What Do We Call Ourselves? Black Identity, Belonging, and the Responsibility of Early Childhood Education

A Thought Piece on Language, Positive Identity Development, and Culturally Responsive Practice

A recent argument that it may be time to retire the term African American in favor of Black American caused me to consider the issue through a particular lens - early childhood education. It also caused me to consider the question through the lens of my own life. I was born in the 1950s and came of age under the influence of the 1960s, a period in which the language of racial identity was undergoing profound change alongside the struggle for civil rights.

I remember the power of legendary soul singer and cultural icon James Brown’s declaration, a refrain that became a clarion call for a generation -  “Say it loud, I’m Black and I’m proud!” Those words were more than lyrics. They represented a transformation in how Blackness could be understood and expressed. At a time when generations of Black Americans had lived within a society that routinely communicated that Blackness was inferior, undesirable, or something to overcome, Black was being reclaimed as an affirmation. Black was beautiful and worthy. Black had history, culture, and power, and Black was something about which one could be proud.

The Civil Rights Movement challenged the legal and institutional structures of racial inequality, while the Black consciousness and Black pride movements challenged something equally consequential - the social and internalized messages about what it meant to be Black. Looking back through the lens of early childhood education, I now recognize something developmental within that historical moment. It was also a struggle over identity, belonging, representation, and the right of people to participate in defining themselves.

That realization shapes how I approach today’s conversation about whether we should identify as African American, Black, or Black American. I do not hear these words merely as demographic categories. I hear them through history, through my own development, and through what I have learned from working in early childhood education. The terminology has changed across generations, but the developmental question remains remarkably relevant: 

What do the words adults use to describe children teach them about who they are, where they belong, and whose histories matter?

Identity Begins Before Children Have the Language to Explain It

Early childhood education has long recognized that development occurs within relationships, families, communities, cultures, and social environments. Children do not develop an understanding of themselves independently of these contexts. They observe differences in skin color, hair, language, family structures, cultural practices, and other human characteristics, while simultaneously observing how the adults and institutions around them respond to those differences.

Research challenges the once-common assumption that young children simply “do not see race.” Children begin noticing racial differences earlier than many adults expect, and their developing ideas about those differences are influenced by the social messages surrounding them (Sullivan et al., 2021); Weir, 2021). Children are learning even when adults do not believe they are teaching. They notice who appears in books, whose hair is described as beautiful, which historical figures appear on classroom walls, who adults describe as intelligent or successful, and what the adults around them say, or refuse to say, about race.

NAEYC’s position on advancing equity recognizes that children develop understandings of their multiple social identities early and that educators have an important responsibility to support positive social identity development (National Association for the Education of Young Children [NAEYC], 2019). Positive identity development, therefore, should not be treated as an occasional multicultural activity added to the curriculum. It is part of children’s social and emotional development and contributes to how they understand themselves in relationship to others.

“I’m Black and I’m Proud” Through an Early Childhood Lens

Perhaps this is why the language of the 1960s feels especially relevant to me now. When I reconsider “I’m Black and I’m proud” through the lens of early childhood education, I hear more than a declaration of racial pride. I hear an affirmation of positive identity and belonging.

Consider the developmental difference between receiving repeated messages that an important part of your identity should be minimized and receiving messages communicating that who you are has value, people who look like you have contributed to the world, your family and history matter, and you belong. These messages are closely connected to what we now recognize as important dimensions of positive identity development.

This does not mean that a slogan from the 1960s constitutes a theory of child development. Rather, lived history can help illuminate why the developmental principles we discuss today matter so deeply. For many Black Americans of my generation, Black was not simply a color descriptor. It carried the memory of a cultural shift from identities frequently defined by others toward identities increasingly claimed and articulated by Black people themselves. That history makes me cautious about declaring that there is one correct term for everyone. It also makes me deeply interested in who gets to do the naming.

Race, Ethnicity, Ancestry, and Culture Are Related, but Not Identical

One of the strongest aspects of the argument for Black American is the distinction among race, ethnicity, ancestry, nationality, and culture. These concepts intersect, but they are not synonymous, and the differences become especially important when we consider children and families.

Imagine three children in an early learning program. One child’s family recently immigrated from Nigeria. Another child’s family is Haitian American. A third child’s family has lived in Georgia for generations, with a family history extending through segregation and American slavery. All three children may be identified racially as Black, but that does not mean they share the same ethnicity, culture, or historical experience. Their families may have different languages, migration histories, foods, religious traditions, music, family practices, and relationships to American history.

That distinction is central to culturally responsive practice. NAEYC’s principles of developmentally appropriate practice emphasize understanding children within their individual, family, cultural, and community contexts (e Edn of Young Children [NAEYC], 2019).). Culturally responsive practice similarly requires educators to recognize children’s cultural knowledge and family experiences as assets rather than relying upon generalized assumptions about racial groups.

For me, this leads to an important principle - A demographic category should never become a substitute for knowing a child and family. When we assume that Black or African American automatically describes one uniform cultural experience, we risk practicing categorization rather than cultural responsiveness.

Black American Culture Is American Culture

The argument for Black American also asks us to reconsider how Black culture is positioned within the American story. Black Americans whose families have lived in this country for generations developed distinctive cultural traditions under uniquely American circumstances. Enslavement attempted to disrupt African languages, ethnic identities, kinship relationships, and cultural traditions. Yet generations of Black Americans created new forms of community, spirituality, intellectual thought, resistance, expression, and cultural practice.

Recently, I had an opportunity to visit the National Museum of African American Music in Nashville where I submerged myself in the spirituals, gospel, blues, jazz, soul, hip-hop, Black churches, historically Black colleges and universities, Black Greek-letter organizations, food, literature, language traditions, political movements, and community institutions did not develop outside American history. They developed within it and, more importantly, helped shape it.

This distinction has significant implications for early childhood curriculum. If Black history appears primarily during February, or if Black Americans appear primarily in classroom conversations about slavery and the Civil Rights Movement, children receive an incomplete understanding of both Black identity and American history. Black children deserve more than narratives of oppression. They deserve narratives that include agency, joy, creativity, family, intellectual achievement, innovation, leadership, resistance, community building, and possibility. All children deserve access to these histories because Black history is not supplementary American history. Black history is American history.

Belonging Changes the Conversation

Belonging is not merely a pleasant feature of an early childhood classroom. Responsive relationships and environments contribute to children’s development, learning, self-understanding, and well-being (National Scientific Council on the Developing Child, 2004). When children experience themselves as recognized and valued members of a learning community, belonging becomes part of the foundation from which they explore, participate, develop relationships, and learn.

That makes the language of identity consequential. If educators repeatedly describe children using terminology that does not reflect how their families understand themselves, we should consider what message may be unintentionally communicated. In contrast, asking families how they describe their cultural or ethnic identity, which traditions are important to them, and what they would like their children to know about their family history communicates, I am interested in knowing you rather than assuming I already know you.

This is where culturally responsive practice becomes relational rather than performative. Diverse books, dolls, music, classroom displays, and other forms of representation matter, but culturally responsive practice requires more than visible diversity. It requires curiosity, listening, relationships, reflection, and responsiveness.

From Cultural Competence to Cultural Humility

This conversation also encourages us to consider the limitations of believing educators can simply learn enough facts to become “competent” in someone else’s culture. Families are not cultural checklists, and knowing several facts about what is commonly described as “African American culture” does not mean an educator understands the Black child sitting in the classroom.

Cultural humility asks something different of us. It requires recognizing the limits of our knowledge, examining assumptions, listening to families, and remaining willing to learn. Instead of beginning with the generalized question, What do African American families value? We might begin with the more relational question, What does this family value? That may appear to be a small linguistic shift, but pedagogically it is significant because it moves the educator from assumption toward inquiry and from categorization toward relationship.

Should We Retire “African American”?

This is where my own history influences my response. I understand the argument for Black American, particularly the significance of explicitly claiming American. Black Americans are not visitors to the American story. Our labor, creativity, institutions, advocacy, intellectual contributions, families, and communities helped build this nation.

Yet, I am not convinced that acknowledging a distinctive Black American identity requires abandoning African American. For many people, African represents ancestry, connection, and reclamation. The institution of slavery did not simply exploit African labor; it disrupted names, languages, families, traditions, ethnic identities, and connections across generations. For some, therefore, African American may represent an attempt to restore connection rather than create distance from America.

My own experience also reminds me that terminology evolves. I was born during one era of racial terminology, shaped by another, and witnessed Black transformed into an affirmation. Later, African American became widely embraced as another expression of heritage and identity. Now another generation is asking whether Black American better communicates a distinctive cultural and historical experience.

Perhaps that evolution should not surprise us. Identity is not merely something society names for us. It is also something people negotiate, inherit, challenge, reclaim, interpret, and pass to the next generation.

When Children Begin Asking Who They Are

Eventually, children ask questions about identity. Sometimes they ask directly, while at other times the questions emerge through observations about skin, hair, language, family, or differences among classmates. These moments should not be viewed as interruptions to learning; they are part of learning.

Developmentally appropriate practice does not require avoiding complicated subjects. It requires presenting truthful ideas in ways children can understand. A young child can begin to understand that they are Black and American, that their ancestors may have come from Africa, that their family has a particular history, and that another Black child’s family may have a different history. Children can also learn that people may be different from one another and still belong together.

Young children do not need the full complexity of adult debates about racial terminology, but they do need adults who communicate that their identities are worthy of understanding. When educators respond to children’s questions with openness rather than discomfort, we create opportunities for children to develop language for difference without attaching hierarchy to that difference.

Perhaps the Question Is Bigger Than the Name

My memories of the 1960s ultimately bring me back to the present. “I’m Black and I’m proud” mattered because the declaration was about more than what people were called. It was about what the name meant. It represented dignity, self-definition, belonging, and the ability of a people to speak about themselves rather than simply accept definitions constructed by others.

Perhaps that is one of the lessons early childhood education should carry forward. Our responsibility may not be to determine whether African American or Black American ultimately becomes the preferred terminology. Our responsibility is to understand why naming matters and to recognize what children are learning through the language, curriculum, relationships, and environments we create.

We can recognize Black history as American history while honoring African ancestry. We can acknowledge shared racial experiences without assuming that all Black families share one culture. We can give children language for understanding human differences without teaching them that difference establishes hierarchy. We can listen when families tell us who they are and create learning environments in which children experience themselves as seen, valued, and connected to histories and communities that matter.

Perhaps that is the connection between the clarion call I heard in the 1960s and the children we teach today. The words may evolve across generations, but the responsibility to help children develop a positive sense of identity and belonging does not.

Question: I wonder, if positive identity and belonging begin developing in the earliest years, how might our practice change if we asked not only, “What should we call children?” but also, “What are our words, curriculum, relationships, and environments teaching children about who they are, whose histories matter, and where they belong?”

For early childhood educators, perhaps that is where the conversation should begin.

References

National Association for the Education of Young Children. (2019). Advancing equity in early childhood education: A position statement of the National Association for the Education of Young Children. https://www.naeyc.org/resources/position-statements/equity 

National Association for the Education of Young Children. (2020). Developmentally appropriate practice: A position statement of the National Association for the Education of Young Children. https://www.naeyc.org/sites/default/files/globally-shared/downloads/PDFs/resources/position-statements/dap-statement_0.pdf

National Scientific Council on the Developing Child. (2004). Young children develop in an environment of relationships (Working Paper No. 1). Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University. https://developingchild.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Young-Children-Develop-in-an-Environment-of-Relationships.pdf

Sullivan, J., Wilton, L., & Apfelbaum, E. P. (2021). Adults delay conversations about race because they underestimate children's processing of race. Journal of experimental psychology. General, 150(2), 395–400. https://doi.org/10.1037/xge0000851

Weir, K. (2021, June 2). Raising anti-racist children. Monitor on Psychology, 52(4). https://www.apa.org/monitor/2021/06/anti-racist-children

About the Author

Victoria Long-Coleman, Ph.D., MBA is the Founder and Principal of Early Childhood Innovations. An early childhood educator, leadership, coach, author, speaker, she focuses on strengthening educators, developing leaders, and translating research into practical approaches that improve early childhood systems.

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