Librarians collect, organize, and access information. Sure, we read books, but we do so much more! In fact, there’s a science to what we do. In some of our work, we use systems like Library of Congress or the Dewey Decimal System to organize and classify information sources so that people can access them. I say information sources rather than books because there are sound recordings, periodicals, series, video recordings, electronic items, images, and so many other types of items to consider. Librarians thrive at ordering things because it’s one of our basic skills. But, ordering and classifying isn’t a black and white process. Let me use the Dewey system and 741.5 as an example. I promise my point here is wider than librarianship, so stick with me.

741.5 is where we stick graphic novels and comics. This is weird because the entire Dewey system is based on genre, not format. And, because graphic novels are a format, I end up with genres like biographies, fictions, and science and history non-fiction, as well as books about comics and graphic novels all in the same area on the shelf. It’s a mess to me, but to catalogers who control the system, it makes sense.

Dewey is just one of many systems used to organize library materials.

Race is just one of many systems used to organize human beings.

Let’s think about the artificial construct of the Black race as it’s developed here in the United States. [to say ‘America’ would be incorrect because America is a land mass that extends from the north pole to the southern tip of Tierra del Fuego.] Let’s start with this piece from the NY Times that does a pretty good job of examining the fluidity of Blackness in the US. The article was written during the Summer of Covid when news outlets were being more aware of the coverage they were providing to people of African descent in the US. Focusing on the transformation of ‘black’ to ‘Black’ in printed text, the article reflections on the different language and concepts used to attempt to define (suprress?) people of African origin in the US. Do check it out. Just like with Dewey and 7451.5, we’re here with an artificial construct trying to define and classify something. Trying to impose not just an identity, but a shelf to sit on.  

If trying to decide what to call this group isn’t complicated enough, let’s decide who gets to sit on the shelf. There are those who create a real distinction between African Americans and Black Americans. While both groups claim Africa as the Motherland, and both group face similar oppression and racism from other racial and ethnic groups, there is a friction between the two that is maintained by African Americans holding to a self-definition based on their historic presence in this county: that we’re different (more American?) because our ancestors experienced racism in this country.

What’s the prize?

I’ve briefly presented the differences between Black American, and African American but, now I’m going to look specifically at African American. The definition here that I’m most familiar with is that it only considers those of Black African descent whose ancestors experience enslavement in the United States. It disregards a much larger representation of those stolen from Africa and enslaved in the Americas as well as a general African ancestry. If a Black person in the US were to be questioned on their identity, they could have difficulty responding unless they’d investigated their genealogy. Consider these possibilities.

First, if we say ‘Black American’ or ‘African American’, we’re talking about people on a very large land mass, because as an example, Brazil, where more enslaved people were taken than any other country, is in the Americas.

Next, know that the first Africans to come to the US were explorers. Even into slavery times, there were free Blacks living in the United States. Not all Blacks who live in the US can trace their families to enslavement.

In the early 19^th century, there were large movements of enslaved people leaving the US to keep or obtain their freedom. They went to Mexico, Canada, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. Give a listen to this podcast, where Black Canadian writer and musician Antonio Michael Downing explains his family’s roots in US enslavement. What is the relevancy of ancestral experience of enslavement in the US if that is indeed the measuring stick? Perhaps it creates a culture group. But, where does that leave countless other Blacks who have left the US to settle in other countries, or Black families that have been here for decades?

History makes it difficult to define human identities. Yet, we often want to turn to the original intent of a term, phrase or concept when we know that the original creators didn’t leave any definitions. So, we work to be loyal to an artificial concept that really has no clear definition so we can do what we’ve always done. We use language as a tool of oppression because that’s what we’ve learned to do, rather than letting ourselves become tools of collective liberation.

Maybe there is a science to this: biological essentialism. In the meantime, we’re just spinning our wheels on divisive concepts. Maybe that’s why there are not any clear definitions for these concepts based in this manmade idea of ‘race’. Yet, we try.

The CSKBART Executive Board proposed and approved the following change to the definition of African American:

• African Americans are descendants of enslaved Africans born in the United States
• African American is an ethnic group.
• Black American is an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial, or total ancestry from Black racial groups in Africa.

This has to be a difficult task for librarians, even though they are well versed in classification. I think that following the work of the CSKBART Executive Board is important for us all to do because in defines the types of stories this group wants to celebrate for our young people.