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| Various other names | |
| Use | Africans and Afro Caribbean/Americans. |
|---|---|
| Adopted | 13 August 1920 |
| Design | A horizontaltriband of red, black, and green. |
| Designed by | Marcus Garvey |
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Thepan-African flag (also known as theAfro-American flag,Black Liberation flag,UNIA flag, andvarious other names) is anethnic flag representingpan-Africanism, theAfrican diaspora, and/orblack nationalism.[1][2][3] Atri-color flag, it consists of three equal horizontal bands of (from top down) red, black, and green.[4]
The flag was created as a response to racism againstAfrican Americans in 1920 with the help ofMarcus Garvey.[5] TheUniversal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League (UNIA-ACL) formally adopted it on August 13, 1920, in Article 39 of theDeclaration of the Rights of the Negro Peoples of the World, during its month-long convention atMadison Square Garden in New York City.[6][7] Variations of the flag can and have been used in various countries and territories in the Americas to representGarveyist ideologies.
The flag was created in 1920 by members of UNIA in response to the "coon song" that became a hit around 1900, titled, "Every Race Has a Flag but the Coon".[8][9] This song has been cited as one of the three songs that "firmly established the termcoon in the American vocabulary". In a 1927 report of a 1921 speech appearing in theNegro World weekly newspaper,Marcus Garvey was quoted as saying:[10]
Show me the race or the nation without a flag, and I will show you a race of people without any pride. Aye! In song and mimicry they have said, "Every race has a flag but the coon." How true! Aye! But that was said of us four years ago. They can't say it now. ...
TheUniversal NegroCatechism, published by the UNIA in 1921, refers to the colors of the flag meaning:[11]
Red is the color of the blood which men must shed for their redemption and liberty; black is the color of the noble and distinguished race to which we belong; green is the color of the luxuriant vegetation of our Motherland.
According to the UNIA more recently, the three colors on the Black Nationalist flag represent:
The flag later became a Black Nationalist symbol for the worldwide liberation of Black people. As an emblem ofBlack pride, the flag became popular during the Black Liberation movement of the 1960s. In 1971, the school board ofNewark, New Jersey, passed a resolution permitting the flag to be raised in public school classrooms. Four of the board's nine members were not present at the time, and the resolution was introduced by the board's teen member, a mayoral appointee. Fierce controversy ensued, including a court order that the board show cause why they should not be forced to rescind the resolution, and at least two state legislative proposals to banethnic flags and national flags (other than the U.S. flag) in public classrooms.[13]
June 19, 1865, is the date in which enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, finally received the news of their freedom. This is commemorated every June 19 withJuneteenth, which is considered the longest-runningAfrican American holiday. Many in the African American community have adopted the Pan-African flag to represent Juneteenth.[14] The Juneteenth holiday became an official federal holiday June 17, 2021, and does have its own flag, however, created in 1997 – theJuneteenth flag.[15]
In the United States, following the refusal of a grand jury to indict a police officer in the August 9, 2014,shooting of Michael Brown inFerguson, Missouri, aHoward University student replaced the U.S. flag on that school's Washington, D.C., campus flagpole with a "black solidarity" flag (this tricolor) flying at half-mast.[16][17][18]
In February 2023, the Pan-African flag was flown over theDenver Federal Center to commemorateBlack History Month, which was the first time that flag was flown over any federal building.[19] InMartinique, a new flag was raised which symbolises the same ties toAfrica.
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A number of flags of nation states in African and the Caribbean have been inspired by the UNIA flag. TheBiafranflag is another variant of the UNIA flag with asunburst in the center. Designed by the Biafran government and first raised in 1967, the colors are directly based on Garvey's design.[20]
Theflag of Malawi issued in 1964 is very similar, reflects the Black Nationalist flag's order of stripes. It is not directly based on Garvey's flag, although the colors have the same symbolism: Red for blood symbolizing the struggle of the people, green for vegetation, and black for the race of the people.[21]
The Kenyan flag (Swahili: Bendera ya Kenya) is a tricolor of black, red, and green with two white fimbriations imposed, with a Masai shield and two crossed spears. It was officially adopted on 12 December 1963 after Kenya's independence, inspired by the pan-African tricolour.[22]
Theflag of Saint Kitts and Nevis has similar colors, arranged diagonally and separated by yellow lines. It similar to the Malawian flag in that the colors are not directly taken from the Pan-African flag but the symbolism is the same.[23]
In the 1960s The Us Organization redesigned the UNIA flag also changing order and significance of the colours to: black, red and green. Defining "black" for the people, "red" for struggle, and "green" for the future built "out of struggle".[24]
United States Postal Service issued a stamp in 1997 to commemorate the African-American festival ofKwanzaa with a painting by artistSynthia Saint James of a dark-skinned family wearing garments traditional in parts of Africa and fashionable for special occasions among African-Americans. The family members are holding food, gifts, and a flag. The flag in the stamp may have been meant to represent the Pan-African flag but instead used the similar flag (a black, red, and green horizontal tricolour) of the Black nationalist organisationUs Organization, which shares its founder, professor and activistMaulana Karenga, with Kwanzaa.[25]
Thebendera (flag in theKiswahili language) was documented as an supplemental symbol of Kwanzaa, in Karenga's 1998 bookThe African American Holiday of Kwanzaa, and included in ceremonial use during the festival.[25]
In 1990, artistDavid Hammons created a work calledAfrican-American Flag, which is held by theMuseum of Modern Art in New York City. Based on the standard U.S. flag, its stripes are black and red, the canton field is green, and the stars on the canton field are black.[26]
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The flag goes by several other names with varying degrees of popularity:
In 1999, an article appeared in the July 25 edition ofThe Black World Today suggesting that, as an act of global solidarity, every August 17 should be celebrated worldwide as Universal African Flag Day by flying the red, black, and green banner. August 17 is the birthday ofMarcus Garvey.[27]
