RE: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Achebe, Armah , missionaries

"I'm patiently waiting for .........." Cornelius Hamelberg




Sorry Cornelius, You won't be hearing much from me on this missionary palaver. If I speak ill of the missionaries and bring up topics such as

pedophilia, child abuse, 'deAfricanization,' cultural imperialism, paternalism, and so on, I would be

bombarded with testimonies of missionary largesse, humanitarianism, self -sacrifice, anticolonialism and what have you. You would be falling over yourself to

prove how wonderful the missionaries were. Buttons with the inscription "I love missionaries" will be distributed online.

Your face will light up, eyes a-glowing, while you reminisce about the wonders of the CMS and how fortunate the continent was to have these direct and indirect

agents of imperialism. And by editorial fiat, without consultation and without my permission, I would be made a Muslim, which I am not, fortunately or unfortunately,

so that you could rant about the evils of that religion.



I lost two good friends over issues related to religion, and ever since then,

I run to the hills when this kind of topic comes up.



The first friend I lost was actually a cousin who happened to be a nun. I paid her a visit in her

convent around 2007, and expressed my dismay at the iconography of whiteness splattered all over the walls of her convent.

"Are there no Black angels, I asked in dismay? Why do you tolerate this kind of propaganda? Are you still perpetuating white supremacist

thinking, in this day and age? Would this kind of biased imagery not have a negative impact on the psyche of your parishioners?

What would happen if you diversified your flock of saints and angels? Will the congregation run away, I asked."

"Cousin, the missionaries taught us how to read," she blurted out.

"But you don't have to be a Christian to use the Lebanese -Greco-Roman script, anymore than you have to be a Muslim to write

Arabic," I retorted.

" Why do you continue to perpetuate the image of a blonde, blue-eyed Germanic, your Savior? What is the real purpose and

true impact of your message?"



My cousin stopped talking to me after that.



I lost the other friend in La Paz, Bolivia. He was a wonderful guide, caring and helpful. He showed me around the city. We talked about the thousands of

enslaved Africans forced to work in the silver mines of la Paz in earlier days. We went from one restaurant to another sampling

food and cocoa tea so that I could cope with the high altitude of 15,000 feet. We really developed a nice, friendly rapport. But all this

evaporated into thin air when I asked him about the Germanic- looking figure with arms outstretched

on the top of the hill- dominating the city, as it were , in a familiar paternalistic pose.

"Most of your population is Native American but here you have this figure dominating your city.

Isn't this a form of propaganda," I asked? What would happen if you changed the image? Will the city crumble?



He, too stopped talking to me after that.



So I have learnt my lesson on matters related to religion, nuns and missionaries.

Run to the hills.



Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History & African Studies
vimeo.com/user5946750/videos


________________________________
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com [usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Cornelius Hamelberg [corneliushamelberg@gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, January 03, 2014 8:44 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Achebe, Armah , missionaries


Dear Brother Kwame Zulu of the Shabazz family,

So you guys are still discussing the role of

Christian missionaries in the scramble for the pastures of Africa<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=Christian+missionaries+in+the+scramble+for+Africa> ?

Fortunately for me, the secondary school I attended was the only one in the country that did not teach religious knowledge or offer it as an exam subject. That's why I don't know much about these things.

I'm patiently waiting for Gloria in excelsis Emeagwali to butt in, then and only then will I butt in too, with some good stories about the glory of C.M.S<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=The+Church+Missionary+Society#q=The+Church+Missionary+Society+%2F+CMS+in+West+Africa+> in West Africa.

As if we don't know that the first slave ship to transport incarcerated Africans to "The New World" was called "The Jesus of Lubeck"<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=The+Jesus+of+Lubeck> . I wonder what the sons of the devil and the slave and plantation owners were called.

As if we don't know the first Maroon Church outside of Jamaica is located in Freetown, Sierra Leone. And what do they now say about Blyden's Christianity, Islam and the Negro Race<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=Edward+Wilmot+Blyden+%3A+Christianity%2C+Islam+and+the+Negro+Race> ?

Don't mind them.

You see what happened to Martin Bernal. They ganged up against him and almost threw him into the dustbin.

Yet, the Yosef Ben-Jochannan<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=Yosef+Ben-Jochannan> // Ivan Sertima<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=Ivan+Sertima> // John Henrik Clarke<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=John+Henrik+Clarke> school is still exerting a lot of influence and to some extent is helping to instil some of the missing pride - in them - and to de-programme some of the gullible and most susceptible to missionary propaganda about not only the origins of their religion, but the origins of their own ancestors, not to mention their very selves. Cultural genocide is putting it mildly. What goal or destiny does anyone have when he / she doesn't know who he/she is, or where he/ she is from – if he/she thinks that on the authority of some missionary - testifying to "the blood of Jesus", no matter what he does his destination is heaven.

Reminds me of this line by the Last Poets:

"Niggers play football, baseball and basketball
while the white man cuttin' off their balls"

I'll have to re-read Armah to locate where he asks what happens to the soul/ identity of an African child who grows up being called Mike/ Michael. Unfortunately, many of our Brethren and Sistren who are the products of missionary education/ institutions feel that you are attacking them personally or pulling the magic carpet to heaven from under their feet and that it's nothing less than blasphemy or historical heresy when you level any criticism of the missionaries of their sacred religion. For the really superstitious, it could be the curse of Ham<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=The+curse+of+Ham> controlling such perceptions.

In the words of Archbishop Desmond Tutu: "When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said 'Let us pray.' We closed our eyes. When we opened them we had the Bible and they had the land"

And here we are talking about the Dutch Reformed Church whose theology<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/despatches/africa/33032.stm> provided the theological foundations for Apartheid. Goodness knows how the Mormons<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=The+Mormon+Church%3A+Issue+an+official+apology+for+racist+teachings+that+declared+Blacks+cursed> would have fared in colonial Africa since it's only recently that they too "apologized" probably in the name of Jesus of Nazareth

However another cautionary note, having taken in what Professor Mbaku has just written - that even though the Christian missionaries belong to the same general flock by their deeds / works them can be differentiated one from another. So let's face some facts: Hitler was a Roman Catholic. So were the guys who perpetrated the Inquisition - is there enough ink with which to write their iniquities?

Don't get me wrong. I just posted Eric's "Don't Ever Let Nobody Drag Your Spirit Down"<http://chordify.net/chords/transatlantic-sessions-eric-bibb-dont-ever-let-nobody-drag-your-spirit-down-steven-stoddart> on the Biafra Genocide facebook site – in response to this message<https://fbcdn-sphotos-b-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-frc3/379670_365391433595020_1844094436_n.jpg> to encourage some Brethren and Sistren

Nor should we forget that the Black Churches provided the organisational structure that contributed so tremendously to the Civil Rights Movement in America and the anti-Apartheid campaign worldwide, over here in Sweden the Lutheran Church was quite active and once again on 24th December at our dinner table I heard once more about how my Better Half shook hands with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther king, when he was over here...

In the meanwhile we're all supposed to turn from evil and to do good.

Sincerely,

We Sweden<http://www.thelocal.se/blogs/corneliushamelberg/>








On Saturday, 4 January 2014 00:11:06 UTC+1, kwame zulu shabazz wrote:
Prof. Nketia is extraordinary. I think he must in his mid 90s by now. I interviewed him several years back and I hope to work it into something publishable at some point. Armah is my favorite writer and he is super popular amongst Black cultural nationalist/Afrocentrist of which I am a (critical) member. As you note, he has switched gears a bit since his earlier writing. He now focuses a lot on Kemet and other Afrocentric themes. Yes, Armah offers a strong critique of Christian missionaries (and Muslims) which, in his view, were the catalyst for cultural genocide.

kzs

On Friday, January 3, 2014 9:44:19 AM UTC-5, Cornelius Hamelberg wrote:
Amended.
As I follow the missionary thread started by Oga Kwabena Akurang-Parry - the name Kwabena echoes that of another great man, the only one who lectured with a smile on his face: Professor Kwabena Nketia <https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=Professor+Kwabena+Nketia> and thoughts about him re-turn me to the Black Star nation. I wonder, did Francis Bebey<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=Francis+Bebey> smile in the same way?

The impact of the African–American presence in Ghana cannot be underestimated – from W.E. B Dubois through Satchmo, Malcolm X<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=Malcolm+X+in+Ghana+> and James Brown, to Stevie Wonder. It's a long story, about six personal chapters. In the late sixties, early seventies of the last century, hundreds of African-Americans made it to Ghana each year, in quest of their roots. It was also Black Power times. In 1968 I also travelled by road in a Renault car with some friends from Freetown, through Liberia and Ivory Coast to Accra, the Golden City, and saw the so called National Liberation circle in downtown Accra, for myself - returned by air...

In 1970 at a point where Ayi Kwei Armah's "The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born" was still being celebrated I remember having a long conversation with one of my African-American neighbours in Ghana, Cyprian Lamar Rowe<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=Cyprian+Lamar+Rowe> about the relative merits of Chinua Achebe and the new kid on the block, Ayi Kwei Armah. Cyprian, as unctuous as ever "the body is an aesthetic instrument "etc to reflect his very colourful clothing – the colours of the Ghanaian flag, the dashiki, it was the era of the Afro too – Cyprian elevated Chinua Achebe(now in the eternal beyond) far above Aye Kwei Armah who at that point had only written the Beautyful Ones and "Fragments" - in short, his main point was that Achebe opened his eyes to traditional Africa - and of course that too is to be celebrated but thought that Armah - a returnee (biographical heresy there) was viewing his society almost like a stranger, a "Westerner". Some of Armah's later work has put paid to that. One thing that Achebe and Armah have in common is their critique of missionary activity - and here Armah is even more awesome than Achebe, particularly in his venom against missionary Islam in his novel "The Healers"

Ayi Kwei Armah --- On His Work<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDx20O37KqI>

O. S. Ogede: The question of identity in Ayi Kwei Armah's "Why Are We So Blest?"<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=O.+S.+Ogede%3A+Thequestion+of+identity+in+Ayi+Kwei+Armah%E2%80%99s+%E2%80%9CWhy+Are+We+So+Blest%3F%E2%80%9D>

Ayi Kwei Armah : The Healers<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=Ayi+Kwei+Armah+%3A+The+Healers>

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