Black joy has always been an act of resistance. To be claimed loudly and experienced fully. Visible and self-defined. Never in response to struggle, in fact an existence beyond it. Often policed, commodified, or treated as something that requires permission. It doesn't.

How You Can Protect It
Make space for it. Honor it without condition. Allow it to exist without interruption or expectation.

Historical Black Colleges and Universities have produced generations of Black leadership, culture, and upward mobility. Despite funding efforts like the FUTURE Act, looming financial gaps and policy shifts threaten their long-term stability.

How You Can Protect It
Donate to your alma mater. Advocate for sustained funding. Tap in with alumni networks to encourage enrollment and continued partnerships.

Our artifacts help keep physical records of our genius, our innovation, and our creativity. Too often, they’re been taken, misrepresented, or stored without proper keeping–separated from the people they belong to.

How You Can Protect It
Support Black archives and museums. Keep physical copies. Respecting ownership. Challenge misrepresentation wherever you find it.

Black stories belong to Black People. Not to be diluted or told without us at the center. They shape how we’re seen and how we see ourselves and they are most authentic when we hold the pen.

How You Can Protect It
Support Black Creators. Invest in Black Stories. Amplify Black Perspectives. Invest In the Future of Black Storytellers.

Black bodies have been surveilled, legislated, and neglected by the very systems built to protect them. That hasn't changed. The disparities in care, safety, and autonomy are not historical. They are ongoing.

How You Can Protect It
Advocate for equality in healthcare. Respect bodily autonomy. Speak out against injustice–loudly. See Black Bodies as human.

Black media creates space for truth, culture, and perspective without compromise. Consolidation and systematic bias continue to limit its visibility and independence. A world without it allows for others to dictate our reality.

How You Can Protect It
Consume it. Fund it. Amplify Black-owned media platforms.

Black History Month was created to correct an omission. Now there are those who want to erase that correction too. What began as a necessary acknowledgement of our existence at the core of this nation’s progress is being erased, defunded, and dismissed–not just in February, but all year. Not on our watch.

How You Can Protect It
Demand full, accurate representation all year-round.

Black beauty has defined global beauty standards. Only to be imitated, appropriated, and celebrated everywhere except at its source. Our features and styles have shaped culture while being simultaneously diminished and stolen.

How You Can Protect It
Honor the origin. Support Black beauty innovators. Call out appropriation.

The Black dollar represents collective economic power that can shape communities. Without intentional circulation, that power is extracted and not reinvested in the communities it's meant to support.

How You Can Protect It
Choose Black-owned businesses. Invest in Black communities. Make it a habit, not an occasion.

Black expression built the culture the world consumes. It drives innovation across music, art, language, and fashion. It is frequently extracted, replicated, and celebrated without acknowledgment of where it came from.

How You Can Protect It
Credit creators. Refuse to support stolen or uncredited work. Know the difference between appreciation and appropriation.

Black history is foundational, continuous, and ever-unfolding. It is not a chapter, but the spine of American history. Efforts to rewrite and alter it are not about education. It's about erasure.

How You Can Protect It
Learn it. Teach it. Share it. The truth deserves to be told.

Black resistance has always been central to survival and progress. Showing up through movements like Black Lives Matter, that are necessary to fight back against systemic oppression. It is often mischaracterized as a disruption and danger by the very systems it holds accountable.

How You Can Protect It
Support movements for justice. Show up when rights are threatened. Refuse narratives that criminalize resistance.

Black churches have long been centers of faith, organizing, and community stability. Spanning Christianity and the many other faith traditions and spiritual practices within Black communities Their influence is foundational and often overlooked.

How You Can Protect It
Support their efforts. Respect their diversity. Recognize their role in community care and cultural grounding.

Black queer identity exists at the intersection of joy, resilience, resistance, and creativity. It deserves both protection and visibility. Progress has been made, but work is far from over. Because we’re not free until we’re all free.

How You Can Protect It
Advocate actively for the safety and dignity of Black Queer people every time. Affirm them. Include them. Recognize them. Support them financially and stand in solidarity with them.

Black leadership has driven change across generations and industries, often while being challenged, underfunded, and underestimated. Its impact is documented. Its potential is still being suppressed.

How You Can Protect It
Develop them. Make room for them. Create clear paths for their leadership and influence.

African American Vernacular English is a legitimate, rule-governed language rooted in culture and identity. It has shaped American speech and pop culture broadly while being appropriated without credit and dismissed without understanding.

How You Can Protect It
Credit the originators. Understand it before you borrow it. Respect its roots.

Black-owned businesses create pathways for wealth, employment and community growth. Systemic barriers like lending practices, access, and visibility limit their scale and sustainability.

How You Can Protect It
Promote them. Buy from them. Invest in them consistently. Not just during Black History Month.

Black books are records of our truth, history, and imagination. They preserve stories that challenge, educate, and empower. When Black books are banned or removed, it's not just literature that's lost—it's access to perspectives that deserve to be seen, heard, and remembered.

How You Can Protect It
Read and share banned books. Support Black authors and independent bookstores. Advocate for inclusive libraries and classrooms.

The Black vote has been a decisive force in shaping American democracy since 1965. It has been suppressed, gerrymandered and discounted at every turn. And recent efforts to roll back voting rights prove that those in power know exactly how influential our vote is.

How You Can Protect It
Vote. Organize. Join local and national efforts to challenge the redistricting of voting maps.

Juneteenth marks the delayed arrival of our freedom, while The 1619 Project centers the truth about this country’s foundation. Both face minimization and pushback. Not because they are wrong, but because of what they reveal about the consciousness of this country.

How You Can Protect It
Celebrate it . Reject watered-down narratives. Understand that discomfort is not a reason to look away.