One holiday tradition my mom always wanted to do with us but never did is celebrate Kwanzaa. She did educate me on what it is and what everything means, but we never got around to ever doing it. But now that I’m starting my own family, I wanted to do celebrate this year (even if Baby won’t be around to see it.) That way we’ll be ready to celebrate it the way we should when Baby is bigger.
So, for 2020 I decided to celebrate Kwanzaa through literature. I’ll be listing the principles for each day along with a book that matches the principles. If you can think of other titles that match the principles, tell me, I’d love to discuss.
Day 3 is Ujima. It means Collective Work and Responsibility. The candle order is the Black one and then the two farthest left red ones. The process is much of the same, light the other two candles in order and then light the two far left red ones. The person who lights it then makes a statement about Collective Work and Responsibility. For me, that means uplifting my community. Again, for me this statement has to do with books. I’m not around as much anymore because of coming baby and new job, but I’m still doing all the things off scene to help get Diverse Books the recognition they deserve. I’m buying them for my library system. I’m making sure they are going to the libraries that most represent those communities. And I’m making sure that they’re visible to the patrons by making social media posts that they can use and running a Diversity Audit with a few of my co-workers.
As a blogger I’m still promoting diverse books on my blog and they’re given priority if I need to review them. I also try to shout about the books in person to other people and give them out as recs as much as possible. It seems small because I’m not a famous Bookstagrammer or BookTok-er (which seems to be the thing right now) but I’m still here doing what I can!
The book I thought about first that reminded me of uplifting their community was:
When I think about this book I remember the spaceship and the park the most. How Quan started in it and how it was when the book ended. It wasn’t the same at the end, but I won’t say how or why it changed. And of course, there’s the fact that Justyce is there and bettering the community in his own way. He’s not the main character of this story, but he’s a mighty important character in his own way.
What about you? What books do you think of when you think of Ujima or Collective Work and Responsibility? Do you think of this one as well? Let me know in the comments!