Africans Around the World

Diaspora -289 stories, Maulana Karenga -152 stories, Maulana Karenga diaspora – 4 stories, diaspora traditions – 21 stories, slavery diaspora -21 stories

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By definition, a diaspora is “the movement, migration, or scattering of a people away from an established or ancestral homeland.” Art collector and curator Daniel Texidor Parker contextualizes the African Diaspora for us, “I consider there--the diaspora anywhere people from African origin--and this is Dr. Karenga's [HistoryMaker Maulana Karenga] definition too--lay their heads and, and do their work; that's the diaspora. Now, there is heavier concentrations in the Caribbean, in the United States, in Brazil, but it's also in England, that's the diaspora of, for black people. In Sweden.”

Because of slavery, Africans were transported across the world in an artificial migration of sorts. When discussing Africans in the Americas many people tend to only think of Africans in North America. But Fannie Rushing, activist, historian, and professor, focuses her research on the African diaspora in Latin America, “There was material in Spanish about the slave trade to Spain, but virtually nothing had been done about slavery in the Americas because everyone at that point assumed that if you were talking about slavery in the Americas, you were talking about the United States, and therefore it had nothing to do with Spain. So, that's where my, my interest in this African Diaspora began. And my goodness, now, every year, I can't keep up with the number of books on the African Diaspora in Latin America”

The Drama of Nommo by Paul Carter Harrison

Paul Carter Harrison, playwright theater professor and author, also speaks to the diversity of the diaspora and his book, The Drama of Nommo, “The book is showing certain responses to the world and even if, even though we are in, what we call the African--we're in the American world, we'll find that Africans throughout the diaspora behaved the same way. It is just different based upon what part of it--where they're located. So if you're in the, if you're in, as what do you call it--if you're an African living in South America, and you speak Spanish and a certain--whatever the landscape allows you to deal with, you still have the African root, is still feeding through how you negotiate that. If you're in Haiti or a French situation, you, you speak French, and you're then negotiated that way through French language----as well as territorially, what it would offer. And I would imagine if we had a lot of African people living in Alaska, you would find similarly in their relationship to the Eskimo, a way of never being completely what has been the tradition of the Eskimos. You'd find some way that the African presence would alter that whole relationship, that whole understanding. It--that--it means it's still, these people are--they would then still be considered Alaskans or Haitians, or South Americans, et cetera. You know, the language being one of the theatres to the sensibility, but they are fundamentally African people.”

South Floridian Archivist Dorothy Fields focuses her work on the unique ancestry of Miami, “Well I mean when you think about it and you think about the African diaspora, Haitians are a part of us, certainly. And while my grand, immediate grandparents came from the Bahamas, I understand their grandparents came from Haiti and their grandparents may have come from Barbados and their grandparents from Sierra Leone.” Being able to trace one’s lineage across a diasporic map is a beautiful thing and Fields’ work is shedding light on the rich makeup of Miami and the people of African descent that live there.

South African boot dance Isicathulo

Beyond history and genealogy, many are spotlighting the creative traditions of the African diaspora. Dancer, choreographer, and dance company director, Ferne Yangyeitie Caulker sees the beauty of the diaspora in dance. She discusses her concept to visualize the connections we share through movement, “what will happen if I took--if we took as a concept the boot dance from South Africa the Isicathulo, which we now see as called stepping in the fraternities and we hooked that up to tap dance. You see, what would happen if we took the ring shout of the Carolinas and we hooked that up to the early southern Baptist movement in the church and then hooked that up to the Haitian Vodun? You know, so then I started seeing very huge possibilities in terms of using dance as a means to show all of us our connectors to each other in the diaspora… why can't we influence each other through the diaspora and reconnect ourselves to ourselves.”

A book of Anansi the Spider stories

English professor and author, Daryl Cumber Dance discusses the similarities between folklore of African Americans and Jamaicans, “I would not say a significant difference. Here, while Brer Rabbit is the most popular, Anansi the spider is most popular there. Sometimes, it's the very same tales, it's just Anansi--sometimes they have Brer Rabbit and sometimes we have a Anansi, but for the most part--so, those differences. In Jamaica, it might be about the ackee tree, whereas here will be something that's here, but not significant. Sometimes the animals are a little bit different. It reflects a little bit, the culture and the physical surroundings in these places. And I'd say the same is true as you move from place to place in the Caribbean.” Because both groups have roots in Africa, the stories were passed down through the diaspora and morphed to their respective landing places.

Renowned author and language scholar Richard Long says, “I am now interested in diasporas and I think that you look at a cultures and peoples you know where they are, where they have gone and what has happened to them and the processes and I regard all of these diasporic communities as being communities in process but also in interaction, creating new spaces and new communities. And I think that if one wants to really deal with African culture--African American cultures, one has to look at the totality of the culture, totality in the anthropological sense. What do people do? You know, what do they eat? What do they wear? What do they think, and so on, all of these things. And then what do they create you know, what do they spend their time doing and so on and using that and looking at the African diaspora we can see how important music has been, how important spirituality has been in defining these communities and in keeping them going and in molding and shaping their contributions to the larger community. 

Minister and NAACP Chicago South Side Prisdent Reverend B. Herbert Martin, Sr.. describes the spirituality that exists among children of the African diaspora, “And those of us who could afford the journey back to the continent to begin to study and to recover some of the African traditional spirituality, we've done it. And we have brought back, hopefully, the best of that, you know, to our local context in America. So, as Africans in the Diaspora, we are beginning to connect back to the indigenous people on the continent. So, that's going to enrich, you know, what we do here. We will share with them the uniqueness of the African American experience, and they will share with us the African traditional experience. So, this cross-fertilization will strengthen both the spiritual communities on the continent as well as those in the diaspora.”

But there are issues that exist as one examines the African diaspora. Daniel Texidor Parker discusses diasporic tensions during President Obama’s first term in office, “I think today more recently with President Obama [HistoryMaker President Barack Obama] being president, he has kind of fused some of that together. But with black people in general we still are going to cling to our own misconceptions and there are coalitions among Africans and African Americans that you don't hear about that are going on throughout this city, you know. Because those of us who realize that we are all one people just geographically separated that it's the same with Puerto Ricans, they just geographically was born on an island but genetically we're all the same people. And Africans have the misconception that because they're intermixed with African blood and--or, or European blood I should say, that they, that somehow makes them not as African American or as African and it may make them less African but genetically they still are. And when we understand this and can accept that, the feeling comes together.”

Chester Higgins, Jr, acclaimed photojournalist, describes the negative ramifications of the diaspora, “we are people who are alienated from ourselves and that manifests itself in so many different ways… we can't relate to our ancestors and the place that we come from.”

To combat these feelings of alienation and hostility towards one another, activist, professor, and author Maulana Karenga pioneered a conference, “FESTAC '77 an international festival of Black Art and Culture”. He describes the importance of that undertaking, “We're all African, you know. I'm a African in diaspora, you're African on the continent, but we are all African, you know what I mean. So we, we need representation." We organized, and we got representation, full representation on the plenary session. It was a very good conference.”

The work that countless HistoryMakers are doing to amplify the voices of the diaspora should not go unnoticed. The spread of African people throughout the world is something to be celebrated and studied.

Student Ambassador Update

 Due to a power outage on campus we are rescheduling our Black History Month Digital Archive Contest. I am waiting on one judge to complete the scoring to determine the winner and I am in the process of securing a new date.

“Diaspora.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/diaspora. Accessed 2 Mar. 2023.

Daniel Texidor Parker (The HistoryMakers A2009.146), interviewed by Larry Crowe, December 16, 2009, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 6, story 4, Daniel Texidor Parker talks about the African diaspora

Fannie Rushing (The HistoryMakers A2003.288), interviewed by Larry Crowe, July 20, 2005, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 2, tape 5, story 7, Fannie Rushing describes her early work studying the African Diaspora in Latin America

Paul Carter Harrison (The HistoryMakers A2004.160), interviewed by Larry Crowe, September 14, 2004, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 5, story 3, Paul Carter Harrison talks about how African roots influence the black community in America

Dorothy Fields (The HistoryMakers A2006.024), interviewed by Tracey Lewis, February 17, 2006, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 5, story 4, Dorothy Fields talks about her research on black ancestry in Miami, Florida

Ferne Yangyeitie Caulker (The HistoryMakers A2007.336), interviewed by Larry Crowe, November 30, 2007, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 5, story 3, Ferne Yangyeitie Caulker talks about South African dance traditions

Daryl Cumber Dance (The HistoryMakers A2016.100), interviewed by Larry Crowe, December 7, 2016, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 5, story 7, Daryl Cumber Dance talks about the folklore of the African diaspora

Richard Long (The HistoryMakers A2002.021), interviewed by Julieanna L. Richardson, March 15, 2002, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 5, story 1, Richard Long discusses the African diaspora

Reverend B. Herbert Martin, Sr. (The HistoryMakers A2003.294), interviewed by Larry Crowe, December 11, 2003, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 7, story 6, Reverend B. Herbert Martin, Sr. describes the embrace of African traditions by African American churches

Chester Higgins, Jr. (The HistoryMakers A2005.205), interviewed by Shawn Wilson, September 2, 2005, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 2, tape 9, story 7, Chester Higgins, Jr. talks about the African diaspora

Maulana Karenga (The HistoryMakers A2002.207), interviewed by Larry Crowe, November 18, 2002, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 6, story 4, Maulana Karenga remembers FESTAC 1977