What is kwanza?

What does Kwanza represent?

• What does the holiday Kwanza celebrate/commemorate? It is just American, is it not?

• Answer:

  Without looking it up to check my facts or anything, I believe Kwanzaa is a minor harvest festival in some Africa cultures that happens to be the closest one to Christmas. Since every other ethnicity seemed to have their own way of celebrating the holidays, black people in the US wanted some heritage to claim, as well, particularly seeing as more sub-ethnically specific heritages were stripped from them in the past. Even if this right to this heritage is taken seriously, I get the sense that it's pretty well recognized even among black people that adopting Kwanzaa and celebrating corn for the holidays is a little humorous, and that nobody is exactly sure what it's supposed to mean. I think it's about being grateful for what you have.