Black August is turning into acknowledged as the choice to Black Historical past Month due to a rising motion geared toward honoring the revolutionary thought leaders and freedom fighters of the previous and current.
Black August was first celebrated in 1979 to commemorate famed Black Panther, George Jackson‘s, struggle for Black liberation, AP Information studies. Jackson was killed in 1971 throughout an rebellion at San Quentin State Jail in California.
Jackson gained prominence for his work as a broadcast creator, activist, and radical thought chief whereas incarcerated on a life sentence he obtained after being arrested at age 18 for robbing a fuel station in Los Angeles in 1960. In a nod towards carrying on his legacy, Black August has develop into a monthlong consciousness marketing campaign geared toward celebrating the Black freedom fighters, revolutionaries, radicals, and political prisoners residing and deceased.
Right now, Aug 21, the Jackson household commemorates the passing of our icon, George Jackson #BlackAugust pic.twitter.com/j1IF2pVwEB
— Jonathan Jackson Jr (@MudandMayo) August 21, 2022
Supporters of the motion discover it essential to acknowledge Black August and honor these early activists who put their life on the road for adjustments that Black Individuals proceed benefitting from in the present day.
“It’s necessary to do that now as a result of lots of people who have been on the unconventional scene throughout that point interval, kinfolk and non-relatives, who’re like blood kinfolk, are getting into their golden years,” mentioned Jonathan Jackson, 51, of Honest Hill, Maryland.
Black August goals to pay tribute to most of the Black liberation leaders and actions that maintain significance to the month of August. These celebrated in Black August embody figures like Nat Turner, who led a slave rebel on a southern Virginia plantation in August 1831.
Marcus Garvey, the chief of the Pan-Africanism motion, who was born in August 1887. Occasions just like the Haitian Revolution in 1791 and the March on Washington in 1963, which each came about within the month of August.
“This concept that there was this one slim manner that Black individuals resisted oppression is mostly a fantasy that’s dispelled by Black August,” mentioned Monifa Bandele, a frontrunner within the Motion for Black Lives, a nationwide coalition of BLM teams, who can be a member of the Malcolm X Grassroots Motion, a gaggle that raises consciousness of political prisoners.
