Oppressed people need to--and are currently trying to--obtain the power to define their humanity in their own terms. However, because it is easy for thrusts toward racial and ethnic consciousness to degenerate into racial and ethnic hate, it is necessary to define the ethnic self in ways that will not conflict with the needs of a world community. In searching for ethnic identity, one must achieve a world view which understands and appreciates the integrated set of primary, philosophical, and intellectual assumptions that bind humans together regardless of their ethnicity. Then, in a true search for self-identity, one is left with the basic questions about the universe, the earth, and man, for which George Washington Carver, Martin Luther King, Jr., and the N.A.A.C.P., among others, have sought answers. (JM)