Some People.....

Originally written July 17th

I had a classmate the other night who voiced a concern during her presentation. She mentioned that she was reading her niece’s Texas history book and was concerned by the lack of black people in the book. She then stated that she was from Mississippi and there were lots of black people in their state history books. Now remember this is a graduate level class. But I wanted so badly to say “Helloooo! Texas belonged to Mexico and I’m pretty sure (now this is just a guess), but I’m pretty sure that there weren’t many black people in 1800’s Mexico”. I could be wrong. But, that might be why there aren’t a lot of black people in our history. Furthermore, there are generations of black families who have lived in Mississippi for years. This could be why there was great mention of them in the history of that state. She was also implying that Texas purposely left out the black people in their history books. As if that is really something the textbook writers and publishers would allow to happen in 2008. History is history. We cannot change it. And if you’re getting an advanced degree at a University you might want to study up on it before you make ignorant comments in front of your classmates.