Why Kwanzaa?
By Lawrence Dandridge
As December rolls into full holiday swing, I find myself deeply contemplating the pacing of a year’s celebrations. We start off pretty slow with MLK day and Valentine’s day at the top of the year… but as we get closer to closing out a long, full year’s journey, all the major celebrations are jam-packed into one month. Most holiday celebrations are rooted in observations of faith. I’m not the most religious person you’ll meet, but as a God-fearing, Christian man, I observe Christmas for many reasons. The Jewish community celebrates Hanukkah. But it wasn’t until recent years that I embraced the spirit of Kwanzaa, as it wasn’t a center point in my household growing up. If you share the same perspective as little me, ignorant as to why Kwanzaa is even a holiday worth celebrating, this one is for you.
“Why Kwanzaa?” was the question posed by our beloved Jeremiah Trusty at a meeting back in 2020 when the initial idea was to center a yearly gala around a holiday theme. To his questioning, Kwanzaa wasn’t the most celebrated or popular of the bunch of Holidays happening in the prime of December. “There is more repertoire to choose from for a Christmas-themed gala.” He argued. And he wasn’t wrong. The Christmas catalog is the root of the holiday spirit. Whether we’re singing carols or hymns, a Christmas gala would sell itself without much effort on our part!
Ujamaa: An Aurway Fundraiser Virtual Event 2020 at the The Newark Main Library.
And though I didn’t disagree with his points, I stood firmly on mine. Which is this:
The 7 principles of Kwanzaa mirror Aurway’s mission of highlighting the experiences of black and brown people through the pursuit, presentation, and creation of culturally relevant art. The network we have built is maintained through the principles of unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity, and faith. This wasn’t something I understood until very recently. Activist, Maulana Karenga, created this holiday in an effort to build an intentional space for black and brown people to connect and reflect into the new year. That is precisely Aurway’s intent. This, coupled with the very fact that Kwanzaa isn’t as popularly celebrated today as it should be is the reason why I would like to center it annually.
My biggest challenge was finding ways to connect a traditional Kwanzaa celebration with a modern flare. But I figured that we should start where every celebration starts… with a candle.
Many people don’t know that the reason we put lights on trees or light candles each night for both Hanukkah (Using a menorah) and Kwanzaa (Using a Kinora) is because daylight hours are shorter in the late fall and winter months so to quite literally illuminate alters during the celebration, we pay homage by keeping a candle burning through the night. Kwanzaa is unique being that it's the only one of the trio of celebrations not rooted in any religious observation. That in itself reflects that this celebration has a universal extension that goes wildly overlooked. Though Kwanzaa was first created in 1966 as an opportunity for black Americans to reaffirm their African roots and strengthen their bonds in a time of racial unrest and is specific to African culture, the commonality of its principles further affirms the power of community and togetherness. Therefore, making space for anyone to celebrate alongside us.
At Aurway, we always take full advantage of opportunities to start conversations with black and brown experiences at the forefront. With a Kwanzaa-centered gala, our hope is that by learning and celebrating with us through a carefully curated evening dedicated to our community, we can entice more people to willingly celebrate Kwanzaa on their own. Or at the very least, with us. Since 2020, we’ve held a live stream of our Candle Lighting Ceremonies, including a virtual gala called uJAMaa (Falling on the 4th day of Kwanzaa, Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics)) so friends and family can participate or observe from the comfort of their own homes... much of which we didn’t have a choice since we were all in a global pandemic… remember that!?
This year, however, we finally get to host our gala in person and the celebration we have in store is not to be missed!
It has since grown and transformed into Ujamboree : An Aurway Soiree! (Because we love to see folks dress up as much as we love a play on words over here at Aurway). We pair a song to each principle and walk through proper traditional ways to celebrate Kwanzaa with a walk-through of Aurway’s creative year. Here, you’ll get to meet our sponsors, community partners, and the Aurway A.R.T.I.S.T.s themselves with dinner, a show, and chances to win some awesome raffle prizes! This is our way of opening up our celebration to whomever is interested on the 4th day of Kwanzaa. There is no way we could do what we do without the community we continue to build.
To Jeremiah’s credit, we do look forward to finding our way of celebrating the other holidays. I promised him I’d write a Christmas Spectacular in exchange for his conceit to our collective vision… look out for “Why Christmas” in a year or so! Jeremiah’s spirit will be wrapped in a bow with that one.
Habari Gani, friends. And Happiest of Holidays!
