New Rochelleans gathered on Thursday, December 27, to participate in the 12th Annual Community Kwanzaa Celebration at the Public Library. Co-sponsored by The Gathering of Men and local corporate partners, the celebration included traditional drums, dance, spoken word and featured New Rochelle’s own Professor James Small, an internationally known scholar-activist, dynamic speaker, and organizational consultant.

Created in 1966 by Maulana Karenga, Kwanzaa is an African American and Pan-African holiday that celebrates values, family, community and culture. 

Professor Small presented Kwanzaa’s Nguzo Saba (the seven principles), developed by Maulana Karenga, offering a set of principles that encourage thought and practice and help define, develop and enhance humanity in the context of community and the world.

The ideas and concepts of Kwanzaa are expressed in the Swahili language, one of the most widely spoken languages in Africa. The Nguzo Saba is:

• Umoja (Unity)
  To strive for and maintain unity in the family, community, nation and race.
• Kujichagulia (Self-Determination)
  To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves and speak for ourselves.
• Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility)
  To build and maintain our community together and make our brother’s and sister’s problems our problems and to solve them together.
• Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics)
  To build and maintain our own stores, shops and other businesses and to profit from them together.
• Nia (Purpose)
  To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.
• Kuumba (Creativity)
  To do always as much as we can, in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.
• Imani (Faith)
  To believe with all our heart in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.