Eh, I mean, what are you arguing for exactly? We are separate individuals, yes, and unique and special and African, even if in diaspora.
But one could hardly pinpoint a "culture" that us African Americans have adhered to. We can only contribute, but we don't have much of a basis to lay back on, considering our language and customs were erased a few generations ago.
Culture is one's way of living, doing, of BEING, not just language and customs which our sojourn in America shows, are not fixed in stone. For instance, I flipped the TV channel to one of the foreign language shows (with English subtitles). I came in on a white guy running into an alley, with 2 other men in shadows (it was nighttime) following. They proceeded to beat him up. Since the picture took place in France, I'm prepared to see 2 white guys beat up another white guy. But when I saw one of the men in shadow beat the first guy to the alley floor with a baseball bat, I thought, "He's BLACK!" Why? Because of the way he wielded the bat. There was a rhythm as well as a purposefulness that whites in that same scenario don't have/use/whateva. How we do what we do comes out of culture.
Think of some a 10 year-old kid running home down a dark street.... all in shadows. Can't see his face, his clothes, just a silhouette of a boy running. Make him some white kid that you know (in your mind) and watch him run. Then make that image in your mind a black kid. You will see that you can tell the race of the kid by the way he moves, in this case, runs. How we move our bodies comes out of culture.
When African Americans have a backyard bar-b-que, everybody in the family is invited - adults, teens, kids, as well as lecherous Uncle Joe and crazy Aunt Zee. White Americans tend to have age-related parties and get togethers. They rarely have everybody of every age at their parties and almost never the "embarrassing" relative. White Americans have BYOB parties where they stand around and drink. African Americans have BYOB parties and when there aren't enough chairs, the neighbors are urged to BYOC (Bring Your Own Chair)! Blacks don't give parties where the guests are expected to stand for
hours (I asked a white co-worker once why they 'stood up' at parties. She said something about when they do the whole 9 yards for a party, they don't want to sit down and wrinkle their clothes, something like that). How you party comes out of your culture.
African Americans are big pork eaters, having perfected our cuisine during slavery. White Americans are big beef eaters. Chicken is big in African American family, festive and other important gatherings (not as big as it once was, however). When the preacher came over for Sunday dinner, succulent and beautifully prepared fried chicken was almost always on the menu. Long before the Colonel, the first fried chicken to be sold as a commercial enterprise was prepared and sold by black women through the windows of trains to white passengers in the South. When Tiger Woods beat the white guy at golf and in a pique of sour grapes he spat something about the white club would have to serve fried chicken, what most papers didn't say was that along with the "fried chicken" he added, "and collard greens or whatever
they eat!" Collard and most "greens" are a staple of the African-American diet and again, arose out of slave culture which said the body needs certain nutrition and vitamins found abundantly in "greens." Although EVERY race eats chicken and pork, fried chicken and pork are black American specialties. We eat them for nourishment, we eat them when we celebrate. Our cuisine, i.e., what we EAT and how we prepare it, comes out of our culture.
When they were just integrating something (schools?) in, I think, Boston and white folks went spastic, a big to-do came about between the Chief of Police and the leader of a black nationalist group. The Chief blustered and dared the nationalist to meet him in some park, "you and me! At the appointed time, the brutha stepped into the park, ready to whip some "pig" a**. True to his word, the Chief was there waiting on him.... only to the brutha's shock, he brought half the Boston police force with him. Black men fight mano a mano; white men fight to win. What you think makes a "man" a man comes out of your culture. What you THINK is "fair" and "honorable" comes out of culture.
Before the Duke and the Count and all those jazzmen, America had no culture, separate and distinct from all other nations. Arranging and composing from out of Black America's hopes and needs and yearnings, Jazz is universally recognized as the only cultural contribution America has made to the world. Jazz came out of the culture African AMERICANS forged out of scores of disparate tribes on this continent.
Culture is not just the fashions you wear or the music you like, it's how you live your every-day life.
Btw, I wasn't "arguing" for anything; I was being facetious.
