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"The Black Academy of Arts and Letters exists for the proper recognition of those who have made a notable contribution to the illumination and the enhancement of the black experience. 

"The Black Academy of Arts and Letters is not a signification of two standards of excellence.  But the existence of the Black Academy may well suggest that we have no comfortable assurance that a judgment of excellence may be taken for granted merely because a common standard may exist.

"We are a great people.  It is time for the world to know it, but more crucial than any other value is that it is time for our children to know it.  We are not great because we are black.  Color is a physical accident.  We are great because for 340 years we have been a latent, silent resource to the developing greatness of America and Western civilization.

"We are Americans.  We will remain so.  But by some irrevocable accidents of history, we are Blackamericans, and that is our proud and unique distinction.

"The Academy is living evidence that black people do, in fact, achieve.  The Academy gives legitimacy to the aspirations of black youth.  It gives reality to speculation, solidity to dreams.  It insists to the black youth who dares to be creative that somebody cares about your dream, somebody cares about your effort.  Somebody cares about you and the shaping of your life, the development of your aspirations."

From the Founding Address by C. Eric Lincoln, President, The Black Academy