Hello Meltingpot Readers,
I can’t believe five years have passed. Yes, it’s been almost five years since I penned that opinion piece in the New York Times, advocating for the capital B when writing about Black Americans. But yes, it was November 18, 2014 that the world learned how I really felt about living in the lowercase. That was the beginning of the Capital B Campaign!
The Capital B Campaign
What started as a blog post here on My American Meltingpot, ended up as a widely read op-ed piece where I made my argument about why people in general, and publishers specifically, should use the capital B when referring to Black people. In a nutshell, because we are a culture, not a color. The thing is, W.E.B. Dubois made this very same argument in the 1920s, only he was advocating for a capital N in the word Negro. But the message was the same. Acknowledge with your words that we, like all people, deserve the respect of capitalization.
When the article was published in the Times, I really had hope that the Times itself would reverse course and start capitalizing the B in Black. Especially since they published my story. But they didn’t. And no, the irony wasn’t lost on me that in an article advocating for a capital B, we still remained in the lowercase. Ah, irony.
The Arc of Justice Bends Towards the B
So, no The New York Times didn’t change their official style guide. Neither did the Associated Press. But in the five years since that article debuted, many other publications have. Earlier this week I learned that the Brookings Institute has just decided to start capitalizing the B in Black in all of their publications. In their official announcement they wrote, ” This update to Brookings’s writing style guide is one critical step in a larger set of actions the institution is taking to modernize and commit to inclusion and diversity.” Bravo, Brookings Institute.
I have no idea how many other publications have changed their style guides, but I was shocked the other day when I googled my original article and saw how many places it was referenced by publications who did make the change. Like here and here and here and here. That’s the power of the pen, people! To be honest, I don’t care if it was my article that brought about the change, I’m just happy that change is happening.
La Luta Continua!
As I always say, words matter. Labels matter. Race matters. And while the world is still wrestling with the idea that Black Lives Matter, I know we matter, and I know we matter enough to warrant the uppercase.
Peace!
