During the week of Kwanzaa (December 26-January 1), families and communities come together to share a feast, honor ancestors, affirm social bonds, and celebrate African and African American culture. Each day a candle is lit to highlight the principle of that day and breathe meaning into the principles with various activities, such as reciting the sayings or writings of great black thinkers and writers, reciting original poetry, African drumming, and sharing a meal of African diaspora-inspired foods.
The Seven Principles of Kwanzaa:
- 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 community’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 to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.
- Imani (Faith) To believe with all our hearts in our people and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.