Sonoma County nonprofit to host 3rd annual Kwanzaa in Santa Rosa

As a child in the 1960s and ‘70s during the Black Power and Black Arts movements, Sabryyah Abdullah learned to take pride in her African roots with help from the momentum of the time and her family while living in a predominantly white Bay Area.

In the 1960s, when Maulana Karenga founded Kwanzaa as a celebration of African American culture and heritage, Abdullah said she was overjoyed. It was a chance for people to connect with African culture and to remember their ancestors who came to America on ships as slaves, struggled, fought for their rights and brought invention and innovations, she said.

Abdullah, of Cloverdale, loved how the founder, Karenga, a professor of Africana studies at California State University, Long Beach, borrowed from African tribes’ harvest practices, incorporating food, poetry, libations and music into the festivities, and also turned the secular celebration into “something Black people can really utilize — it’s not the commercialization that Christmas has become.”

But as time moved forward, she noticed an absence in the celebration of African roots among youth and she and others were dismayed that Sonoma County lacked a public gathering to celebrate the communal aspect of Kwanzaa, which is observed every year from Dec. 26 to Jan. 1.

So, in 2019, Abdullah, N’Gamé Gray and other leaders of Santa Rosa-based NuBridges Youth Collaborative decided to create an annual event in Sonoma County where all ages and ethnicities could celebrate and learn about Kwanzaa, including its seven guiding principles, or “Nguzo Saba.”

This year, NuBridges Youth Collective will co-host its third annual Karamu, a communal feast on the sixth day of Kwanzaa, from noon to 6 p.m. Saturday at the Arelene Francis Center, 99 Sixth St. in Santa Rosa.

“We're celebrating who we are because we are a nation of people, we're everywhere,” said Gray, the collective’s founder and executive director.

The event is mostly self-funded, with some help from donations. “But we're more than happy to do it,” Gray said. “Because, you know, we're leaving a legacy here.”

It will be the first year the group is co-hosting with the Nubian Cafe Collective, an organization run by Black women to uplift Black arts and culture.

Guests are encouraged to wear African attire and participate in a candle lighting ceremony and the ancestral naming ceremonies of a young baby and an elder.

There will also be poetry, arts and crafts for children to make Kwanzaa presents, which are always handmade gifts and usually tied to African culture; soul food; and live music from Emcee Radio Active, a local Black musician.

Abdullah said one of her favorite aspects of Kwanzaa is the emphasis on the African philosophy of Ubuntu: “I am because we are,” a reminder of one’s personhood in relation to others.

“That means we are a part of those from our past, and because of them, we are the new beings,” she said.

While the seven principles can be found in any culture, the purpose of Kwanzaa is to reinforce them, Abdullah said.

“It’s a movement of consciousness,” she said.

More information on the event can be found at nubridgesyc.org or arlenefranciscenter.org.

You can reach Staff Writer Alana Minkler at 707-526-8511 or alana.minkler@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @alana_minkler.

Editor’s note: A previous version of this article misstated the decade which Kwanzaa was founded.