Cultural Identity as an Agent for Change
Or: why we need to return to collective thought
I.
you did not know you were Afrika
When you set out for Afrika
you did not know you were going.
Because
you did not know you were Afrika.
You did not know the Black continent
that had to be reached
was you.
- Type the word ‘Diaspora’ in Google
- Hit Enter.
- Before you even scroll, look at what Google offers as a definition:
di·as·po·ra
dīˈaspərə/
noun
- Jews living outside Israel.
Although Zionism has it’s roots in the mid to late 1800s, it wasn’t until after World War II that a Jewish homeland was established. Theodor Herzl & Joseph Chamberlain’s plans to move into Uganda were scrapped once and for all, Palestine was decided upon, and Israel became a Nation State in 1948.
One of the main tenets of Zionism is Aliyah or immigration of Jewish people from “the diaspora” to the Land of Israel. This tenet, The Law of Return 5710 1950 (note: the Jewish year of 5710 is included in the Law), was passed on July 5, 1950. The Law of Return gave Jews the right to move to Israel and become citizens. Ashkenazi, Sephardi and Mizrahi are generally considered to be the prominent Jewish groups. With that as a distinction, the 140,000 or so Ethiopian Jews and also the Hebrew Israelites who settled in Dimona are rarely accepted as Jews.
The Knesset or parliament’s determination of who is and who is not Jewish is rarely contested as Self-Determination is a basic Human Right.
Three hundred and thirty-eight years before Kristallnacht, the process began that would, as Walter Rodney staunchly pointed out, underdevelop Africa, sever the ties of West Africans from present day Senegal down to the Congo, and transport between 12–20 million Africans to North and South America — in what is considered the largest movement of people in the history of people.
And that was just the beginning.
Chattel slavery would persist for 300+ years in a system that suppressed, often by law, most, if not every, tradition practiced by the enslaved African. While some remnants remained either hidden in plain sight like Santeria/Voodum or carried over somewhat unintentionally such as retaining rhythmic patterns and noun and verb agreement, the enslaved African lost their language and lineage — two very important factors in maintaining culture.
Some estimate that 90% of the enslaved Africans were brought to the Caribbean by various Europeans: the French, the English, the Dutch, the Portuguese, & the Spanish, who sliced up the Caribbean very much in the same way that they would later slice up Africa.
But as slavery slowly gave way to independence, the Black man and woman sought to define themselves and this is where we begin.
As we discussed in “What’s Slavery Got to Do With It…” where we once had Collective Consciousness, a Diasporic Identity, that no longer exists and it is to the detriment of not just us, here, in the U.S., but it has a negative affect on Black people throughout the African Diaspora.
We included that brief description of the Jewish rise to Israel for one simple reason — Part of the Jewish people’s power is in their unity and their ability to define for themselves who they are and what they stand for. They are able to do this without interference and they are able to hold claim to words like “diaspora” and “holocaust” to the point where any mention of our own experience is suddenly bogged down in arguments of comparisons.
When in reality…there is no comparison.
But that’s neither here nor there. What we seek to do here is to take a look, first, at the rise of self-determination and self-identification by Black people in the early 1900s up until at least 1977, then we’ll point to the forces that contributed to the end of that era, and lastly we’ll talk about what’s most important — solutions.
II.
I could not have told you then that some sun
would come,
somewhere over the road,
would come evoking the diamonds
of you, the Black continent —
somewhere over the road.
You would not have believed my mouth.
We could start our journey back at the very first rebellion of the enslaved African, the greatest act of Pan-Africanism if there was ever one, but instead we will start in 1900.
Our story begins with Henry Sylvester Williams who convened the three day, 1900 Pan-African conference at Westminster Town Hall, London, England. Considered by many to be the father of Pan-Africanism (he coined the phrase), Williams was born in Barbados but raised in Arouca, Trinidad.
At the time, Trinidad sat at the cross-section between African expatriates and Africans who were fleeing the U.S. Thus you had a mix of Yoruba, Hausa/Fulani, Ibo, Ewe-Foh, the formerly enslaved that were brought to Trinidad, and the aforementioned Africans from the U.S. It is this mix, one scholar believes, that played a role in Henry Sylvester Williams’ views on a Pan-African, Diasopora-centered reality.
While studying in London, Williams, 28, formed the African Association in 1897 with a mission to, “encourage a feeling of unity and to facilitate friendly intercourse among Africans in general; to promote and protect the interests of all subjects claiming African descent…” which ultimately would be the basis of the Pan-African Conference that would take place three years later. The AA, in true Pan-African form, had chairpeople from Antigua, Sierre Leone, & South Africa, and course, Trinidad. It was the AA’s lobbying of the British government that caught the attention of many Africans on the continent.
Elisabetta Bini in “Drawing a Global Color Line: ‘The American Negro Exhibit’ at the 1900 Paris Exposition” is of the belief that between the Pan-African Conference (that took place in July of 1900) and the Exposition des Negres d’Amerique (which was presented by W.E.B. Dubois in April of that same year), that a change in thought and approach to the “problem of color” was taking place. The Exhibit’s aim was to show the world the progress that had been made in 35 or so years since the end of the Civil War but most importantly it was imagery to combat the rise of the propaganda that promoted the idea that Black people were inferior to whites.
The Pan-African Conference set out to: secure civil and political rights for African peoples, promote friendly relations between races; encourage African peoples in education, industry, and business; lobby governments on behalf of African peoples; and ameliorate conditions of black people in Africa, America, the British Empire, and other parts of the world. Between 30 to 40 delegates attended and the conference took place between July 23 and July 25, 1900. Although the conference is rarely spoken of now, Dubois made his famous, “problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line…” statement here during his closing speech and also had this to say:
If now the world of culture bends itself towards giving Negroes and other dark men the largest and broadest opportunity for education and self-development, then this contact and influence is bound to have a beneficial effect upon the world and hasten human progress. But if, by reason of carelessness, prejudice, greed and injustice, the black world is to be exploited and ravished and degraded, the results must be deplorable, if not fatal-not simply to them, but to the high ideals of justice, freedom and culture which a thousand years of Christian civilization have held before Europe.
Between the Exhibit and the Congress, Bini argues that Black politics were becoming radicalized. Some contend that Dubois’ views were in stark contrast to Williams’ aim, but it’s really of no consequence. The spark of Pan-African thought had been ignited and Africans who had been affected by slavery and colonialism began to think in terms of Diaspora.
III.
When I told you, meeting you somewhere close
to the heat and youth of the road,
liking my loyalty, liking belief,
you smiled and you thanked me but very little believed me.
This could easily coast off into a paper about the growth & rise of Pan-African thought but to do that we would have to place more of our focus on politics and policy. That is not our aim.
Our sole purpose of bringing up the Pan-African Conference was to show the rise of collective thought; that despite language differences, and despite the difference of origin, Henry Sylvester Williams and all that attended the conference recognized the need for an organization that dealt with the issues of Africans who were subjected to the rise of colonialism at home on the continent and the needs of those who had suffered for hundreds of years under chattel slavery.
As early as 1897, we see Black people throughout the Diaspora collaborating.
Sam Coleridge-Taylor, a Black British composer, met Paul Laurence Dunbar and the two went on to give joint recitals; Dunbar reciting poetry and Coleridge-Taylor accompanying him on piano. Coleridge-Taylor also wrote two compositions, “African Romances” and “Dream Lovers” with Dunbar. (Later, at the age of 25, Taylor provided music for the Pan-African Conference)
Despite Robert Abbott Sengstacke’s opposition to “Black nationalism” and Marcus Garvey (whom he tried to get deported), he still took up correspondence with Jose Correia Leite (who started O Clarim da Alvorada) when he travelled to Brazil in 1923. O Clarim would include articles from Sengstacke’s Chicago Defender, Garvey’s Negro World, and would go on to politicize middle-class Black Brazillians and promote Pan-Africanism. This ultimately led to the rise of the Frente Negra Brasiliera (FNP)- the first national Afro-Brazillian political organization.
Aime Cesaire first used the term Negritude in his 1939 poem Cahier d’un retour au pays natal, but Cesaire, Léopold Sédar Senghor, and Léon-Gontran Damas had been working with the concept as early as 1933. These men are recognized as the “fathers” of Negritude.
Soon, the word took on a new meaning. Inspired by the Harlem Renaissance, Marcus Garvey, and the Dubois resurrected Pan-African Congress, Negritude became an identifier for the African colonized by the French and all the Africans that had been brought to the French Antilles.
Greater still, Negritude became a movement; a movement that extended beyond the arts, into history, philosophy, & politics. The defining aspect of Negritude for this writing, however, was the idea that all African descendants had an “African Personality.” With that as a concept, proponents of Negritude began to have their own conferences.
An offshoot of the magazine Presence Africane, which started in 1947, the Negritude conferences sought to unite all Black people who had been subjected to European oppression. The First International Conference of Negro Writers and Artists took place in September of 1956 and the list of presenters is like a who’s who of African thought — from the aforementioned Aime Cesaire to Frantz Fanon, from Richard Wright to Cheik Anta Diop.
Léopold Sédar Senghor would go on to become the first president of Senegal in 1960 and continue to work in the spirit of Pan-Africanism. The Negritude Movement matched the cultural expression with the political and Senghor would also lead the way in producing The First World Festival of Black Arts. The Festival took place from April 1 to April 24th 1966 and had representatives from over 45 countries from Africa, the Caribbean, the US, South America, and Europe.
Before The Second World Festival of Black Arts took place, Hugh Masekela in conjunction with boxing promoter, Don King, organized Zaire74, a music festival with 31 acts, 17 from Zaire and 14 from all over the world including James Brown, Bill Withers, The Fania All Stars, and many more. A little over 80,000 people attended Zaire74. (it’s miraculous that that footage wouldn’t come out for twenty-years)
The Second World Festival of Black Arts (FESTAC) — January 15 to February 23, 1977 — was the largest cultural event ever held on the African continent. FESTAC was covered in Ebony & Jet Magazine. FESTAC is where Minister Farrakhan met Haki Madhubuti (who would help him in the rebuild of the Nation of Islam later that year). Stevie Wonder was at the height of his career at FESTAC. The transitioning, breakbeat making Donald Byrd was at FESTAC. FESTAC was a big deal. And it wasn’t all about entertainment.
The core of the festival from the organizers’ perspective was a two-week long colloquium where more than 200 leading Black scholars presented papers and discussed topics related to everything from arts and languages, philosophy and religion, to science and technology. The History of the World Festival of Black Arts & Culture
Renowned Jazz pianist, Randy Weston remembers FESTAC this way:
This FESTAC thing was too powerful; it was too big. The white press gave it absolutely no coverage, no more than they had given to our 1961 trip — which was nothing. But this was the most fantastic event I ever participated in up to that point.
IV.
Here is some sun. Some.
Now off into the places rough to reach.
Though dry, though drowsy, all unwillingly a-wobble,
into the dissonant and dangerous crescendo.
Your work, that was done, to be done to be done to be done.
Over the past twenty years Black people from Mexico down to the tip of South America have been in the pursuit of being recognized by their governments.
As early as the 1500s Africans that escaped slavery (also known as Maroons) settled the West Coasts from Mexico to South America. These communities were largely untouched but despite that, they have remained on the fringes of society, often times, they have been the poorest most underrepresented population in their countries. This is largely due to how they’ve been classified.
In Mexico, Sergio Peñaloza Pérez, a school teacher of African descent, founded an organization Mexico Negro in 1997 that pressed the government to count and recognize descendants of Africans. Earlier this year, Mexico did just that counting the number of “Afro-Mexicans” (most of whom live in pueblo negros, or Black towns, in the states of Guerrero and Oaxaca) at 1.38 million. Now that the “Afro-Mexican” has been counted, according to Peñaloz, they seek to join with indigenous communities in their fight for their inalienable rights.
Although the Garifuna people of South America (located in Honduras, Columbia, Ecuador…to name a few countries) have long been recognized, their rights continue to be trampled upon. We’ll only focus on Columbia for this writing.
Along the Pacific Coast of Columbia, the Garifuna live in palenques, the Columbian version of pueblo negros, and have also remained autonomous. But once the economy sank, the drug trade became more lucrative and dealers and corrupt government officicals encroached on many of these palenques, displacing some of the people as far north as Panama.
Marino Cordoba, a human rights activist and founder of the Association of Displaced Afro-Colombians (AFRODES) has used the concept of Pan-Africanism to draw attention from the Diaspora to the conditions that are taking place in Columbia. And, in a way similar to Mexico again, AFRODES seeks to join with indigenous communities as they attempt to claim the land that they’ve been on for over 600 years.
Almost 40 years have passed since FESTAC and things have changed drastically with the Black man and woman in America. Surprisingly, graduation rates have risen by almost 50%, as we are often reminded, we have a Black president, we have a couple of Black billionaires….the end.
Because all the other numbers are bleak, bleak, bleak. Half of all homes are single-parent homes. Which, almost isn’t a surprise considering that 16% of all Black men are headed to jail and 16% of the free Black men are unemployed. You can do the math — 68% of all Black men are not in jail and are employed. We could cut into that number, but you get the drift.
If you really want to depress yourself, read the Moynihan Report from 1965. Sadly, it doesn’t read like a historical document. Aside from the fact that we’re called Negros, the Report reads like a modern, viral, Facebook, 1.5 million shared, document.
So what is the difference?
Identity.
Between 1965 and 1975, mostly based on the Civil Rights Movement and Racial Pride Movements such as the Nation of Islam and the Black Panthers, Black people were able to see a bit of progress. The names of our children reflected that. We opened our own schools or home schooled. Concepts like “Afrocentricity” were born turning our attention from European-centered thoughts of beauty and beliefs, towards that “African Personality” that the Negritude Movement emphasized.
Then Crack hit.
There are more detailed writings on how Crack ravaged the Black community so that will not be done here. But suffice it to say that with Crack, Black on Black crime increased, the focus on long-term goals and ideas of consumption changed, and most importantly for this writing, the concept of Self changed.
Growing up in or around the Crack epidemic disintegrated any concept of community. No one was to be trusted and every man and woman was for themselves. Because of that, the desires changed as well. Where one would once long for a family and to become a productive member of their community, Crack and the quick riches that it brought made Conspicuous Consumption the only desire.
Because of this rugged individualism that exists in a large segment of the Black community, the return of the World Festival of Black Arts in 2010 (FESMAN) went largely unreported. FESMAN took place in Dakar, Senegal as it had 44 years before for the First World Festival. It attracted 3,200 participants from throughout the Diaspora to the tune of 80 countries. The theme was, “African Renewal, Cultural Diversity and African Unity” and had Americans — Akon, Busta Rhymes, Rahzel, Rick Ross, & Fat Joe (to name a few) — performing in front of screaming Senegalese audiences.
It’s no surprise to anyone that Hip-Hop has affected the world and become the universal voice of youth culture. As we can see in the above Rick Ross FESMAN performance, the music has no boundaries.
And that’s just it. The Black man and woman of America are not only the most well-off Black people of all Black people on the planet, we remain the most influential. Despite that, collectively, we are mostly unconnected, uninvolved, unconcerned. We fail to acknowledge that U.S. media, beyond being parasitical of our culture, plays a role in being a propaganda machine that gives the world an impression of who and what we are here in America, despite our diversity. And we fail to see our responsibility.
The solution begins with awareness. Many of our people, be they poor or middle-class, are rarely exposed to anything beyond their local surroundings. Programs like the African Genesis Institute since 1998 have taken as many as 2,000 students, some free, to countries ranging from Senegal, Gambia, Ghana and Egypt. The Program’s mission is “corrective history to provide African-American youth with a correct historical perspective of their roots and culture thus enabling them to assume their predestined role as leaders in the 21st century.”
The U.S. government also has a program, The Kennedy-Lugar Youth Exchange and Study (YES) that, since 2007, has accepted youth from Senegal. As the program title states, YES, is not a visitation program, it is an exchange for students between the ages of 15–17. Typically, these students land in the hands of some well-to-do white family, but if you are of means and have educated yourself, bringing a Senegalese student into your home can, as the YES site suggests, “promote mutual understanding by forming lasting relationships with…” you the host family, your community and a young Senegalese student who’s only impression of Black people in America have come from white media outlets and rap music.
Also, The United Nations has proclaimed the years 2015 to 2024 “The International Decade For People of African Descent” with a focus on, “provid(ing)a solid framework for the United Nations, Member States, civil society and all other relevant actors to join together with people of African descent and take effective measures for the implementation of the programme of activities in the spirit of recognition, justice and development” and the website is full of videos, links, and documents.
Presently, China is involved in it’s own version of the 1884 European land grab. Several articles have questioned the intent and impact of China’s presence. Surely Miles-McClellan Construction Co. Inc. and THOR Construction, thinking Diasporically, could combine to provide opportunity for their firms and local employees. Maybe that thought is too far reaching.
Due to the fact that we come from so many countries and have since developed a wide variety of cultures, a universal goal such as one unique homeland, like Israel, might be out of the question. Liberia was supposed to be such a place but the reality of that dream, due to the countries close ties to the U.S., never materialized.
But it doesn’t always have to be about “the grand plan.” The reality is it all starts with the individual and their family. As a people, we once recognized anyone from the Diaspora as Black. We rooted for them; their interests were our interests. As individuals, we carried ourselves in the same manner; we saw ourselves as representatives of our people. We sought to define ourselves.
That thought process is what united leaders like Dr. Martin Luther King and the first President of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah. That thought process is what drove The Honorable Elijah Muhammad and later Malcolm X to unite with Black people throughout the Diaspora. This is the thought process that has driven Minister Farrakhan on his several World Friendship Tours. And that thought process is what is needed if we are to be a competing people in the 21st century.
I close with this adage from the 1956, First International Conference of Negro Writers and Artists:
In the modern world, where violence is gaining ground, and the quiet ones are cruelly trampled upon, we had long felt the need to make known the presence of Negro men of culture. The number, quality and variety of talents should be the first assertion to the world of our presence. PRESENCE AFRICAINE
poem excerpts are from Gwendolyn Brooks’ “To The Diaspora”
