While taking place around Christmas, the Kwanzaa holiday is anything but Christmas for African Americans. The non-religious cultural holiday was founded in 1966 by African Americans as part of both the pan African and Afrocentric movements. The holiday's name gets its name from matunda ya kwanza (Swahili for first fruit with kwanza being the Swahili word for first) which is a nod to
harvest festivals in the southern part of Africa. Kwanzaa is a holiday
to commemorate and celebrate African heritage (a lot of African Americans descended from ordinary African people who were kidnapped and sold into slavery by colonizers who brought them to the Americas). In fact the reason why Kwanzaa was created was to empower and unite te African American community who were recovering from the aftermath of the destructive Watts Rebellion. Kwanzaa is celebrated over 7 days starting on 26 December and ending on 1 January and each day is themed after specific principal. The colours of the candles lit during Kwanzaa (red, black and green) are also the colours of the pan-African flag.

Each candle represents the seven basic values of Kwanzaa, the words also being Swahili with English meanings:
1. Umoja: to strive and maintain family unity.
2. Kujichagulia: self-determination like defining, naming, crating and speaking for oneself.
3. Ujima: collective work and responsibly therefore uplifting ones
community.
4. Ujamaa: Co-operative economics so uplifting ones community
economically.
5. Nia: purpose. In the words of Karenga to make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.
6. Kuumba: creativity. Doing as much as one can to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than when one inherited it. 7. Imani: faith so to believe with all ones heart in ones people like parents, teachers and leaders.
Despite being African descent associated, the holiday's founder Maulana Karenga says anyone can observe the holiday. During Kwanzaa, African Americans would visit their families and exchange gifts which would usually be homemade and preferably bought from black owned businesses.