Blacks entered colonial America as a severely marginalized people. Thought of as more property than people, African Americans had no actual place in civilized society until the Civil War and Reconstruction. Jim Crow laws largely (and swiftly) reversed any societal equality gains that freedom from slavery provided Blacks. Our culture was largely an afterthought until the beginning of the civil rights movement.
The death of Emmett Till made our fellow citizens and the rest of the world aware of the long-standing arguments and plight American Blacks were facing. The ensuing Civil Rights Movement brought the African Americans struggle center stage.
With the signing of the Civil Rights Act in 1964, Blacks were covered legally. However, there was another war silently raging that had yet to be addressed. Since the symbolic end of the Civil Rights Movement (the death of Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1968) American society has progressively, even perhaps systematically, drifted away from the concerns of Black people.
American Blacks are, to this day, marginalized, under appreciated and under represented in American society. The Black Intellectual’s voice still works to make it into mainstream dynamics and all aspects of the ‘system’ have been built to work against Blacks. We are still not considered equals, and unfortunately, this is an aspect that no law can fix.
Black scholars have been developing ideologies to answer the call of achieving equality for Blacks. Afrocentrism is one such example and is the focus of this essay. Because of the strengthening nature of Afrocentrism - a relatively new term - many interpretations exist. One of the best descriptions I have found is this: Afrocentricity is intended as an answer to the intellectual colonialism that undergirds and serves to validate political and economic colonialism. It places African people at the center of any analysis of African phenomena in terms of action and behavior. It is a devotion to the idea that what is in the best interest of African consciousness is at the heart of ethical behavior and seeks to cherish the idea that “Africanness” itself is an ensemble of ethics (KW Stikkers, 2008).
It represents the continued longing among Africans for some set of ideas that would bind them together as a community and offer some alternative to an assimilation that is excluded by Europeans or seen by Africans as an admission of inferiority and defeat. It binds the various elements of African and African-American studies (Chawane, 2016).
W.E.B DuBois coined the term “Afrocentric” in the early 1960s to describe the subject matter of Encyclopedia Africana, a comprehensive guide of scientific knowledge about the histories, cultures, and social institutions of people of African descent. The term was picked up and used by Black activists in the late 1960s. However, for Afrocentricity’s contemporary meaning, Molefi Kete Asante defined the term in his book, Afrocentricity: The Theory of Social Change in 1980. Asante developed Afrocentrism into a methodological curriculum based on African perspectives. According to Asante, “Afrocentricity an intellectual idea takes no authority to prescribe anything; it is neither a religion nor a belief system. It is a paradigm that suggests all discourse about African people should be grounded in the centrality of Africans in their own narratives.”
Afrocentricity’s definition is still developing and has come under scrutiny, as should any major philosophy. Some still view Afrocentric thought as pseudohistory. American classical scholar, Mary Lefkowitz states in her book, Not Out of Africa, “In other words, their historical methodology allows them to alter the course of history to meet their own specific needs.” Interestingly, Afrocentrism is not dedicated to proclaiming that European history is wrong. It merely aims to tell all of history, which includes Africans' place in global history.
I am reminded of a time when someone I worked with gave me a book about art for Christmas. I liked the book very much; I had been a frequent visitor of many art museums across the country and was even taking a couple of art history courses in college. After flipping through the book, I noticed the only art depicted was of European culture. I asked why no other cultures were represented. The answer blew me away, “Europeans were the only ones making art in ancient times.” How was this answer even possible?
However, from the Black perspective, we have been hearing similar statements our entire life just like this one. We have heard that Africans had no history. We have heard that there was no adequate language, art, books - anything for scholars to determine a historical account of the thousands of tribes thriving on the African continent. And of the one place on the entire continent that had something to offer - Egypt - that country was not built by Africans, but by Greeks.
Afrocentrism seeks to change the narrative. It seeks to acknowledge the past and present contributions and ideas that people of Africa and African descent have achieved. Afrocentric thought aims to show how those achievements affected and continue to affect American society.
Afrocentrism encompasses several facets that I would like to examine:
Self-determination for the African diaspora in America
The tragic consequences of a Eurocentric education on people of African descent
Obtaining intellectual pride for the African diaspora
Feeling a connection with African ancestors and past African history
Recognizing the legitimacy of African and African diasporic culture
Afrocentricity emerged as African scholars searched to challenge Eurocentric perspectives. And I believe it is the responsibility of the Black community to continue to mold and shape Black thought.
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