COPY AND PASTE- ES RECAP 2
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Some progress being made- mainstream scholars recognize Egypt as an African civilization
and even say that calling the Egyptians black is reasonable... Still much work to be
done however..
1) MANY EUROCENTRICS THEMSELVES STARTED DISTORTION AND RACIST SCHOLARSHIP ON EGYPT, AND
CONTINUE BOGUS STRAWMAN TACTICS.
Eurocentrics with various tactics and slant paints a picture of mostly
virtuous whites versus unreasonable "Afrocentrics' but WHO pioneered just such a methodology
of making "historical claims on th basis of identity or color?" SPace aliens?
Certainly, not virtuous white people who are paragons of "reason" and "science.."
And the "Afrocentrists" way back in the day cited plenty of scientific evidence
based on the knowledge of that era. Diop for example offered over 6 lines of evidence
on the African character of ancient Egyptians including blood group gene data and skeletal data.
Van Sertima in his book: "Egypt Child of Africa" offers even more detail.
2) A small vocal minority of students and activists pursue Afrocentric themes to various
degrees but such themes are highly diverse, and most African Americans are not a monolithc
bloc looking for "History in Black" as Eurocentrics claims. Most AAs for example,
acknowledge Egypt but don't see it as the be all and end-all of African civ. They
are to the contrary very interested in other West African culture-like the Ashanti or
Mali and Mansa Musa etc. or the hard-fighting Zulu. Egypt is part of the mix but
I don't see a vast wave of Egyptcentrism among AAs, though there is a fair amount
of lip service.
3) Most alleged AA self-esteem is not focused on Greece, Egypt or Mexico. Rather itseems to be focused on popular culture
formats- rappers, sports figures etc. Popular baby names can also be looked at- many are
compound types- like Tashonda, etc not Egyptian names like Seth, Osiris, or Tut, and
there are plenty of West African and non Egyptian names popular among AAs like Shaka.
The popular Kwanza holiday likewise is 'based on non-Egyptian motifs and themes, and as
noted-popular names among AAs follow West African or Muslim themes for the most part not EGYPTIAN.
4) White people are just as obsessed about Egypt as any black person-more so on several
measures. Hence we have the phenomenon of "Egyptomania" and even Egyptian symbols appearing on US currency.
In fact white people were so obsessed that they ate the dead flesh of Egyptian mummies
at one time. And Europeans have been the biggest, most greedy appropriators of Egyptian
heritage- from art/cultural rip-offs, to "Aryan Egypt" claims, to the looting, theft and
hoarding of Egyptian artifacts and treasures. In short, white people who lecture blacks
bout being "too obsessed" with ancient Egypt are the biggest hypocrites around.
5) US Blacks have as much claim to Egypt as part of their overall African heritage as anybody else for
they are in fact descendants of indigenous tropical Africans like ancient Egyptians. If anything they
have data to make that link onseveral counts - from DNA skeletal/limb proportions, cultural data and
artifacts, African languages, religion, and so on. The ancients are fellow Africans sharing numerous things
and united with elements of a common heritage. This is OVER AND ABOVE merely counter-reacting
to the historical enmity and distortions of racists. Some see the case as merely a
"reverse Eurocentrism" but when the full picture is considered, this not the whole case at
all. The African character of ancient Kemet is INDEPENDENT of any reaction to European
racism. It stands by itself, without needing it to be a counter-reaction to say JP Rushton
or assorted racists.
(b) Some people try to make out Egypt as some sort of
"central headquarters" for civilization in Africa. This is problematic. It is
not Egypt that is the central headquarters-
it is Africa itself
that is the starting point - the groundings. Van Sertima's
book title "Egypt: CHild of Africa" captures it perfectly. Egypt is
ONE child of Africa - an extremely important child but
ultimately, ONE among many.
6) (African Americans don't need to duplicate the common Eurocentric
"Greece/Rome is all" model as far as Africa. They hardly need
some sort of "central civilization headquarters." The Greece/Rome
model based on the broad MEditerranean transmission belt in any event
is not physically or environmentally possible in Africa. Hence, for informed modern
AAs, the central starting point, the genesis- is ALWAYS Africa. The Sahara and
the Nile are the twins that lay part of the main foundation.
Many speak about the Nile, but they often shortchange or forget the Sahara.
The Sahara is a PAN-AFRICAN phenomenon cutting across the
continent from ancient times- and once a lush greenbelt.
Egypt is one child of the Sahara, as are other African cutures
and kingdoms. The Sahara helped shaped Egypt just as it
helped shape Mansa Musa's Mali. Along with the Pan-African Sahara
is the borad zone of the Nile Valley Basin
The Nile Valley Basin (Diop 1974) complex is more than Egypt- it includes the
Pan African Sahara, the Sudan, Ethiopia and Nubia, parts of
parts of CHad based on linguistic links with Egypt. In fact, the Nile Valey
Basin extends into Burundi in East Africa, and covers 10% of the land
area of Africa. It is not merely Egypt, but extends deep into East
Africa. Combined with the Sahara there is a firm geographic basis
to talk about the Nile Valley as an African entity. African Americans
need no "self-esteem" projects in the face of such facts.
Egypt is not needed as central headquarters- Africa is its own central headquarters
an the Pan-African Sahara is one of the central transmission belts.
We don;t start with "the glory that was Greece, the grandeur
that was ROme"- the glory and grandeur begins at the
groundings, WITHIN Africa, BEFORE we get to any pyramids,
or massive Mansa Musa gold caravans that stagger world markets.
7) And "Afrocentrism" is not a monolithic block with a central
doctrine. There are many perspectives falling under than
umbrella. In fact, Van Sertima is quite critical of Martin Bernal
and his "Black Athena" thing and how Bernal cashes in on the "Afrocentric angle"
but then turns around and disparages DIop and others who labored long
and hard in the field before he showed up. The Afrocentric monolith bogeyman
doesn't exist. Its again, a strawman construct - easily set up so would
be "critics" look like they are doing something useful.
8) BLACK AMERICANS ARE NOT LINING UP ON ANY "BLACK ATHENA" BANDWAGON AND NEITHER
ARE SEVERAL PROMINENT "AFROCENTRIC" SCHOLARS
In fact, so-called "Afrocentric" writers like Van Sertima, while crediting Black Athena for opening a neglected dimension in the field to debate, specifically criticize Bernal for his focus on Greece and his seeming manipulation of the "race angle" to get more exposure for his book.
(a) Van Sertima decries Bernal's disingenuous dismissal of Diop's detailed work on the African character of the ancient Egyptians- as van Sertima notes in Egypt Child of Africa. Bernal cashed in on the "Afrocentric" ferment in some circles in the late 1980s-early 1990s- even conveniently naming the tome (some claim it was all his publisher's idea)"Black Athena" to get more publicity. But after cashing in well, he treated many "Afrocentric" scholars dismissively - people who had labored long in the field without much press or recognition, and who earlier made some of the same points BErnal made, charges Van Sertima. While only too happy to benefit from the extra attention brought by the "Afrocentric angle"- BErnal, some Afrocentrics hold was also only too happy to "distance" himself from the core matter in the field- i.e. the African roots of AE. Lefkowitz and Bernal both played cynical football with the "racial" angle.
(b) Critics like Van Sertima hold that Bernal gave the African roots of Ancient Egypt relatively short shrift- failing to document & present in detail the mass of solid evidence available to him even in the 1980s and early 1990s. For a book with the title "Black Athena" - and one cashing in specifically on the "racial" angle, this strikes some as a major failing. Indeed, since his critics used the "racial" angle as a propaganda handle to bash not only the African roots of Egypt but also Bernal's work linking Greece in broader Afro-Asiatic context, this was a major omission. See van Sertima's Egypt: Child of Africa for this critique, among others.
[QUOTE:]
"The evidence also points to linkages to
other northeast African peoples, not
coincidentally approximating the modern
range of languages closely related to
Egyptian in the Afro-Asiatic group
(formerly called Hamito-Semetic). These
linguistic similarities place ancient
Egyptian in a close relationship with
languages spoken today as far west as
Chad, and as far south as Somalia.
Archaeological evidence also strongly
supports an African origin. A widespread
northeastern African cultural assemblage,
including distinctive multiple barbed
harpoons and pottery decorated with
dotted wavy line patterns, appears during
the early Neolithic (also known as the
Aqualithic, a reference to the mild
climate of the Sahara at this time).
Saharan and Sudanese rock art from this
time resembles early Egyptian
iconography. Strong connections
between Nubian (Sudanese) and
Egyptian material culture continue in
later Neolithic Badarian culture of Upper
Egypt. Similarities include black-topped
wares, vessels with characteristic
ripple-burnished surfaces, a special
tulip-shaped vessel with incised and
white-filled decoration, palettes, and
harpoons...
Other ancient Egyptian practices show
strong similarities to modern African
cultures including divine kingship, the
use of headrests, body art, circumcision,
and male coming-of-age rituals, all
suggesting an African substratum or
foundation for Egyptian civilization
(rather than diffusion from sub-Saharan
Africa, as claimed by some Afrocentric
scholars.)"Source: Donald Redford (2001) The
Oxford encyclopedia of ancient Egypt,
Volume 3. Oxford University Press. p.
28
Some have argued that that
African-Americans Should not “interfere”
with Nile Valley history, and have “no
connection” to said history, and
self-styled “concerned” Egyptians, both
bogus and real sometimes put in an
apparent appearance to lecture said
‘African Americans.” or “Black
Americans.” But if the conservative
mainstream references see below themselves show that
numerous ancient Egyptian cultural links
and similarities to other parts of “Black
Africa”, including MODERN African
cultures, how come African Americans
are supposed to sit quietly and say
nothing?
“African Americans" are not obsessively
tracing their history back to Egypt as
alleged by assorted blowhards and pundits.
They don't need to any such tracing, nor do
they need "permission" from self-styled
Arab nativists, alleged "Egyptian"
natives/nativists, or white people to study
and comment on Egypt.
The Sahara was once a lush greenbelt
extending across one-third of Africa,
allowing the easy movement of peoples.
Its climatic cycles - the famous Saharan
"pump" - was to create conditions for the
movement of peoples into the Nile
Valley, the Sahelian zone and elsewhere.
But it remains the foundation.
Informed African-Americans thus do not
conceive of Egypt as being created out of
thin air. Nor do they rely on the truism
that "Egypt is in Africa."
They begin at the Saharan zone, which
provided the main source for the
peopling of the Nile Valley, and laid the
foundation, and was the genesis of the
Nile Valley Civilization.
As far as peopling:
The Sahara is the key, the starting point,
the genesis, the fundamental force. Egypt
follows AFTER and derives from that broad Saharan
foundation, not before. There is no need to seek
"inspiration" from latecomers like Rameses or Cleopatra.
The "inspiration" springs from the starting point,
the African cultures that gave rise to the Egyptian
dynastic civilization. It is from that genesis, that
launching point, that other developments are appreciated,
in all their continuity.
[Quote by another conservative
mainstream scholar:]"There is now a sufficient body of
evidence from modern studies of skeletal
remains to indicate that the ancient
Egyptians, especially southern Egyptians,
exhibited physical characteristics that are
within the range of variation for ancient
and modern indigenous peoples of the
Sahara and tropical Africa.." (Nancy C.
Lovell, " Egyptians, physical
anthropology of," in Encyclopedia of the
Archaeology of Ancient Egypt, ed.
Kathryn A. Bard and Steven Blake
Shubert, ( London and New York:
Routledge, 1999) pp 328-332)
The Sahara was also a key player in the
great West African civilizations that were
to arise as well- Mali, Ghana, Timbuktu
etc., ranging from the Saharan trade, to
the transmission of knowledge, to the
transmission of new methods and
technologies.
The Sahara is the great linking pin and
transmission belt culturally. It is also the
great climate and environmental motor
that shaped one-third of Africa. As one
study notes:
From:
Climate-Controlled Holocene
Occupation in the Sahara: Motor of
Africa's Evolution
by Rudolph Kuper and Stefan Kröpelin*
”Radiocarbon data from 150
archaeological excavations in the now
hyper-arid Eastern Sahara of Egypt,
Sudan, Libya, and Chad reveal close
links between climatic variations and
prehistoric occupation during the past
12,000 years. Synoptic multiple-indicator
views for major time slices demonstrate
the transition from initial settlement after
the sudden onset of humid conditions at
8500 B.C.E. to the exodus resulting from
gradual desiccation since 5300 B.C.E.
Southward shifting of the desert margin
helped trigger the emergence of
pharaonic civilization along the Nile,
influenced the spread of pastoralism
throughout the continent, and affects
sub-Saharan Africa to the present
day.”Many of today's informed African Americans in the 2000s,
place Egypt in its proper context as a tropical
civilization. They don’t begin any
exploration of African civilizations with
Egypt, they start with AFRICA ITSELF,
from which the genesis, the foundational
elements sprung, that provided the
basis or substratum for that civilization.
The Sahara is one such central
foundational element. It is in that broad
Saharan zone for example that the ancients
created theih huge megaliths of stone, and
designed calendars and other astonomical alignments.
It is from that broad zone that the cattle cults of
NE Africa developed- cults that were to figure so
prominently in Egyptian religion. It is from the
African genesis that other concepts such as divine
kingship, and the art iconography of Egypt developed.
It is from the Saharan zone (which extends well into
the Sudan) that patterns of technology in pottery,
toolmaking, mummification, and numerous other influences
emerged that were to distinguish ancient Egypt.
ANy "inspiration" taken by African-American begins
with a foundation based on the ground, in Africa.
There are other
“African Americans” who look even
further back than the Saharan mix
mentioned above. They look back to the
dawn of modern humanity, which
emerged from “sub-Saharan” Africa, then
proceeded to Northeast Africa, (also "sub Saharan"
by the way), and from there to the rest of the
globe by various exit routes. Again, the
starting point for any discussion remains AFRICA itself.
