"In a typical history book, black Americans are mentioned in the context of slavery or civil rights. There's so much more to the story."

History

Create & Download Quote Image

Select Template

Insight & Reflection

This reflection on history by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar resonates across generations. It highlights a fundamental truth about human nature: our continuous search for meaning in history is what ultimately defines our character and our path forward.

About Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is an American former professional basketball player who was a center for 20 seasons in the National Basketball Association (NBA) with the Milwaukee Bucks and Los Angeles Lakers. He played college basketball for the UCLA Bruins. A member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, Abdul-Jabbar won a record six NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) awards. He was a 19-time NBA All-Star, a 15-time All-NBA Team member, and an 11-time NBA All-Defensive Team selection. He was a member of six NBA championship teams as a player and two more as an assistant coach, and was twice voted the NBA Finals MVP. He was named to three NBA anniversary teams. Widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, Abdul-Jabbar broke the NBA's career scoring record in 1984, and held it until 2023.

More quotes by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar  ’
Editorial Note: This quote is curated and fact-checked by the Quotes Archive Editorial Team. Verified Literature Specialist.

More by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

"The '80s made up for all the abuse I took during the '70s. I outlived all my critics. By the time I retired, everybody saw me as a venerable institution. Things do change."

Read more  ’

More about History

"I have a crazy amount of different jobs, so the way I manage that is to not do more than one at a time. It's like old computers that had small memory chips, they would do something called swapping, where they would fill the memory with one task, do it and get it out."

Read more  ’
View all History quotes  ’