45th Annual Kwanzaa Celebration: December 27th, Kujichagulia
45th Annual Kwanzaa Celebration
Day 2: Saturday, December 27th: Kujichagulia- Self-Determination
WorldBeat Cultural Center will be celebrating its 45th Annual Celebration with 4 of the 7 days of Kwanzaa. Kwanzaa is an African American Holiday celebrated from the 26th of December to the 1st of January. The annual Kwanzaa holiday was created by Dr. Maulana Karenga to celebrate and reaffirm family, community, and culture.
Kwanzaa was a celebration that was established as a means to help African Americans reconnect with their African cultural and historical heritage by uniting in meditation and study of African traditions and Nguzu Saba, the “seven principles of African Heritage” which Karenga said “is a communitarian African philosophy”.
Each night will feature Special guest speakers or performers, Ceremonial candle lighting and libation with drumming, poetry readings by Johnnierenee Nia Nelson, and Karamu (the traditional feast and family get down).
Harriet Tubman’s legendary life is widely known: escaping enslavement, leading others to freedom via the Underground Railroad, and tirelessly fighting for change. But a crucial chapter often overlooked is her daring Civil War service as a spy for the US Army, detailed in Dr. Edda L. Fields-Black’s groundbreaking book, COMBEE: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom during the Civil War, which won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize in History and the 2025 Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize. A direct descendant of a soldier who fought in the raid, Fields-Black unveils Tubman’s command of spies, scouts, and pilots and intelligence gathering among freedom seekers, which led to a raid that liberated 756 enslaved people from bondage on seven rice plantations. It was the largest slave rebellion in US history. Through unexamined documents, she brings to life the Combahee River Raid and the untold stories of those freed, their resilience, and the lasting impact of Tubman’s heroism.
About Edda Fields Black
Dr. Edda L. Fields-Black is a Pulitzer Prize–winning historian at Carnegie Mellon University and Director of the Dietrich College Humanities Center, known for her groundbreaking research on West African rice farmers, the Gullah Geechee diaspora, and overlooked chapters of African American history. A consultant for the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture and the librettist of the acclaimed contemporary classical work Requiem for Rice, Fields-Black descends from both Africans enslaved on South Carolina rice plantations and a USCT soldier who fought in the Combahee River Raid. Her award-winning book COMBEE: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom during the Civil War illuminates Tubman’s role as a military strategist and intelligence leader, drawing from previously unexamined documents to reveal the raid that freed 756 enslaved people—now recognized as the largest slave rebellion in U.S. history.
