Evolution of Black History Month

February is known for Valentine's Day and being the shortest month of the year, but February also represents a history that is usually not given much attention in the textbooks, Black History.

According to History.com, Black History Month was started by Dr. Carter G. Woodson, the second Black American to receive a degree from Harvard. Woodson realized how important it was to "preserve one's heritage" and urged his fraternity, Omega Psi Phi, to educate people about Black history, and they did so by starting the "Negro Literature and History Week" in 1920. Later, it was changed to "Negro History Week" in 1926.

Woodson picked the month of February because of two people he felt had helped the future of Black Americans- Abraham Lincoln who signed the Emancipation Proclamation on February 12 and Frederick Douglass who was born on Feb. 14, and was one of the leading abolitionists in the United States.

After Woodson died in 1950, his efforts lived on with the beginnings of the Civil Rights Movement during the 1950s and 60s. More cities started to recognize this celebration of education and history of the Black community across the United States.

The Black Power Movement of the 1970s was what helped change "Negro History Week" into the "Black History Month" as we know it. The Black Power Movement was all about racial pride and emphasized the "significance of collective cultural values," which is what prompted the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (ASNLH), which was co-founded in 1915 by Woodson and Rev. Jesse E. Moorland to research and raise awareness about the role of Black Americans in the history of the U.S., to change the name from "Negro History Week" to "Black History Week, which they later lengthened it to make it "Black History Month."

The evolution of Black History Month represents the Black community's past and heritage. The struggles faced since the beginning of the colonization of America through the Civil War and Civil Rights Movement, and to the present day, shows that Black culture has been evolving and contributing to the mainstream American culture through music, art and politics through the generations.