Early African History - Assignment Example

1. Early African History Discuss the role of paleontology in Africa"s historiography. Evaluate the contributions of the evolutionary theory and traditions/myths of origin to the reconstruction of Africa"s past. African identity seems to have a strong link to the Nile Basin which was the central point for the convergence of people of African origins. From the evidence of archaeological excavations, it is apparent that most people of African origins once lived in concentrated sections of the Nile Basin. This is because of several forms of evidence. First of all, early Greek and Roman writings that survived to this day alludes a lot of things to Ancient Egypt. There is evidence that the people who lived in Egypt and in the Nile Basin over 2,000 years ago were darker skinned by the Europeans and other persons of other origins. Secondly, many of the practices of Ancient Egypt still exists in various forms in African societies. And although most of these practices have systematically disappeared over the past 500 years due to Islamic and Christian influences, most African tribes continue to pay homage to the dead and some even worship ancestors. This is the exact traditions that were held sacred in Ancient Egypt. This is because the Egyptians saw their leaders as a link between the contemporary society and the supernatural world. Hence, there was a lot of attention that was given to the leaders of the community. The beliefs in the Afterlife led to the creation of pyramids which exist to this day as a way of keeping the Pharaohs eternally alive. Although Africans moved from these regions many years ago, they still have traditions like preserving the dead, having very elaborate funerals and the beliefs in spiritual systems and structures similar to what existed in Ancient Egypt. The culture and political structures of Africa continue to show resemblance with what existed in Egypt. Paleontology primarily shows evidence of changes in weather and other natural conditions that explains the need for Africans to move in various directions from the Nile Valley. Global warming and other challenges like war caused Africans to move in other directions. Then the desertification of the mid-section of Africa led to the creation of what is now the world’s largest desert. This caused Africans to move further south. And when the Sahara was fully formed, most Africans could not move to North Africa to link up to mainstream activities and technologies. Therefore, they moved in small scattered communities that were in the interior of West Africa and East Africa. Other conditions caused Africans to move further down south to places like the coast of West Africa, Central Africa and Southern Africa. 2. State Formation in Africa before A.D.1880 Discuss the role of the environment (geographical location) in the emergence of the Egyptian civilization. 1. Using two African empires as case studies, discuss the role of long distance trade in the emergence and growth of the western Sudanese polities (kingdoms and empires). 2. With reference to four polities, discuss four factors that aided the process of state formation in Africa before A.D. 1880 (one factor for a polity) After the decline of Classical Egypt, persons of European extraction and lighter skins took over affairs in the fallen Kingdom. This included the Greeks, then the Romans and finally the Arabs who paved way for other Muslim dynasties to rule over Egypt. Darker skinned Africans moved down south in various direction and in different groups. This exodus is documented from the times of Alexander the Great about 2,500 years ago. They moved in different directions westwards and southwards in search of peace and better living conditions. As they moved, environmental conditions caused Africans to move into different directions and carry out different activities. However, as the lighter-skinned settlers in the north of Africa controlled better military power and better firepower, they sought to attack Black Africans whenever environmental conditions like desertification and drought occurred. This caused Africans to move further down south and set up kingdoms to protect themselves and their allied tribes and clans. Eventually, the Sahara desert developed and caused Africans of darker skins to be trapped beyond the Sahara and stay in the southern half of Africa. African tribes and communities converged in different points of the continent and as environmental conditions proved right and appropriate, there were several concentrations of people in parts of the continent. These early to medieval kingdoms were styled on the trading routes that linked Black Africa to other parts of the world. As identified above, the Sahara developed and it was difficult for people to cross from sub-Saharan Africa into the Mediterranean zone and the Middle East to link up with mainstream trade with Europe and the rest of the world. Therefore, the few traders who knew routes to link up these different parts of the world created systems and approaches that allowed them to connect and link up to different peoples in the rest of the world. Kingdom of Kush developed just south of classical Egypt. This was fundamentally because the policies of the lighter skinned occupiers of classical Egypt were not favorable towards the darker skinned persons. Therefore, Kush became a safe haven for these darker skinned Egyptians who were now known as Nubians. They carried out a lot of activities that are reminiscent of Ancient Egypt like the creation of pyramids and similar structures several centuries after Egypt became non-African. The Ghana Empire was also developed through the establishment and maintenance of trade links between the interior of West Africa and North Africa. Medieval Ghana allowed trade to be conducted between places in the north like Morocco and the rest of West Africa. The four main polities that existed in the formation of African states after the Medieval kingdoms: 1. Security: Ashanti came about as a consolidation of states to create a military union that could stand up against the enemy state, Denkyira. It was a consolidation of different ethnic groups to one state that could have the military competency to protect the people; 2. Cultural & Ethnic identity: Igbos came together to form unions to protect the fundamental values they had. They protected their interest by forming various states that could stick together and work together to maintain some form of social order for the Igbo people; 3. Trade: The Swahili Coastal states fundamentally concentrated on the conduct of trade between Africa and the Middle East. 4. Religious Reasons: The Hausa states flourished because of the desire to create Islamic safe havens where people could have Islamic worship and gain protection. 3. Question of Motives-Apologists of colonialism Civilization (how true? Africans, the uncivilized, barbaric, and primitive lot?) Education (how true? use hindsight to examine their record in colonial Africa: less than 5% of school-age children benefited, education that supported the colonial enterprise, etc) Stop slave trade (huh, who started it?) Spread Christianity (a case of whose God is more powerful?) Colonialism was defined by four Cs – Civilization, Colonialism, Christianization, and Commerce. Civilization seem to be based on the way Africans were viewed by Europeans in their own one-sided argument. It is a fact that Africa and Africans had been cut off from the rest of the world and its technology for centuries when the first European ship explorers came to Africa. However, African culture was judged on the basis of what the Europeans deemed to be right and wrong. In spite of this, Africans had their own ways of doing things. Although some things were unusual and different, they were versions of what already existed. Things like executions were being practiced in Europe too. Other elements like the judiciary, civil society, architecture and other things were different. Europeans took a side without any respect for African views and ideologies and condemned Africa as uncivilized. Although I agree that some things were not very progressive in Africa at the time of European exploration and some still are, there should have been a way of evaluating things before judging and condemning African ways of doing things. It is true that there was no formal education, however Africans had ways of education. Most of the large states had ways of training their children through informal means to become responsible members of the society. Formal education in Europe came with the Protestant Reformation. However, Europeans forgot this a century or two away and judged Africa as being barbaric. And in spite of this, they sought to provide education to Africans in a way and manner that enabled them to meet their own malicious and selfish ends. This included empowering a small group of selected favorites to be used against other groups. Slavery existed in Africa around the time the Trans-Atlantic slave trade started. However, it is not clear whether it was in existence before Europeans came in. However, the commercialization of the trade and the integration of firearms which dramatically changed the face of slavery is a European thing. Christianity was spread to Africa as a means of promoting holiness and salvation to the natives. This was seen by the Europeans as a better thing to do. However, evidence seems to suggest that some Africans who were living in protectorates and were treated well by the colonialists accepted Christianity whole-heartedly. However, those in other states that were seen to be hostile to European rule maintained their traditional religious values. This suggests that Africans did not always accept Christianity as supreme. 4. Colonialism To what extent could it be said that the Europeans expanded into Africa in the 19th century for the twin purposes of spreading civilization and ending slavery? Discuss the economic and political motives for European expansion into Africa in the 19th century The need felt by some Europeans to stop the internal slave trade and spread civilization and education is often stated as the main reason for the partition of Africa. Discuss. (Note: this is a two-part question; it is not enough to argue against the stated motives (only 50% of the answer). You must in addition discuss the more probable reasons economic, political, and social motives (the other 50% of the answer). What is colonial situation? How did the colonial situation in Africa lead to the anti-colonial struggle? Overwhelming evidence suggests that European powers expanded into Africa and colonized nations as a means of seeking their own economic interests. This is because most of these territories in Africa had huge volumes of gold, minerals, natural resources and other trade opportunities that the Europeans could benefit from. Some African tribes and African communities were hostile and they had built some negative tendencies because they got firearms during the height of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. These groups and gangs and kingdoms were terrorizing other Africans. However, it appears that the immediate objective of the European move was to protect their allies that they were using as agents to loot the continent. After they did this move, other things came with it, like disarming hostile tribes and in the process of “civilizing” Africans, Europeans gained direct benefits like selling goods at extremely high prices for huge profits. So it is not exactly true that their purpose was to civilize Africans and end slavery. They were motivated by their primary interests and civilization and ending slavery came along the side. Colonial situation refers to the domination of a country by an alien minority who assert their racial and cultural superiority. This automatically creates a context of making the native feel he is inferior. This comes with the creation of a master-servant situation where the natives are made to work as servants and the members of the colonizing minority are treated as the masters. In most parts of Africa, the colonial situation was typically created by a process whereby the European minority was so small that they could not maintain power directly. This is because there were diseases Europeans were not used to nor had medication like malaria and the climatic conditions were so harsh for them. Therefore, only a few Europeans could represent the colonizing power at every point in time. Save for the south of Africa where the conditions were less harsh for the Europeans, Europeans used divide-and-rule techniques. This was done by defining hostile ethnic groups and allied ethnic groups. The allied ethnic group was empowered through education in order to act as a middle-class that was being trained to potentially take over from the Europeans after a possible independence (which most European powers did not even anticipate). This way, the Europeans could use their allies as partners even when they were no more occupying these countries. Decolonization took center-stage after some of these African countries took part in the Second World War. Most of them fought for the British Royal Armed Forces. The drafting for the war was quite intimidating so the “allied” tribes rather delegated this to the “hostile” tribes. Therefore, there are accounts of Yoruba and Fante representatives of the British colonial authorities in Nigeria and Ghana, sought to recruit members from hostile and less privileged tribes under colonialism like Hausa (in Ghana and Nigeria), Igbos (Nigeria) and Ashanti in Ghana. These tribes that were generally treated negatively by the colonial structure went to the war and they learnt a lot of things from the Asians who were talking of independence. Additionally, these draftees were promised jobs and pensions after the war. However, after World War II, things went bad for all the colonial powers and they could not honor their promise. Therefore, the arming of traditionally hostile tribes and the exposure they gained in the war gave rise to the argument for colonialism. The United Nations was formed and it sought to support decolonization. Therefore, nationalist elites rose in Africa and they began to act on the demands of the veterans and the struggle for independence began, first in the British colonies and then the French and finally, the Portuguese colonies. 5. Harlem Renaissance Assess the significance of the Harlem Renaissance in the emergence of a new Black America by the 1940s. Evaluate the impacts of Dr. W. E. B. DuBois The Souls of Black Folk on the Harlem Renaissance. Under slavery, it was apparent that the civil liberties that the Founding Fathers preached were not applicable to African-Americans because they were to be considered as a property to their White owners. This means that the African-American was to be treated as nothing more than a chattel. This was an unfortunate and a highly negative situation. However, this also came with a situation where the culture of the African-American people brought from Africa was either eliminated in totality or disguised and integrated into the “master’s culture”. This is because the Africans in the New World were all forced to give up their identity due to the risk that they might revolt and question the legality of the institution of slavery. Therefore, everywhere in the Americas, African identity was eliminated from Black slaves who were to be seen as nothing more than labor to their White owners. However, after the Civil War in the mid-1800s and emancipation that came after the abolition of slavery, African-American people were to plant on the farms as sharecroppers and they were to be paid. There was therefore the need for some kind of identity to be created to represent the African-American in the American society. Thus, the cultural movement known as the “New Negro Movement” evolved in the 1920s. African-Americans had to create a culture that will ensure they were best represented in mainstream American society. There was a new African-American cultural expression and this was due to their migration into urban areas in America. Harlem was the largest area where most of the African-Americans raised in rural agrarian societies lived in urban America. At this point, many African-Americans lived with writers from francophone African countries (particularly Senegal which was highly advanced due to the French colonization policy implemented there at the end of the 19th Century) and the Caribbean. At this point, there was no definitive leader of African-American society. Therefore, the people naturally turned to various authorities for guidance and directions. One of the most important books that provided guidance was the Souls of Black Folk and this brought about important experiences of African-Americans to bear. It became an authoritative source and it helped Black people in America to converge and identify their best interests. During the Harlem renaissance, this book moved from obscurity into mainstream society and a lot of people of African-American origins read it and they got to ask important and vital questions about their inclusion the society. This caused African-Americans to gain an understanding of who they are and helped them to converge to demand what was rightfully denied them. 6. Civil Rights Struggle Evaluate the impacts Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois The Souls of Black Folk on the Civil Rights Movements of the 1950s through the 1960s. Assess the contributions of the Black Power Movement to the Civil Rights Struggle in the United States in the 1960s. Published in 1903, W. E. B. DuBois’s Souls of Black folk it provided important elements of African-American history and this gave identification to the kind of suffering and challenges African-Americans had endured. Right from the first chapter, DuBois challenges important elements and aspects of the American society and asks for change through the use of various metaphors that ask for changes in the way things are done. This way, he discusses important aspects of the society and asks questions. The use of Black men as workmen in certain undesirable fields is also explored. He presents a pioneering view of sociological studies by a Black man about African-American society. He also brings to light the kind of life and suffering that African-Americans went through under slavery. This builds a strong background for the identification of Black people as a unique constituent of the United States. In the 1950s and the 1960s when the United States was formed and some African-American men had taken part in the US war effort and some other constituents of society had African-Americans in leading positions, this book and its influence was transformed. This is because most of the younger generations of African-Americans who lived through the Harlem Renaissance had pondered over the content of the book throughout their childhood and teenage years. And they could see the truths of the challenges enumerated in the book play out in the lives of their parents. They also knew some stories about some of the horrors of slavery and the war to end slavery from their grandparents and other older relatives who had lived half a century earlier. Therefore, that generation of the 1950s and 60s were ready to make demands as was outlined in The Souls of Black Folk.. Another external pressure that was exerted from outside was the formation of the United Nations which was primarily the work of the United States in their hypocritical effort to promote liberty and human rights to nations around the world. The UN created a liberalist idea of how the world could be democratized and a structure for international law was formed with the view of promoting human rights and protecting minority. America’s leaders, all of them White at the time sought to position themselves as the protectors of the free world. Thus, the UN laws gave the impetus for the African countries to gain independence from their imperialist European authorities. So the question was why not in our own backyard? Therefore, the generation that was influenced by the writings of DuBois formed various radicalized groups that sought to teach Black consciousness within the scope of the book. They sought to ask questions and demand better action in dealing with the problems of the African-American. Why was he called Negro? Why was he denied important rights? What was the state of discrimination and segregation? Was it legitimate? If it was, what was the right of the US to ask the Apartheid government of South Africa to back down on its stand? This cause a lot of controversies and the time came for the United States to act. Therefore, it can be said that The Souls of Black Folks gave the impetus for a whole generation of African-Americans to be conscientized and prepared to ask for changes in the nation’s attitudes towards African-Americans. This was backed by theories like civil disobedience which was used to get the US authorities to listen to Black people and make changes to the society. Read More