Individual or Issue Related to Africana Studies - Essay Example

 Historic Event / Individual or Issue Related to Africana Studies Similar to the arts of all individuals in the world, African art illustrate thought, attitudes, and values which are a result of African experiences in the past. Therefore, the study of African art gives an avenue for learning about the history of Africa. Through the study of African Art, individuals can find answers to the questions which have been engrossing the continent for long. Nonetheless, it is not only African art that can assist people get information on the past of Africa. Other elements, for example, lifestyle and stage of African development can also assist people gain additional information on the status of Africa in the globe. As individuals search information on Africa and its past, they must also take into consideration how Western view of racial and race differences has had an impact on views of the African history (Said 8). This paper will look at the impact of slavery and the slave trade era on the development of Africa. The ideas of race and racial differences have always assumed, black people are inferior compared to their white counterparts. This notion begun in Western regions as the people from these regions attempted to rationalize their enslavement of Africans and the consequent colonization of the African continent. Historians and other professional studying African issues have now established that views of racial inadequacy have led to the conviction that African people in the past existed in a condition of primitive barbarism (Said 11). In addition, these professionals have also recognized that a large number of European works on the past of Africa, for example, stories by 19thcentury travelers and missionaries are stained by the similar view points of African inadequacy. This recognition has made historian and other experts studying the past of Africa to search for different sources of information that is less or not inspired by European or foreign concern with racial disparity. These different resources comprise oral traditions found in Africa, works by Africans, the physical evidence unearthed by archeologists, African art, and structures and vocabularies of the African language. These different sources, unlike European or foreign sources, will assist individuals comprehend the history of Africa from the African point of view. Historians and other professionals have started to search for alternative ways of thinking about the history of Africa and the history of Europe (Said 15). This is because they have comprehended the erroneous belief of Western and foreign notions about issues that have affected Africa from the past periods. Slave trade and slavery period symbolize an unsustainable and spiteful time in the history of Africans and Africa. Prior enslavements incorporated Native Americans and Europeans, but these slaves found escape routes and mingled easily with the rest of the people. Afterwards, attention was turned to black Africa. Slave trade had already started being successful by the 17th century. The first bunch of captives was ferried to America to work on plantations in the 1500s. These slaves worked in areas, for example, Louisiana, Jamestown, New Orleans, Virginia, among others. Human traffickers and slave traders from European nations moved to the West African region to acquire slaves for sale. Africans were tied together in groups and ferried to be sold to the masters of slaves (Said 16). These unfit travels caused a lot of deaths. Moreover, those African slaves who attempted to escape were harshly punished. The concern about this dehumanizing activity of the slave trade was that healthy, young, and capable males and females were obtained, exchanged or sold for products, for example, salt, glass, gun powder or linen. During this time, heads of communities collaborated with the slave traders and pin pointed and identified slaves from their areas in exchange for gifts and favors from the white man. Slave trade saw the most capable females and males in the working age bracket captured and taken to other areas (Said 21). This means that African nations were dispossessed of robust workforce with less or no compensation provided. Slave trade became a rewarding business activity and a life time source of wealth for a number of dealers in the slave trade. Slave trade and the slavery period contributed to African’s weak economic and developmental state in a number of ways. First, many able bodied and capable Africans were shipped from Africa to the Americas and other European destinations where they toiled and developed the economy for these areas. In contrast, the African continent was left with a weak population which could not engage in economic productive activities. Second, the old, extremely young, and weak Africans were left to survive (Said 24). Since they were unable to pursue economic activities, Africa’s sustainable development was negatively affected. Third, there were a lot of unplanned loss and deaths of a number of Africans during the capturing and transportation process. This means that Africa lost a significant number of people who could assist the continent attain economic prosperity. Fourth, African slaves lost the citizenship of their countries and were also not able acquire citizenship of the countries they were shipped to, this means they could not return to build the economies of their respective countries. Hence, these countries suffered stagnant development and poor economic growth. Fifth, the slave trade provided economic power to the African kingdoms (Said 26). These kingdoms battled with each other so as to acquire slaves for the slave business. The outcome was an increased social and political weakness in the African kingdoms and caused division of African civilizations, tremendous human displacements, and the ruin of sustainable development in Africa. In conclusion, the slave period and the slave trade had a negative effect on Africa’s development. Even when the captives were returned to their respective African countries, they were left on their own and deserted. A large number of the returnee slaves could not join up with their loved ones. In addition, the traumatized, over exploited and humiliated slaves could not engage in economic activities to improve the economic status of their communities (Said 27). Slave trade made Africans resort to the natural setting to cultivate crops through land degrading and rudimentary techniques, hunting pressures, over fishing, and harvesting and collecting wild fruits. Work Cited Said, W. E. Culture and Imperialism. New York: Knopf/Random House, 1993. Print. Read More