I thought I would work and change and came to Addis Ababa

I thought I would work and change. When I was 13 years old, I lost my family and came to Addis Ababa. It goes back to the reason Black History Month is founded. It’s not that this history is more important but the reason it was founded is that it was under-explored. 

So it highlights the under-explored element and that’s what gave birth to it. What we see in today’s sphere is that there is more opportunity to explore that history but there is also unwritten history that is yet to be explored. 

For example, I celebrated and organized my first Black History Month when I was in high school 30 years ago. As a young African-American, it offered an opportunity to do research and find out things that I didn’t know. 

But it wasn’t until I came to Ethiopia that I heard for the first time about John Robinson. He was a pioneer and a hero who had a connection to Ethiopia 75 years ago. Why didn’t I know about it? Why don’t most Americans know about him? That’s the rationale for having African-American History Month, which is to explore those things that we should know about.

In terms of why isn’t there a White History Month, well, to be honest, the history of America has been written primarily about whites for whites and so most of the ground has been covered. Academia is full of historians who are exploring parts of American history but the same has not been true for African-American history.