RE: USA Africa Dialogue Series - CORRECTED Chika Ezeanya on Olaudah Equiano: Before We Set Sail

My In-Law Papa Ikhide:

 

Thanks for your posting below that forces us to rethink our histories, and that is why I have allowed you to marry all my Ghanaian sisters.

 

Aside from constructed phenotypic cues that lead to lazy categorizing of Blacks/Africans, we should ask new questions about the ways that "Africa is fast becoming a pejorative used to lump together for nefarious reasons, scores of nations and cultures and languages." And I like these questions to boot:  "Did Africans sell off fellow Africans as slaves? Did these people see themselves as monolithic Africans or as distinct nations warring each other for spoils and profits?"

 

In my response to Louis Gates' sensational blame-game essay on Africans and reparations that appeared in the New York Times, I wrote:

 

"The viewpoint that 'Africans' enslaved 'Africans' is obfuscating if not troubling. The deployment of "African" in African history tends to coalesce into obscurantist constructions of identities that allow scholars, for instance, to subtly call into question the humanity of "all" Africans. Whenever Asante rulers sold non-Asantes into slavery, they did not construct it in terms of Africans selling fellow Africans. They saw the victims for what they were, for instance, as Akuapems, without categorizing them as fellow Africans. Equally, when Christian Scandinavians and Russians sold war captives to the Islamic people of the Abbasid Empire, they didn't think that they were placing fellow Europeans into slavery. This lazy categorizing homogenizes Africans and has become a part of the methodology of African history; not surprisingly, the Western media's cottage industry on Africa has tapped into it to frame Africans in inchoate generalities allowing the media to describe local crisis in one African state as an "African" problem.

 

 

Kwabena 

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From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com [usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com] on behalf of Ikhide [xokigbo@yahoo.com]
Sent: Saturday, November 17, 2012 9:54 AM
To: Toyin Falola
Cc: Ederi; krazitivity@yahoogroups.com
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - CORRECTED Chika Ezeanya on Olaudah Equiano: Before We Set Sail

All in all, Ezeanya spoke to me in this book. I read the book at a time when I was reflecting on the notion of identity, chafing at the realization that even as color confounds, Africa is fast becoming a pejorative used to lump together for nefarious reasons, scores of nations and cultures and languages. Did Africans sell off fellow Africans as slaves? Did these people see themselves as monolithic Africans or as distinct nations warring each other for spoils and profits? Much of the contemporary commentary on Africa is superficial only because good scholars have bought into the myth of a monolithic Africa. Ezeanya brilliantly rejects that narrative and offers a uniquely creative version of world history that doubles as an enduring celebration of the humanity of a people long hunted and haunted by forces beyond their control. All through this lovely book, nothing tells of the abiding dignity and pride of black Africa more than these resounding lines by a defiant Equiano:

 

The strength of my nation in farming is profound; my people never lacked food, and the rarity of ill-health among my people is direct testimony to the wealth of our diet, and our industriousness. We cultivated yam, our chief staple in several varieties; also, maize, beans, fruits of diverse kinds, assorted vegetables, and other crops made their way to our tables every mealtime and to the market every market day. Fish, game and certain edible insects are found in abundance in my part of the world, and provided the nourishment we needed from time to time. (p 29-30)

 

Hear! Hear! I love this book.

 Read the rest of my thoughts on this book here.

 

http://xokigbo.wordpress.com/2012/11/17/chika-ezeanya-on-olaudah-equiano-before-we-set-sail/

 

- Ikhide

 

Stalk my blog at http://www.xokigbo.com/

Follow me on Twitter: @ikhide

Join me on Facebook: www.facebook.com/ikhide

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