I want to say one of the reasons I like these posts focusing on pan-african activists is because one of the sad things about Black History Month, especially in the US, is that a lot of focus is on various "firsts" like Jackie Robinson and Guion Bluford, and while I don't want to diminish what they did, it overlooks what I think of when I think of "black history": the important people and ideas involved directly in the struggle for the rights and political recognition of black people.
You might get a bit on MLK Jr. or Rosa Parks or Harriet Tubman but the truth is that there's many many more. I suppose this is because a lot of the thoughts and goals these folks had are still considered controversial opinions and pierce the false narrative of racism being a danger of the past.
But if we get into deep discussions about what Thomas Jefferson or John Locke or Abraham Lincoln did and what political theories they drove for in (white) history, so should we in black history. And I think even more I appreciate the focus on leftist and Marxist thinkers because while there's definite truth to the idea of Marxism having a lot of unexamined whiteness, I get grumpy about how it's some times ceded to white people ignoring the many black Marxists there have been and often some of the most successful anti-colonial activists. (Much like how queerness is sometimes dismissed as a "white" thing, but that's a different rant...)
So I just wanted to really show my support for these posts, and that's enough rambling from me.
