100
102
03
Iyrropverion To Armican Anrnican Srupies
M. Wheele 1: Kesler and D. Duos, “Review of Thre Recent Randomized Tri of School-Based Mentoring: Making Sense of
“Mixed Findings” Sokery fr Research in Child Development Social Policy Report, 242010), 1-27,
Tid
Castes Core, “Hillary Caton Outines Obama Aiea Policy” January 24,20 bep/alsiescomstoris/200901240008.m
US. AFRICOM Public Afirs Office, “Fact Sher United States Mica Command reievel July 12,2011 hp fwwaticomal/
gevdeileasparel64
Resist AFRICOM, “Help Stop AFRICON(” retrieved Jul 12,2011. hup//alsa demoeracynacton.og/a/
inphey-300,
Stephanie Hanson, "China, Ae, and Oil*(A Council on Foreign Relations Hackgroundes), june 62008 htp//rwckc ong?
chinalchina-afin 0/9537
Ii
Stephanie Hanson, “Ching, fia and Ol" (A Coon on Foreign Relations Backgrounder)
ia/chine-afsis ol 587
Meleie Everley MLK Je. Memeril Confronts Controversy" USA Today, uly 4,201. htp/nwoestodaycom/news!
sution/2011-07-4-MLK-Jr-sanue-ritie-naoeintersitalskip
*Grand Opening Celebrations The New Aican American Ci War Memorial and Muscum htpd//mmwafoameiitarorg!
splushpby
Tid,
‘Alscan American Cri War Memoria nd Museum in Washington, DC hip aboutcom/od/monumentv4/AACWMem htm,
oanie Bunch, “A Vision for he National Mescum of African American istry and Cultre hepa sedwsecon!
shouts
“rssociaton forthe Study of Afcan American Life and History hep//ewm:aalhong/ Woodson Tome:himl
[atonal Gente for Edwaton Stasis, Digest of Edacation Statics 2000. hee. gonpuslO01/digest/
Manorie Coejman, Black Stdies on the Move,” Carian Science Monitor, Febraary 12,2002 L-1,L-14
Abdol Alla, "Africana Sade inthe U.S.” March 2007-sps/7eBlacltadis org
‘Max Schindler, “National Organizations Opps Acana Stadics and Reseach Center Overhaul” Comell ua, January 24, 2011
hyp ew.comeln com
WEB. Du Bovs (1904), "The Alana Conferences” Voie ofthe Negro 1 (March, 190), 85-90.
Ibid, p85,
bid, p88
STA THgaUp.
Je 62008. hphnwnchcore!Chapter I
Foundation of African American
Studies
Introduction
African Americans
The growing number of people with mixed “racial”
ancestry prompted an expansion of racial/ethnic
designations included in the 2000 Census. Many
commentators who supported changes to the previ-
cous racial categories perceived the revision as sig-
naling a gradual end to the use of traditional racial
categories by government for developing and as-
sessing public policies. However, an analysis of the
2000 Census data suggests that W.E.B. DuBois’
“color line,” which he depicted as “the problem of
the twentieth century” over a hundred years ago
persists nearly as indelible at the dawn of the twen-
ty-first century.
In the 2000 Census 32,690,635 persons chose
‘only “Black or African American” as their racial
classification, whereas 211,558,460 chose only
“White.” The total number of persons claiming
both White and one or more other racial clasifica-
tion was 4,969,172, or only 2.4 percent of all per-
sons claiming “White” as one of their racial classifi-
cations. The number of individuals claiming “Black
‘or African American” and at least one other racial
cation was 1,866,399 or 5.4 percent of per-
iming “Black or Aftican American” as one
cial designations.
‘The data indicate that over thirty million
citizens of the United States of America are de-
scendants of the continent of Africa. Identified
principally by skin color and differentiated socio-
politically and economically, they are, indeed, Afri-
cans in America or, conversely, African Americans.
America’ population, historically and contempo-
rary, comprises immigrants, with the exception of
the few million Native Americans largely relegated
to reservations throughout the country. However,
African Americans are clearly distinguished from
other racial-ethnic groups because of their involun~
tary immigration and initial enslavement. Although
history reveals that there were Africans accompany-
ing the early European explorers of the Americas
a hundred years preceding the landing of the first
captives at Jamestown in 1619, Blacks were the first
numerically significant involuntary immigrants to
the New World.! Whereas the overwhelming ma-
jority of other immigrant groups came to America
voluntarily in pursuit of political freedom and eco-
nomic opportunity, the African presence in Ameri~
«a, in contrast, was based on economic exploitation
and the denial of freedom.
Africans in America were robbed of their hu-
man dignity and commoditized into capital goods
(enslaved) to promote the development and eco-
nomic growth of America and Europe. The nature
of their subjugation and treatment at the hands of
White Enropean-American enslavers constituted
form of racism based on color that had never been
practiced anywhere in the world. African immi-
grants were forcibly denied their language, history,
culture, ancestral ties, and homeland affiliations. Af-
rican American women were raped and otherwise
forced into miscegenation with enslavers. Such vio~
lations often resulted in the sale of mixed-race off-
spring as chattel property. Although such extremelyIwrropverion ro Arnica Auantcas Sruptes
rressive conditions and inhuman acts may no
Tanger prevail the legacy of enslavement and its ef
fects still linger in the psyche and social orientation
of many African Americans.
‘Moreover, Emancipation, Reconstruction, the
Givil Rights Movement and resulting laws and en-
actments have failed to accord African Americans
complete equality of opportunity or a full measure
of social justice. Institutional racism, prejudice, and
discrimination continue to impede the advance-
‘ment of Aftican Americans in education, employ-
‘ment, and political empowerment.
Nevertheless, despite the legacy of enslave-
ment, segregation, and continuing disheartening
discrimination, African Americans, in the face of
such daunting odds, have exhibited resilience and a
robust capacity for perseverance against oppression.
History provides no record of any other people who
were captured, shipped thousands of miles, and sold
like cattle, who endured four hundred years of en
slavement and racial degradation, yet have survived,
achieved, and progressed in the same land, and in
the presence of their former enslavers, This phe-
nomenon should be considered in any comparison
of the African American experience with those of
other immigrant groups.
Racial Identification
Recognition of their humanity and their national
origins were denied Africans in the New World.
Consequently, their identities, designations, an:
names were arbitrarily decided by their captors and
enslavers. Africans in Europe and America were
called by or given negative and colloquial titles or
names, such as nigger, darkie, colored, and negro.
‘The debate concerning a racial/national identity or
name for Americans of African descent has not yet
been fully resolved.
Sterling Stuckey has written a comprehensive
historical account of the dilemma and controversy
of Blackidentity in his book Slave Culture: Navional-
ist Theory & the Foundations of Black America. Anoth-
er commentator, Beverly H. Wright, suggests that
choice of a name for racial identification by Black
Americans has been influenced by the social and
political environment, by the locus of control, and
by changes in ideology during each era of progress
‘social movement.’ During the height of the Civil
Rights Movement of the 1960s, millions of Black
Americans embraced the ideology of Black Power
and self-determination. Thus, any name or identity
imposed on them by White Americans was emphat-
ically rejected.
‘The 1960s could be characterized as an era of
social and political reformation of the American pol-
ity. Both older and younger Black Americans insist-
ed that the gulf between the theoretical precepts sct,
forth by the U.S, Constitution for equality and jus-
tice for all citizens and America’ practice and con-
formity to the law be closed. They demanded and
agitated for reformation. For Americans of African
descent, it was a period of active rebellion against all
forms of White racism and the prevailing ideology
of White supremacy. The Civil Rights Movement
‘of the 1960s signaled a rebirth of African Ameri-
can pride in their race, history, and culture that was
reflective of the Harlem Renaissance. A faction of
African American participants in the drama of the
19608 revived the ideology of self-empowerment,
self-sufficiency, self-determination, self-help, and
self-respect. More importantly, they felt that it was
time the descendants of Africa reasserted their own.
identity. Iewas time for self-naming.
In European and Western historical thought
and folklore, both the color and the word black have
negative and ominous connotations. Black connotes
that which is soiled, dirty, foul, horrible, wicked,
evil, or bad. The European concept of the devil is
black.’ Thus, it has been easy for White Americans
and Europeans to associate negative connotations
of Blackness with the dark-skinned peoples of
Africa, Furthermore, asa religious rationale for the
‘unjust and oppressive treatment of African people,
Whites introduced the biblical myth of Nosh’
son Ham, According to the story, God willed that
Ham’ son and all his descendants be Black, and he
banished them into the depths of Africa (Egypt)
Older generations of African Americans had been
socialized to believe that Blackness was bad and that
the pigmentation of their skin was disadvantageous.
‘Many revered White or light-skinned persons and
‘engaged in futile attempts at skin lightening.
‘However, in defiance of the White Europea
American conceptualization of Blackness, Ameri-
cans of African descent rejected, permanently, the
traditional term Negro and replaced it with Black.