The author, Keisha L. Bentley-Edwards says that she agrees with the claim of columnist and Black Lives Matter activist Shaun King, who wrote that Black History Month should not begin and end with lessons of American slavery. But for different reasons. She says that american society, does not recognize the fullness of black humanity. She says used the analogy of the Jews and the holocaust, that when discussing Jewish history we do not often begin discussions with that horrific event. She wants people to realize that before European Imperialism, the peoples of Africa were civilized they had their own empires and political systems Stereotypes of African American men as strong but not smart and women as hypersexual can be traced to common perceptions