A New Old Holiday: Community IT Celebrates Juneteenth
Community IT is pleased and proud to announce that after taking an unofficial holiday for Juneteenth in 2021, this year it is official and we will be closed and conducting no business on Monday, June 20th, 2022. We will have a small crew manning the help desk, but we hope your organization and you yourself will be celebrating the most recently added federal holiday in the US.
With many Americans, our staff watched the events of summer 2020 unfold with anger at persistent injustice. Together, we became determined to understand the steps Community IT as a company, made up of our staff as individuals, could take to educate ourselves, support our Black co-workers, and better understand our own assumptions and our actions, with the goal of making positive change.
One of the first initiatives to emerge from that summer was an internal education program around Black history in the United States and Black culture as a culmination of that history. It had become tangibly clear that summer of 2020 that our Black co-workers were feeling a personal impact of national and local events, and that supporting our friends would require gathering a better personal understanding of Black life in America and in DC. An internal discussion group and cultural education program has evolved from that beginning, with monthly and bi-weekly events and learning opportunities. Among our self-education events we held a series of four after-work events to watch and discuss “High on the Hog” the award-winning show featuring Black Chef and writer Stephen Satterfield tracing American cooking from African roots and through history to current practitioners and modern gatherings.
“The nature of being Black American is to always be reintroducing yourself to your history. I suppose that’s true of many cultures, if you’re willing to stipulate that the past isn’t static, that what we unearth over time reveals new truths about ourselves. But this constant looking backward to inform and expand how we see ourselves in the present feels particularly African American. This is because, as in many historical tales, the full truth has never been the dominant narrative, and has at times been ruthlessly obscured.”
Osayi Endolyn, The Profound Significance of High on the Hog, New York Times
What is Juneteenth?
In 2021 Community IT held our first internal Juneteenth celebration to learn about this holiday and its significance. We learned together about special foods and traditions, and you can learn more here about the history of Juneteenth and the events leading up to the creation of the federal holiday in 2021. If you are in the DC metro area you can attend Juneteenth events or participate virtually with the Smithsonian National Museum of African-American History and Culture online programs. Wherever you are you probably have a local gathering, parade, or public cookout nearby.
Happily, Community IT celebrates Juneteenth and continues the tradition of celebration and learning in 2022. We hope you and yours are also celebrating African-American freedom, families, heritage, and dreams for the future.
