2023 Kwanzaa message from its founder Dr. Maulana Karenga

Here is this years annual Kwanzaa message from its founder Dr. Maulana Karenga. This year his message is focused on Freedom, Justice and Peace: Principles and Practices For A New World.

Again, this year we wish for Africans everywhere throughout the world African community “Heri za Kwanzaa. Happy Kwanzaa.” And we bring and send greetings of celebration, solidarity and continued struggle for an inclusive and shared good in the world.

Also, in the still-held-high tradition of our ancestors, we wish for African peoples and all the peoples of the world all the good that heaven grants, the earth produces, and the waters bring forth from their depths. Hotep. Ase. Heri.

Moreover, among all the goods that are granted, given, and gained through ceaseless striving and righteous and relentless struggle, we wish, especially for our people and all other oppressed and struggling peoples of the world, the shared and indivisible goods of freedom, justice, and peace, deservedly achieved and enjoyed and passed on to future generations.

Indeed, we live in turbulent times of continuing unfreedom and oppression, the enduring evil of injustice and destructive conflicts, and unjust and genocidal war. And freedom, justice, and peace in the world and for the good of the world and all in it are urgent, essential, and indispensable.

Thus, we are morally called, commanded, and compelled to bear witness to truth and set the scales of justice in their proper place, especially among the voiceless and devalued, the downtrodden and defenseless, the oppressed, and the different and vulnerable. And we must do this not only through speech, but also in the way we live our lives, do our work, and wage our struggles for shared good in the world.

Kwanzaa was conceived and born in the womb, work, and transformative struggles of the Black Freedom Movement. And thus, its essential message and meaning was shaped and shared not only in sankofa initiatives of cultural retrieval, of the best of our views, values, and practices as African peoples.

It was also shaped by that defining decade of fierce strivings and struggles for freedom, justice and associated goods waged by Africans and other peoples of color all over the world in the 1960s. Kwanzaa thus came into being, grounded itself and grew as an act of freedom, an instrument of freedom, a celebration of freedom and a practice of freedom.

It was an act of self-determination and self-authorization; a means of cultivating and expanding consciousness and commitment; a righteous reveling in our recaptured sense of the sacredness, soulfulness, and beauty of our Black selves; and the practice of principles that engenders and sustains liberated and liberating ways to understand and assert ourselves in the world.

And at the heart of this liberated and liberating practice are the Nguzo Saba, the Seven Principles of Kwanzaa and of Kawaida philosophy out of which I created both Kwanzaa and the Nguzo Saba. Kawaida defines itself as and strives mightily to bring forth the “the best of African sensibilities, thought and practice in constant exchange with the world” and thus is developed and directed in the interest of African and human good and the well-being of the world.

If we are to achieve these vital goods and the new world that their securing will require and reflect, then, we must have principles and practices that ground and direct us toward this noble and needed goal. And the Nguzo Saba, the Seven Principles, offer us these principles and practices. Umoja (Unity) calls on us to work and struggle for principled, purposeful and practiced togetherness in freedom, justice and peace in our families, communities and the world. It stresses the ties that link us and cultivate in us sensitivity to each other, other humans and the world and all in it.

Indeed, it is expressed in the teaching of Nana Dr. Anna Julia Cooper who affirmed this ancient and African value. She says, “we take our stand on the solidarity of humanity, the oneness of life and the unnaturalness and injustice of all favoritism whether of sex, race, condition or country.”

Kujichagulia (Self-Determination) reaffirms the fundamental principle and practice of the right of every people to determine their own destiny and daily lives, to live free in their own place, space and time. And it reaffirms the right to resist all forms of unfreedom, injustice and oppression. It reaffirms Nana Haji Malcolm X’s teaching that “freedom is essential to life itself. Freedom is essential to the development of the human being. (And) If we don’t have freedom, we can never expect justice and equality.” Indeed, “only after freedom do justice and equality become a reality” in the fullest sense of the principle and practice.

Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility) reminds us and reaffirms the enduring and essential truth that we must build the good world we all want and deserve. It teaches the centrality of togetherness in our constant quest for an inclusive freedom, justice, and peace. And it reaffirms the reality that only in collective work and responsibility can we achieve freedom, ensure justice, and build the peace and security of persons and peoples we all long and struggle for all over the world.

And as Nana Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune taught us, “Our task is to remake the world. It is nothing less than this.” And we must do this together, for freedom, justice, peace, and other goods are indivisible and they are vulnerable and unattainable in isolation.

And we know from the hard lessons of history and the irreducible requirements of our humanity that there can be no peace without justice, no justice without freedom and no freedom without the power, will and struggle of the peoples of the world to achieve and sustain these shared and vital goods.

Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics) teaches us the principle and practice of shared work and shared wealth. Modeled on the shared harvest, it calls for cooperative work, respect of the rights of the workers and the needs of everyone for a life of dignity and economic security and the conditions and capacities to live a free, good, and meaningful life. It is rooted in the concept of kinship with and caring kindness toward others and the earth and cultivates a sensitivity for avoiding and resisting injuries to fellow humans and the natural world.

The principle and practice of Nia (Purpose) calls us to do good in and for the world, to pursue and practice freedom, justice, peace, caring, sharing and all that contributes to African and human good and the well-being of the world and all in it. Indeed, the ancestors teach us in the Odu Ifa that we should do things with joy for humans are divinely chosen and righteously challenged to do good in the world. And they remind us in the Husia that the good we do for others we are also doing for ourselves, for we are building the good and promising world we all want and deserve to live in and to leave as a storehouse of good for those who come after.

The principle and practice of Kuumba (Creativity) commits us to work and struggle for a new world and a new us that is rooted in the ancient African ethical imperative of serudj ta which is a moral obligation to constantly repair, renew and remake the world, making it more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it in the process and practice or repairing, renewing and remaking ourselves.

It teaches and urges us, in our relations with each other, others and the earth, to raise up what is in ruins, to repair what is damaged, to rejoin what is separated, to replenish what is depleted, to set right what is wrong, to strengthen what is weakened, and to make flourish that which is fragile, insecure and undeveloped.

And the principle and practice of Imani (Faith) teaches us to believe in the good and strive constantly to achieve it everywhere and in its most essential, inclusive and expansive forms. It reminds us that we must have faith in the future and the new world we seek to bring into being in order to imagine and build them.

And it is a faith that teaches us to believe that through hard work, long struggle and a whole lot of love and understanding, we can with other oppressed, struggling and progressive peoples reimagine and redraw the map of the world and put in place and develop conditions and capacities for everyone to live in dignity-affirming, life-enhancing and world-preserving ways and come into the fullness of themselves.

Dr. Maulana Karenga, Professor and Chair of Africana Studies, California State University-Long Beach; Executive Director, African American Cultural Center (Us); Creator of Kwanzaa; and author of Kwanzaa: A Celebration of Family, Community and Culture and Essays on Struggle.

Annual Founder’s Kwanzaa Message 2022

By Dr. Maulana Karenga

Annual Founder’s Kwanzaa Message

By Dr. Maulana Karenga —

Heri za Kwanzaa. Happy Kwanzaa to African people everywhere throughout the world African community. And we share these greetings also with all peoples of goodwill and especially with all the oppressed, progressive and struggling peoples of the world. Again, this year we bring and send you all Kwanzaa greetings of celebration, solidarity and continued struggle for a shared good in the world. And in the words and way of our ancestors, we wish for you all things good, pure and beautiful, all the good that heaven grants, the earth produces, and the waters bring forth from their depths. Hotep. Ashe. Heri.

Kwanzaa is a unique and special season and celebration of our beautiful, sacred and soulful selves as African people, grounded in and profoundly respectful of our culture. It is a unique and special pan-African time of remembrance, reflection, reaffirmation, and recommitment to the good, the right, and the possible. It is a unique and special time to remember, raise up and honor our ancestors whose legacies we strive to live and build on; to reflect on what it means to be African and human in the most profound and meaningful sense and ways; and to reaffirm the rightfulness and moral imperative of our relentless struggle to be ourselves and free ourselves and contribute to an ever-expanding realm of freedom, justice and caring in the world.

Again, this year in this our season of celebration, we find humanity and the world are in severe and continuing crisis, including: the resurgent pandemic of Covid-19, constantly producing deadly variants; failed and predatory economies and expanding hunger, famine, homelessness and suffering; continuing conflicts and wars; massive displacement of peoples; unjust and irrational immigration policies; and continuing environmental degradation through plunder, pollution and depletion. And all these oppressive practices and impositions are carried out by the rich and powerful, the obscenely armed and aggressive, who are irresponsibly and immorally unmindful and uncaring about the cost and consequences they savagely impose on humanity and the world and all in it, especially the most vulnerable among us.

Indeed, we live in a world of domination, deprivation and degradation of every kind, in a word, a world plagued with the persistent and pandemic pathology of unfreedom. And thus, there is an urgent need for us to engage in self-conscious, righteous and relentless struggle on every level and at every site to lessen and eliminate it. Here we remember and reaffirm in struggle Nana Paul Robeson’s teaching that “the battlefront is everywhere. There is no sheltered rear.” And so, it is with Nana Haji Malcolm’s parallel instruction that “wherever a Black person is, there is a battle line.” Thus, we in the organization Us say, “everywhere a battle line; every day a call to struggle.” And that struggle is always a dual struggle to be ourselves and to free ourselves.

I created Kwanzaa in the midst of the Black Freedom Movement, in the wake of the assassination and martyrdom of Haji Malcolm X and the Watts Revolt, and in the supportive context of my organization, Us, a vanguard organization of the Black Freedom Movement and dedicated to cultural revolution, community self-determination, and radical and revolutionary social change. Thus, the creation and values of Kwanzaa reflect my philosophy, Kawaida, the concerns of my organization Us, the Movement and those times, i.e., cultural consciousness; cultural revolution; radical and revolutionary social change; community unity; self-definition; self-determination; economic well-being; and self-conscious participation in the liberation struggle.

This year’s Kwanzaa theme self-consciously focuses on the foundational right and practice of freedom. I speak here of freedom in its inclusive sense, not only freedom from domination deprivation and degradation so rampant and ruinous in the world, but also of freedom to be ourselves, to express and develop ourselves, to grow and flourish and come into the fullness of ourselves. Also, I pose practice as the path to freedom, emphasizing its necessity and the required characteristics for it to contribute meaningfully to the struggle for freedom and good in the world. As we say in Kawaida, practice proves and makes possible everything. Indeed, every principle must ultimately find its meaning and value in practice. And I define practice, from a Kawaida perspective, as self-conscious, thoughtful and transformative action toward a chosen objective.

Kwanzaa was conceived, created and developed, then, in the context of the organization Us and the Black Freedom Movement and was understood as part and parcel of a two-fold liberation struggle to be ourselves and free ourselves. As part of our liberation struggle to be ourselves and free ourselves, Kwanzaa was and remains an act of freedom, an act of reaffirmation and resistance, reaffirmation of ourselves and our right to be ourselves and free ourselves, and in resistance to European cultural hegemony and political domination. It was and is a conscious and conscientious choice again to be our culturally-grounded selves, free ourselves from all forms of oppression and celebrate ourselves, and thus, reaffirm our unique and equally valid and valuable African cultural way of being human in the world. Indeed, we did not seek permission or petition for Kwanzaa to be recognized by the state at any level. It was a holiday and work of love and creativity I conceived and carefully constructed out of our own rich, ancient, ongoing, soulful and sacred history and liberating culture.

Kwanzaa was and is also an instrument of freedom, a means of cultivating liberated and liberating consciousness, returning us to our history and culture, and building and strengthening our families and communities in culturally-grounded ways that are good and transformative and cause us to flourish and come into the fullness of ourselves as African persons and peoples. Indeed, it opens up horizons of sensitivities, thoughts, possibilities and practices essential to reimagining and successfully struggling to bring into being a new history, hope and world for African peoples and humankind as a whole.

And Kwanzaa is and has always been also a celebration of freedom, a celebration of hearts and minds free from the negative conceptions, the catechism of impossibilities, and forms and practices of oppression taught and imposed by a racist society. And it was and is a celebration of our freedom to see, express and sing ourselves in dignity-affirming, life-enhancing, world-preserving and liberating ways. And Kwanzaa is a liberating celebration of the awesome beauty and possibilities of being ourselves, of seeing ourselves as sacred and soulful and equally worthy of every right and common good of any and everyone, and freely reaffirming this without question, apology or erasing and deforming ourselves for the comfort or convenience of others.

Kwanzaa and its core principles are a powerful force for good in the world. Its central message and meaning urge us to think deep about our lives, our families, our communities, and our struggles to bring and sustain good in the world. And its values speak to the best of what it means to be African and human in the fullest sense, and these values at the heart of Kwanzaa and its central message and meaning are the Nguzo Saba (The Seven Principles), a communitarian African value system. These dignity-affirming, life-enhancing and world-preserving principles  offer rightful, reciprocal and rewarding alternative ways to relate to each other and the world in these difficult, demanding and turbulent times.

They urge us to reflect on, choose and practice: Umoja, unity, over needless division and manipulated divisiveness; Kujichagulia, self-determination, over the impositions of the majority or the mob mentality; Ujima, collective work and responsibility, over selfish individualistic irresponsibility and willful negligence; Ujamaa, Cooperative economics, shared work and wealth and care for the vulnerable over greed, disparities and deprivation of others. And these essential values and ways of engaging each other and the world also urge us to reflect on, choose and practice; Nia, purpose, bringing and sustaining good in the world over wasteful wandering and mindless meandering; Kuumba, creativity, repairing, renewing and remaking the world over destructive practices against each other and the environment; and Imani, faith, believing in the good and our future over a paralyzing pessimism and fear and distrust of others which problematizes and limits our relationships and the open-textured promise of our future. For we and what we do are the future unfolding, and in honoring our past and improving our present, we must strive mightily to forge our future in the most ethical, effective and expansive ways. Happy Kwanzaa. Heri za Kwanzaa.

50th Anniversary Founder’s Kwanzaa Statement

Kwanzaa founder, Dr. Maulana Karenga has released the following statement celebrating the 50th anniversary of Kwanzaa.

The 50th anniversary of the pan-African holiday, Kwanzaa, of necessity brings added focus and emphasis on its customary call for remembrance, reflection and recommitment. We remember our history and the legacies left and the people who made and left them for us and the world. We reflect on the expansive meaning of being African in the world, on the context and issues of our times, and on our way forward in struggle to forge a future responsive to our needs and interests as well as those of the world. And we recommit ourselves to our highest values, to our most anchoring, elevating and liberating practices, and as ever to the good of our people and the well-being of the world.

At this historical milestone and marker, it is good to remember and reflect on the origins of Kwanzaa, not only in the ancient African festivals of harvest and shared good, but also its origins in the relentless and righteous struggles of the Sixties, i.e., the Black Freedom Movement for freedom, justice, equality, and power of our people over their destiny and daily lives. For deeply embedded and ever-present in the celebration of Kwanzaa and the practice of its founding principles, the Nguzo Saba, is the constant call for and commitment to striving and struggling. Here, I use striving and struggling interchangeably, with the meaning being exerting great and focused effort to achieve, excel and advance. For the struggle, as we imagined and waged it and continue to do so, is not only to defy and defeat the oppressor, but also to overturn ourselves, removing from ourselves the legacy of oppression, clearing social space in which we can live, love, work, build and relate freely, and striving diligently then to come into the fullness of ourselves.

On this 50th anniversary celebration of Kwanzaa, it is only right and appropriate that we pay rightful homage to those who brought us to this good and beautiful point. First, we offer sacred water and words first to our ancestors, ancient and modern, for the culture they created, the battles they fought, the lessons they taught, the legacies they left and the ways they opened for us.

Read more: 50th Anniversary Founder’s Kwanzaa Statement