In our world, today there are many different cultures with their own beliefs, values, morals, and challenges. With each of those things comes diversity between all of the different cultures and ethnic groups. Each culture is unique in its own way. African Americans are one of the many ethnic groups found around the world and right here in the United States of America. They are descendants of both African culture and American-European culture, as they were both ethnic groups enslaved during 17th and 18th centuries. Since they are descendants of both cultures, they have a mix of aspects from each. The African American population in 2000 was 34,675,985 and grew to 41,359,936 by 2017. That is a large amount of growth for an ethnic group in the United States, but they make our country so much more diverse.
One of the biggest beliefs/values among all African Americans is respecting their elders because they are a major source of wisdom. Also, addressing them as Mrs., Mr., or sir are very important in their culture as they are people to look up to. Family is big value for them as well, they may live with not just their immediate family but their extended family too. Children are viewed as very important and loved because they are the future of the culture, they are usually brought up in an authoritarian family setting. Friends and community is another important part of the African American culture. Well, what holidays do they celebrate with their friends, family and communities? They do celebrate some of the same holidays as Americans, which are Christmas, New Year’s, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, and Easter Sunday. For African Americans, a major holiday is June 19th (Juneteenth), which celebrates the Emancipation Proclamation finally reaching them after nearly 3 years. December 26th-January 1st they celebrate Kwanza, which is time to celebrate family, culture, and their ancestral ties. During the whole month of February, they celebrate Black History Month, which is big for them because they get to learn more about how many different people found for freedom and the right to be treated equal.
Spiritual orientation/religion is another part of what makes them unique and different from other cultures. A big part of their religion is ancestor worship and that it because they are big believers in the past and their ancestry. At the time when slavery was happening they picked up a lot on rituals, magic, and devotion to spirits of their deceased ancestors, which goes again with their value of the past. In the mid-1700s African Americans became part of Methodist and Baptist churches but did not become members of the clergy due to the amount of whites in the clergy at the time. By the 1770s African Americans opened their own very first independent congregation which they named “Silver Bluff Baptist Church.” This was a big step up from how things began for them as they made their way to the new world during the time when slavery began. Today, the largest African American denomination is the National Baptist Convention of the U.S.A., but there are also many of them taking part in Methodist churches as well as the Church of God in Christ, which is a Pentecostal denomination.
Each culture has a different way of handling health and medical problems. For African Americans, they believe in the use folk healing traditions, which have to do with home remedies, herbal medicines, nutrition, and root work with herbs, stones and roots. They developed these during slavery due to a lack of conventional medicine. African Americans see illness or disabilities as bad luck or punishment due to wrong doing by parents. With that being said, they do not have any prejudice against those with disabilities or illnesses. For those in their families that may be dying or have died they have special things they do for them. They have memorials, otherwise known as a home going service, which means they have a shared meal and gather at the home of the deceased. One belief that African Americans have is that there is such a thing as living dead, this means that the spirits of family and friends are still alive through thoughts and memories of those still living.
Healthcare challenges are something that also varies from culture to culture. For African Americans, there is a major relationship between unemployment and poor health, around one-third of their population is poor and that can cause illness due to a poor diet and bad living conditions. They also have most cost involved if healthcare is needed because they are less likely to have insurance coverage. Distrust in the healthcare system is another problem, because they believe that the care is inadequate or harmful. Also, having racism within healthcare systems can be very detrimental to the African Americans care. Babies in African American families are twice as likely to die than babies in white families. They have problems within their culture with cancer, sickle cell anemia and hypertension. For cancer, they have a 27% higher rate than whites do and for hypertension they are one-third more likely than whites to have it due genetics, poor diet and stress. Sickle cell anemia is worse for anyone with African American descent, one in twelve have the gene and around one in six-hundred actually develop the disease. This disease means that the blood cells will become elongated and pointed which will clog vessels, reducing oxygen flow, and could even cause organ failure.
How could these challenges be overcome? A few big things that can be done are raising the African Americans employment, giving them insurance coverage, and reducing racism within healthcare. Healthcare needs to eliminate any differences present in healthcare for African Americans and any culture. Curative, rehabilitative, and preventative care also needs to be there for everyone, including African Americans. An increase in care for children/infants and pregnant women is very important to decrease the mortality rate among infants in the African American culture. One thing that African Americans would love, is increasing the number of healthcare professionals of their own ethnicity because they would feel more comfortable with talking to someone that shares the same ideas as them.
There are six areas of cultural diversity, communication, space, time, environmental control, biologic variations, and social organizations. African Americans have a very direct, passionate, and animated form of communication which also includes larges gestures. Facing and interacting/talking with the person you are having a problem with is preferred because they believe is you have that big of a problem with someone you can talk with them about it. If there is a potential interest in a romantic relationship African American men and women will be completely honest about it. As for eye contact, they use it directly while speaking but indirectly while they are listening to the other person talk. They are very aware of their personal space as a culture but it differs depending on the situation and are open to physical contact depending who the person is to them. If it is just their culture they are more likely to have a smaller space, but if it is them in public with other cultures they are more likely to have a larger space. African Americans view time much differently than Americans. They are more relaxed about time and do not have a precise calendar or schedule. One belief they have is that there can be many things done at one time. Clock time for them is less important than the season cycles and the past is very important. Their form of environmental control is being suspicious of healthcare providers due to racism and using their own remedies and folk healers before anything else. A big biologic variation is the likelihood to have sickle cell anemia due to genetics of their ancestors and family members. There is also an increase in psychological problems in children due to poverty and way of life as they are growing up. Social organizations for Africans Americans have to do with their extended family, community, and churches. They can belong to one church or can belong to multiple if that is what they decide.
Beliefs, values, morals, and challenges are something that are not universal across every culture found in our world today. African Americans are very different from other cultures because they have dealt with such things as slavery in the past. They handled slavery a lot differently than other cultures may have, they always saw the bright side of it and did what they could with what they had. Our world has so much diversity today, which is a great thing, because we are able to see all these different cultures mingle and learn things from one another.