QUAKERS FIRST WHITES TO TAKE A STAND AGAINST SLAVERY

From Swarthmore and Haverford College library: Quakers & Slavery

http://trilogy.brynmawr.edu/speccoll/quakersandslavery/

"The Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) was the first corporate body in Britain and North America to fully condemn slavery as both ethically and religiously wrong in all circumstances. It is in Quaker records that we have some of the earliest manifestations of anti-slavery sentiment, dating from the 1600s. After the 1750s, Quakers actively engaged in attempting to sway public opinion in Britain and America against the slave trade and slavery in general. At the same time, Quakers became actively involved in the economic, educational and political well being of the formerly enslaved.

The earliest anti-slavery organizations in America and Britain consisted primarily of members of the Society of Friends. Thus much of the record of the development of anti-slavery thought and actions is embedded in Quaker-produced records and documents. Friends Historical Library at Swarthmore College and the Quaker Collection at Haverford College are jointly the custodians of Quaker meeting records of the Mid-Atlantic region, including Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, New York and Vermont and these records illuminate the origins of the anti-slavery movement as well as the continued Quaker involvement, often behind the scenes, in the leadership and direction of the abolitionist movement from the 1770s to the abolition of slavery in the United States in 1865, and beyond."

Black Heritage Now--President Obama

From the New Your Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/29/us/health-care-ruling-may-secure-obamas-place-in-history.html?_r=1&hp

"For Barack Obama, who staked his presidency on a once-in-a-generation reshaping of the social welfare system, theSupreme Court’s health care ruling is not just political vindication. It is a personal reprieve, leaving intact his hopes of joining the ranks of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Lyndon B. Johnson and Ronald Reagan as presidents who fundamentally altered the course of the country."

INVENTION OF WRITING AND ITS IMPORTANCE TODAY

THOTH - EGYPTIAN GOD OF WISDOM AND WRITING 

We rarely think about the fact that writing is a powerful tool; therefore, we take writing for granted. Reams of Black heritage have been lost because records have been destroyed, or accomplishments weren't ascribed to the right people, or the history was not written down. Although we are constantly writing texts or things for work, we seldom write down what is truly important. We rarely write about what we create. We don't write down our thoughts about life, philosophy, or our hopes and dreams.  We don't write our autobiographies. In short, we leave nothing for posterity. Please do not take the gift of writing for granted.

Videos about Origin of Writing in Africa:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUGc2W06rgo Origin of writing in Africa part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bpsIFT4uJo Origin of writing in Africa part 2


More traditional explanation of the origin of writing.

There is not a unique origin of writing; it was independently born in different parts of the world. It seems the first people who wrote were the Sumerians and the Egyptians around 3500-3200 BC. It is not clear which of those two peoples invented writing first, although it seems the Egyptian writing had some Sumerian influence and not vice versa. They were peoples who had known agriculture for some millennia and who felt the need for a system of notation for agricultural products. Usually, sovereigns imposed taxes on their own subjects as agricultural products. They used these resources in order to pay for the construction of palaces and temples, to maintain the army, the court officials, the court, etc. Also in the trade exchanges people felt the need to be allowed to annotate goods. The same is valid for the offers which were brought to the temples. The invention of writing closely followed many other innovations typical of the Neolithic age, such as the construction of cities, the use of bronze, the invention of the wheel, the potter's wheel and the loom for weaving. In this period, agriculture and breeding spread and it was always more important to be able to indicate goods and persons in account documents and in commercial transactions. FROM http://www.funsci.com/fun3_en/writing/writing.htm

FIRST SLAVE REVOLT IN COLONIES

There are many kinds of revolt. One lesson we can take from American slave revolts is that no matter how dire the situation and no matter how high the cost, freedom is worth fighting for. On September 13, 1663, the first recorded major conspiracy of persons in servitude in colonial America occurred in Gloucester County, Virginia. White and Black slaves tried to escape from their masters. However, the plot was betrayed.

The other lesson: WHEN YOU ARE TRYING TO SECURE FREEDOM, TRUST WITH SUSPICION!


A Wikipedia history of slave revolts:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_rebellion

A PBS timeline of slave revolts and a movie about Nat Turner:
http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/natturner/slave_rebellions.html

From a pdf. essay on slave revolts by Dr. Sujan Dass at www.TwoHorizonsPress:
http://supremedesignonline.com/2012/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/blackrebellionexcerpts.pdf

"A cursory glance of our traditional history curriculum suggests that slave revolts, like the one led by Nat Turner, were few and far in between. Further, the uprisings themselves are typically thought of as disorganized clashes between angry slaves and local whites in the South. Instead, the historical record reveals that uprisings, and revolt plots were common and widespread, that it was often free Blacks and those enslaved under the least repressive conditions that led insurrections, that these insurrections were often highly organized and required months of planning and thousands of committed participants, and that enslaved Africans and their descendants rebelled against captivity from its very onset." 

KARMAH AND KUSH

"Before the late 1970's scholars saw Karmah and Kush as little more than Egyptian colonial outposts. Racists beliefs that Black Africans were incapable of establishing advanced cultures and civilizations contributed to the misconception. Modern archaeologists have restored Karmah and Kush to their proper places among great cultures in world history. Although they borrowed from Egyptian culture, they were indigenous Black African societies  comparable to Egypt in importance, power, material wealth, and cultural development. The civilizations of Karmah and Kush occupied the Nile Valley between present-day Khartoum (in Sudan) and Aswan (in Egypt)."

from Africana: The Concise Desk Reference 

ANOTHER BLACK PRESIDENT TAKING OVER IN TROUBLE TIMES

Congratulations for Fred Luter's election to the Southern Baptist Convention. Much like President Obama, he is taking over when the Convention is in serious transition. Their membership is down, baptisms are down, and more minorities are joining their church, much like Obama coming in at a time of fiscal disaster and facing two wars. I wish he could have come into power in less challenging times. But perhaps I'm just being cynical. I shouldn't give power to past stereotypes or old motives. I hope Pastor Luter will do a great job and be strong voice for his entire organization.

From: The Christian Post
http://www.christianpost.com/news/a-new-era-in-the-sbc-fred-luter-paves-way-for-diversity-76995/

All eyes are on Fred Luter as he officially begins his term as the first black president of the Southern Baptist Convention.
His election comes at a time when the SBC is already seeing growth among ethnic minorities. The percentage of Anglo churches has decreased from 95 percent in 1990 to 80 percent in 2010. Despite the decline in overall baptisms and membership, Hispanics, Asians and African Americans are the fastest-growing ethnic groups in the SBC, according to A.B. Vines, the newly elected president of SBC's National African American Fellowship, to The Christian Post. "

From:
http://www.cleveland.com/nation/index.ssf/2012/06/southern_baptist_convention_el.html

Luter's election occurs at a time when the nation's largest Protestant body has been experiencing a decline in membership and baptisms and is aiming for greater participation among minorities. In 1995, the body apologized for its racist history. And it has recorded growth in nonwhite churches of 5 percent to 19 percent between 1990 and 2010, according to the Baptist Press, the denomination's news source.

FIRST ORGANIZED BLACK PROTEST

In 1644, eleven Blacks petitioned for freedom in New Netherland (later called New York). The Blacks were freed by the Council of New Netherland because they had completed their seventeen to eighteen years of servitude. Each received a parcel of land in what is presently Greenwich Village. 

Adapted from:

A-Group Nubia 3100 BCE to 2780 BCE

Around 3100 BCE there flourished in Nubia a culture that archaeologists call A-group, because theirs was the first culture found in upper Nubia.  A-Group remains are quite distinct from those of contemporary Egypt, so there is good reason to suspect that the people differed from the Egyptians politically, linguistically and culturally, and perhaps ethnically. Their unmistakable objects have been found well distributed throughout Lower Nubia, from the Second Cataract north to Aswan, and a few of their objects have been found at Hierakonpolis, site of the earliest Egyptian capital in Upper Egypt. Although a few small and rather poor looking settlement sites were identified before the region was flooded forever by the Aswan High Dam, the A-Group people are known primarily from their much more prosperous looking cemeteries.

Adapted from: http://www.nubianet.org/about/about_history3.html

The most important archaeological source material related to the Nubian A-Group came from about seventy-five village cemeteries. Many graves had rich and varied funeral offerings that consisted of a whole array of indigenous and imported pottery types, including Nubian bowls and dishes with rippled surfaces, delicate thin-walled vessels with red-painted geometric patterns, and Egyptian bowls and wine jars. Among the other finds there were ivory bracelets, stone beads and amulets, mollusk shells from the Red Sea, copper tools, quartzite palettes, mortars and grinders, and female pottery figurines.

The leaders of the A-Group communities probably played an important intermediary role among the fast-developing Egyptian economy, the communities in Upper Nubia and those in surrounding regions, furnishing raw materials of various kinds, including ivory, hardwoods, precious stones, and gold, perhaps also cattle. 

Adapted from: http://www.numibia.net/nubia/a-group.htm

FIRST AFRICAN AMERICAN DOCTORS

During the early Colonial Period in English North America, there were virtually no apprentice or institutionally trained physicians. The single recorded exception seems to be Lucas Santomee, a Dutch-trained physician who practiced in New Amsterdam during the 1660s. Santomee was successful and a property owner. In 1644, he was issued a Dutch land grant in New Netherland that included property in what eventually became Brooklyn and Greenwich Village. Santomee was the son of Peter Santomee, one of the first eleven Africans brought to the area. Lucas, a free black, became a well-known physician in the area.

There were many African medical practitioners. This can be viewed as a continuation of ancient African medical traditions and was the healing method with which slaves were most comfortable. These healers could be described as slave midwives, root doctors, spirit healers, conjurers, or “kitchen physicks.” They were hands-on medical work force that staffed the slave health subsystem and provided the medical care and attention most Black received during the Colonial Period until the Civil war.

Adapted from Black Saga: The African American Experience by Charles M. Christian and An American Heath Dilemma: A Medical History of African Americans and The Problem of Race by W. Michael Byrd and Linda A. Clayton. 

FREE YOUR MIND WITH BLACK HISTORY

This is a video where Dr. Hilliard speaks about how Black folks can free their mind through the study of history. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TkE90WDL8s&feature=related

Dr. Asa G. Hilliard III was the Fuller E. Callaway Professor of Urban Education at Georgia State University, with joint appointments in the Department of Educational Policy Studies and the Department of Educational Psychology and Special Education. A teacher, psychologist, and historian, he began his career in the Denver Public Schools. He earned a B.A. in Educational Psychology, M.A. in Counseling, and Ed.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Denver, where he also taught in the College of Education and in the Philosophy colloquium of the Centennial Scholars Honors Program.

TRADITIONAL AFRICAN BELIEFS

from:

THE MEANING OF PEACE IN AFRICAN TRADITIONAL RELIGION AND CULTURE

Godfrey Igwebuike Onah

Pontifical Urban University, Rome 

@ http://www.afrikaworld.net/afrel/

"Considering Africa as a whole, the main objects of religious belief are: God, the divinities, spirits, and ancestors. Belief in God, conceived as one Supreme Personal Being seems to be shared by the majority of African cultures. Nevertheless, there are a few cultures where the situation is not very clear....
            Next to God are what one may call divinities, for lack of a better expression. These are spiritual beings who owe their origin to and are dependent on God. Some of them are personified attributes of the Supreme Being, like the thunder divinity, which usually represents God’s wrath...
            There is yet another class of spiritual beings who are not always good. There is yet another class of spiritual beings who are not always good. Some of them are good, some are, to say the least, mischievous, while others are outright evil. And they are innumerable! Some of these are human, like the wandering spirits of some dead persons who due to some lack did not make it to the home of the ancestors and also the spirits of witches and wizards who, though still alive, are believed to be able to leave their bodies and inhabit lower animals in order to harm other persons....            
            Perhaps the most dearly loved spiritual beings in ATR are the ancestors, those “living-dead” (to borrow the expression of John Mbiti), who are effectively members of the family and clan, now living in a state that permits them to enjoy some special relationship with God, the divinities and the good spirits...."

FIRST BLACK LEGISLATOR

http://www.blackpast.org/?q=aah/de-souza-matthias-circa-1642

Matthias de Souza, an indentured servant, was the only black person to serve in the colonial Maryland legislature.  As such he is the first African American to sit in any legislative body in what would become the United States. From www,BlackPast.org

WHITE SLAVERY

The history of white slavery in the United States is swept under the carpet in this country in order to attempt to create a servile attitude in Black people here and abroad. These two authors, coming from different perspectives, outline the history of white slavery. Below I link to interviews with both authors. I don't agree with everything that they say, but it seems clear that white slavery in Europe was a precursor to enslavement of Africans by Americans. It also seems patently clear that slavery is much more about power than race.


Nell Irwin Painter, Edwards Professor of American History, Emerita, at Princeton University is the author of an extremely interesting book entitled, The History of White People. In a footnote to her book, page 42, she says,

"Present-day white nationalists resenting the burden of black slavery in terms of white guilt and black demands for redress seek to remind Americans of the history of white slavery, They were White and They were Slaves, by Micheal A. Hoffman II, for instance, begins with a protest, 'Today, not a tear is shed for the sufferings of millions of our own (white) enslaved forefathers, 200 years of White slavery in America have been almost completely obliterated from the collective memory of American People." Drawing on historical scholarship, Hoffman nonetheless blames "professorcrats' and 'the corporate media' for hiding information about enslaved whites from the public." 

This is a link to her interview on NPR: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124700316

A really interesting interview with Micheal A. Hoffman II gives a very thorough discussion of this issue:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRZAyQznQM8

"The indentured servants who served a tidy little period of 4 to 7 years polishing the master's silver and china and then taking their place in colonial high society, were a minuscule fraction of the great unsung hundreds of thousands of White slaves who were worked to death in this country from the early l7th century onward. 

Up to one-half of all the arrivals in the American colonies were Whites slaves and they were America's first slaves. These Whites were slaves for life, long before Blacks ever were. This slavery was even hereditary. White children born to White slaves were enslaved too.

Whites were auctioned on the block with children sold and separated from their parents and wives sold and separated from their husbands. Free Black property owners strutted the streets of northern and southern American cities while White slaves were worked to death in the sugar mills of Barbados and Jamaica and the plantations of Virginia. - Description of Hoffman interview 

Black Pharaohs from Nubia

This article, http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/02/black-pharaohs/robert-draper-text., talks about Black pharaohs of Egypt. Now the concept of race, the way we mean it, was not important in ancient times. In fact, the concept "race" is basically an invention by Europeans who exploited others. Many Afrocentric scholars believe that many more pharaohs were Black than the ones mentioned in this article.

"Piye was the first of the so-called black pharaohs—a series of Nubian kings who ruled over all of Egypt for three-quarters of a century as that country’s 25th dynasty. Through inscriptions carved on stelae by both the Nubians and their enemies, it is possible to map out these rulers’ vast footprint on the continent. The black pharaohs reunified a tattered Egypt and filled its landscape with glorious monuments, creating an empire that stretched from the southern border at present-day Khartoum all the way north to the Mediterranean Sea. They stood up to the bloodthirsty Assyrians, perhaps saving Jerusalem in the process.
Until recently, theirs was a chapter of history that largely went untold. Only in the past four decades have archaeologists resurrected their story—and come to recognize that the black pharaohs didn’t appear out of nowhere. They sprang from a robust African civilization that had flourished on the southern banks of the Nile for 2,500 years, going back at least as far as the first Egyptian dynasty."

African Prehistory Summarized

From General History of Africa: Volume I, Methodology and African Prehistory

In a nutshell, material civilization originated in the tropical latitudes of Africa and Asia in prehistoric times, and then shifted to more northerly latitudes in Europe where, as a result of its enhanced technology and the amassing of capital, its performance has been outstanding.... However, the more the productive forces gain strength, the sharper the conflicts generated by will to power. The struggles for national liberation and social emancipation being waged all over the continent epitomize its rejection of being shackled in the fetters imposed so long ago. It is this struggle for liberation, this unquenchable desire for higher things, free from the constraints of alienation, that have characterized human beings ever since the time when, no longer animals, they stood up and took their first steps. In Africa, the creation of Man by Man, which began thousands of millennia ago. In a sense, Africa prehistory has still not come to an end. 

Stereotype Threat

Stereotype threat is the experience of anxiety or concern in a situation where a person has the potential to confirm a negative stereotype about their social group. Check out the lecture by Claude Steele below.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOjiAivuPfI&feature=em-uploademail

Ethiopia:The First Civilization

From the blog, "An Ethiopian Journal." I am using this direct quote because of all of the books the author notes.

The Ethiopians were considered as occupying all the south coasts of both Asia and Africa,” and adds that “this is an ancient opinion of the of the Greeks.” Then we have the view of Stephanus of Byzantium, that: “Ethiopia was the first established country on earth; and the Ethiopians were the first who introduced the worship of the gods, and who established laws.” The vestiges of this early civilization have been found in Nubia, the Egyptian Sudan, West Africa, Egypt, Mashonaland, India, Persia, Mesopotamia, Arabia, South America, Central America, Mexico, and the United States. Any student who doubts this will find ample evidence in such works as The Voice of Africa, by Dr. Leo Froebenius; Prehistoric Nations, and Ancient America, by John D. Baldwin; Rivers of Life, by Major-General J. G. R. Forlong; A Book of the Beginnings by Gerald Massey; Children of the Sun and The Growth of Civilization, by W. J. Perry; The Negro by Professor W.E.B. DuBois; The Anacalypsis, by Sir Godfrey Higgins; Isis Unveiled by Madam H. P. Blavatsky; The Diffusion of Culture, by Sir Grafton Elliot Smith; The Mediterranean Race, by Professor Sergi; The Ruins of Empires, by Count Volney; The Races of Europe, by Professor William Z. Ripley; and last but not least, the brilliant monographs of Mr. Maynard Shipley: New Light on Prehistoric Cultures and Americans of a Million Years Age.

First African Settlers Reach North America

"On August 20, 1619, a Dutch ship arrived in Jamestown, Virginia, carrying Captain Jope and a cargo of twenty Africans.... Although they were not the first Africans to arrive in North America, they were the first African settlers." 

from Black Saga: The African American Experience by Charles M. Christian

These are the first African Americans.

http://www.blacksaga.org/

Buddy Guy - Hoochie Coochie Man

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yowJiQZBXrA&feature=related