Afrocentrism: What exactly does this mean and entail??

[N.A.R.]

I refer to the statement made by Eja below in a response to an article I posted on another thread:

NAR, the answer to your WHY? is very simple: Everything you bewail in your article is caused by the very same state of mind that you have defended here many times.

Or are you not one of the crew that breaks out in a rash whenever the word Afrocentricism is mentioned? How many times have you argued against ones advocating for the supremacy of an African-centred perspective in matters that have to do with the progression of African collectives?

You ask why Africans have no feelings of fellowship...have you ever given thought to what such a feeling would be based upon? It is very simple - in all instances, unity is preceded by differentiation...i.e. separation.

In other words, before a group of people can get together, they must first acknowledge what they have in common with each other and, what differentiates them from others. Then they must separate themselves from those who do not possess the qualities that define members of the group. Nothing new said here....

Nothing new because such differentiations go on all the time...even as we are here speaking, we are differentiated by material status, religion, ethnicity, gender, etc. For various activities in all arenas, those who do not have the qualities that indicate membership of the group will either only have limited access or none at all to the benefits that come from the activities.

On the "streets", if you are not a member of the gang that runs things, there are certain things that you will not be permitted. When you go for a job, if you have not passed through a specific level of training/education, you will not be employed. In politics, if the groups that share power have not vetted you to ensure that you possess a suitable temperament and ability, you will get nowhere.

Many more examples in all areas of human activity...so why do we think that the most important - i.e. the ones to do with global group dynamics and allocation of resources - will not also proceed in accordance with the same pattern?

Why are we still puzzled as to why we, the only group of people who refuse to device a self-serving unique set of collective ideals, remain rooted to the bottom of the food chain?

In other words, until Africans get up the courage to define their own unique attributes with no apologies to anyone left outside such a definition and, unite on the basis of those defined attributes, we will get nowhere. But, until we are able to identify our competitors without the current fear that causes some of us to call such entities allies/patrons, we will never be able to embrace the full set of those common attributes.

Let me start off with the following response;

Eja

NAR, the answer to your WHY? is very simple: Everything you bewail in your article is caused by the very same state of mind that you have defended here many times.

Or are you not one of the crew that breaks out in a rash whenever the word Afrocentricism is mentioned? How many times have you argued against ones advocating for the supremacy of an African-centred perspective in matters that have to do with the progression of African collectives?

I think you misunderstand my opinions and viewpoints. I believe we need to engage in progressive thinking as regards Afrocentricism, and not regressive thinking. We need to also bear in mind that we cannot and do not exist in a vacuum.

Secondly, the past is the past. The fact is when you and other disparage the white man for colonialism, I have to you that this is a world of the survival of the fittest, its as simple as that.

The answer to your WHY? is that things will start getting better when people like you find a way to let go of the confusion that is pulling you in two opposite directions.

Let me see if I can get you to state clearly where you are trying to go and lets see if we can then agree on certain common ground. So tell me what are the two opposite directions that are pulling at me?

You ask why Africans have no feelings of fellowship...have you ever given thought to what such a feeling would be based upon? It is very simple - in all instances, unity is preceded by differentiation...i.e. separation.

In other words, before a group of people can get together, they must first acknowledge what they have in common with each other and, what differentiates them from others. Then they must separate themselves from those who do not possess the qualities that define members of the group. Nothing new said here....

Nothing new because such differentiations go on all the time...even as we are here speaking, we are differentiated by material status, religion, ethnicity, gender, etc. For various activities in all arenas, those who do not have the qualities that indicate membership of the group will either only have limited access or none at all to the benefits that come from the activities.

On the "streets", if you are not a member of the gang that runs things, there are certain things that you will not be permitted. When you go for a job, if you have not passed through a specific level of training/education, you will not be employed. In politics, if the groups that share power have not vetted you to ensure that you possess a suitable temperament and ability, you will get nowhere.

Many more examples in all areas of human activity...so why do we think that the most important - i.e. the ones to do with global group dynamics and allocation of resources - will not also proceed in accordance with the same pattern?

Why are we still puzzled as to why we, the only group of people who refuse to device a self-serving unique set of collective ideals, remain rooted to the bottom of the food chain?

In other words, until Africans get up the courage to define their own unique attributes with no apologies to anyone left outside such a definition and, unite on the basis of those defined attributes, we will get nowhere. But, until we are able to identify our competitors without the current fear that causes some of us to call such entities allies/patrons, we will never be able to embrace the full set of those common attributes.

You say we remain the only group that does not have a self-serving unique set of collective ideals, so I ask you how do intend to get one? What is your suggestion? To unilaterally throw out all that was done during the colonial era? To behave as though it did not happen?

Would you rather we all shed our current western ways like, the cars we drive, the cloths we wear, the houses we live in, the western universities our leaders attended, the industries that have been built, the computer you are using to read this and we should go back in time to when we only lived with our own inventions and developments? or as many say, are we just to go back and "fix" history so we can get all the glory we deserve and that would make things right. So we can then evolve on our own and find our unique self serving ideals?

The fact is, we are where we are today, and we cannot turn back the clock. From this point we must move forward. Like it or not we have embraced and imbibed the ways of the West, for you to advocate a separation would be rather superficial if you are only proposing a partial separation and not a complete rejection and separation.

So tell me, what do you define Afrocentrisim to be? Many African Americans believe it was Afrocentric to take on African names, for others, its wearing African cloths, some clebrating Kwanzaa et al.

How do you propose countries are governed? Disband the current government structures and go back to monarchy rule? Should African countries have bodies of Kingmakers to elect who takes the crown?

How about medicine? Do we throw out all the western trained doctors we have and strictly use juju men and herbs and spirits to cure our sicknesses?

Does your Afrocentric society incorporate Brazilians, Caribbean, and African Americans?

I will end by quoting what you said in the first line of your response:

NAR, the answer to your WHY? is very simple: Everything you bewail in your article is caused by the very same state of mind that you have defended here many times.

Now tell me, what state of mind would you have me be in? So over to you and possibly if you friend Neo-Africanus.

[N.A.R.]

Did not want that post to be too long, so let me continue with this addition. From Wikipedia, I find:

Afrocentrism, Afrocentricity, or Africentrism[1] is a world view which emphasizes the importance of African people, taken as a single group and often equated with "Black people", in culture, philosophy, and history.[2] The roots of Afrocentrism lay in a reaction to the repression of Black people throughout the Western world in the 19th century and as a backlash against the scientific racism of the period, which tended to attribute any advanced civilization to the immigration of Proto-Indo-Europeans and their descendants.[3] Part of this reaction involved reviewing history to document the contributions that Black people made to world civilization.[4]

Now, The write up I posted on bringing back Festac 77 in my opinion is more about the future of the Black race rather than the past. I am less interested in demonizing the colonial masters and more interested in seeking solution to the ensure that stories like the clash between African Immigrants and African Amercians become a thing of the past.

I read Exponent saying that African American and Africans are not culturally linked. I am not sure if thats a joke or if he is indeed serious.

I have had questions that have gone unanswered by chaps like Neo Africanus, I as a few here again

1. Why didn’t Black people go over to Europe and the Americas and colonize them first?

2. When they came to colonize Africa, why did some of us accept their ways and work with them? To such a majority that we forgot our own ways? And why are they to blame for that?

3. You might say that we did not colonize other countries as we were minding our own business and content. Our societies were so advanced that we did not require to seek anything from elsewhere. So if this is the case, how come we did not defeat the invaders with our superior logic and technologies?

4. So fast forward to today. What do we discard that they brought to us and what to we keep? How do we determine what to discard and what to keep? And who makes the decisions on this?

[N.A.R.]

Now from the same article in Wikipedia, I read further:

In 2000, Molefi Kete Asante, chair of the Department of African American Studies at Temple University gave a lecture at the University of Liverpool entitled "Afrocentricity: Toward a New Understanding of African Thought in this Millennium,"[11] in which he presented many of his ideas:

• Africa has been betrayed by international commerce, by missionaries and imams, by the structure of knowledge imposed by the Western world, by its own leaders, and by the ignorance of its own people of its past.
  
• Philosophy itself originated in Africa and the first philosophers in the world were Africans.
  
• Afrocentricity constitutes a new way of examining data, a novel orientation to data, it carries with it assumptions about the current state of the African world.
  
• His aim is “to help lay out a plan for the recovery of African place, respectability, accountability, and leadership.”

On what Prof Asante lists, I have highlighted my concern. We were betrayed by our own leaders and the ignorance of our people. So why demonize the White man only? Does that solve the problem?

[Eja]

N.A.R., with regards to the subject of the question you used as title to this thread, it was examined by myself and others at The Crucible last year. You will find the main debate here and related comments here.

As for describing you as one who is pulled in two opposite directions, what I meant was that your center is not fixed. Specifically, with regards to this article of yours, what caught my eye was how one day you were attacking the ones who made the call for a common sense of purpose and unity amongst Africans, and next day, you are here publishing an article where you basically call for the same thing......

I continue by agreeing with your statement about how this a world where only the fittest survive. Question now is, can we restrict this description of reality to individuals or does it have to be applied to collectives? If yes - if only the fittest collectives survive, then what are the indicators that show how Africans worldwide are aware that they belong to one common pool - or, more accurately, to several closely related collectives that are all sub-sets of one large set? And if this awareness is not present, then how could this collective (which does not view itself as such) have any hope of surviving?

What you say about the irrelevance of the past is a description held in common by two sets of diametrically opposed types of people:

• Beneficiaries of tainted victories who wish to be able to enjoy the fruits of their crimes with conscience quietened.
• Those who have been so throughly defeated that they now wish only to be left in a state where memories of their downfall (and consequent actual status) no longer troubles their self-awareness.

In short, dismissing history is common to ones who wish to construct a new identity (and awareness of self/condition) that will bear to traces of its source.

For others who are more prepared to face up to and deal with all aspects of reality (including the uncomfortable/unpalatable components), the past is always present. It is always present because the past is a useful record of the mistakes we made (tactically, strategically and doctrine-wise). We remember the past so that we do not repeat the same mistakes twice. In short, to my knowledge, keeping our history in mind has nothing to do with "dwelling in past" or, "wanting to go back". It is all about trying to ensure that the future is not blighted by new incarnations of old mistakes.

However, it will remain convenient for defeated souls who only wish to be left in peace to enjoy the jangling of their glitterous chains of enslavement to resist all invitations to engage with the roots of the problems we face as a collective.

Therefore, strategic misunderstanding and misinterpretations will remain the order of the day.

The shortish version of the state of human affairs today is as follows:

• This is a world that is ordered for the benefit of a few.
• Africans do not have a voice in the evolving discussions about how this order is entrenched because Africans remain unable to persistently articulate their own collective self-interest.
• Africans are unable to persistently articulate a collective self-interest because every now and then, we take a break.
• While on a break, we play at being 'christians', 'muslims', 'globalist humanists', 'feminists', etc.
• Meanwhile, those who are serious about ordering the world (and all its resources) in service of their own collective needs never take a break.
• Even when these 'masters of the universe' are playing (or praying), they are ordering the world around themselves.

[Eja]

Originally Posted by N.A.R.

Now from the same article in Wikipedia, I read further:


On what Prof Asante lists, I have highlighted my concern. We were betrayed by our own leaders and the ignorance of our people. So why demonize the White man only? Does that solve the problem?

N.A.R. I cannot answer that question since this is not what I do. You might as well ask me why a dog barks at the moon.

You will find, if you read without prejudice, that no African-centred person worthy of note does this. What they do is make valid criticisms of European/Arabian imperialists, our home-grown misleaders and, those from us who are willfully ignorant.

But for some reason, when responses are made from some quarters, it is always of the hysterical sort that screams "racism!", "bleck racism!!" as if to question the way the world is ordered today is the same as advocating for the extermination of all non-Africans.

Some times, when I wish to cause revulsion in myself, I have tried to follow the perverse chain of thought that leads to that particular conclusion....

[N.A.R.]

Eja,
I will take time to read the previous threads you list above and see how the argument shaped out. I was a bit down in the last few days.

Ironically, I think we may agree on quite a bit, especially from the current and probably going forward. I certainly agree that if the "collective" does not even identify itself as such then, it greatly minimizes the hope for the future people. But the people must also be defined.

However if you say that we must not forget our history even as a reminder towards the future, it seems to me that you are considering a truncated history. You historical recollections are largely occupied by the injustices done to us by the European and Arab colonial masters and hence you are focused on those groups and correcting the injustice and ills they brought on our collective society. But how about what existed beyond that time? Was it perfect?

I say that is a truncated past as it in itself denies the role played by our ancestors in the whole affair. Starting at the advent of the colonial masters and religious missionaries from both Islam and Christianity seems to have provided a convenient “detour” to our evolution. We existed before those events hence we cannot just go back to those traumatic events and start there. This is the crux of where we seem to have divergent opinions; we have to go beyond the time of the foreigners in Africa. And when you do that, I think you will actually get to better solutions for an Afrocentric society.

N.A.R. I cannot answer that question since this is not what I do. You might as well ask me why a dog barks at the moon.

As noted above, then you like Ribadu and Wazird are being “selective” in your decision. The question must be answered! It is part of the whole situation in which we find ourselves today. Its like a doctor who has a patient who has Lung cancer, a broken leg and whopping cough. Of course the more serious of the ailments is the cancer, and the broken leg, so it seems you are saying, doctor, treat the cancer and the leg as that’s more serious, and I am not concerned about the cough. If that remains untreated will the patient still not die eventually?

As a funny coincidence, I am not just listening to the audio edition of Chinua Achebe’s landmark novel, Things Fall Apart. I have never been that much interested in Literature so I never read such books except for the few classes in Secondary school where we read the books basically to cram like effico and score as high as possible. However now as I listen to the novel a lot of what I am reading has new meaning and I have quite a lot of questions. It’s a rare insight into life before the White man, as is Wole Shoyinka’s “Death and The Kings Horseman” which I also did not read, but saw a play in Ife. I am going to get that next on audio if I can.

Two incidents that have puzzled me about the way we are (were) and how we think. First, the killing if Ikemefuna by Okonkwo (I would assume that as a strong Afrocentrist you have read his book). Yes Okonkwo was a man driven by tradition and also a man of no fear, but, I assume he was also a man of sound mind. So how could he so blindly believe in the Oracle (or the Gods) and kill the boy whom he was so fond of? The boy whom he actually loved more than his own son? Especially after he was cautioned not to have anything to do with the boy’s death?

First, he did not even see it fit or wise to go and ask the Oracle why the boy’s death had been ordered. Secondly, he agreed to go on the journey, even as his good friend declined and against the strong advise of the oldest in the clan. Third, even though he moved to the back to the line, he is the one that eventually struck the death blow to the boy. WHY??? So they will not think him weak!! Now consider the fact that when the Oracle then told the priestess to get his daughter in the middle of the night, Ezenma, in this case against the order of the priestess, he did not stop his wife, her mother and he himself when to the mouth of the shrine to wait. DUH!!!!!

What I am noting here is how we chose to blindly follow the “Gods” that we had in our day even when they did things against our wishes. Secondly;

When he was in exile at his mothers village and a neigboring village that saw their first White man on his “iron horse” and he was killed. The “horse” was simply tied to a tree and left to rot. Until, the fellow white men came, saw the “horse” and proceeded to wipe out the town in anger.

Now, several questions arise in my mind. Why did they not ask the man why his mission? Why did they not seek to go see what else his people were up to? And the issue that most puzzles me is why was his “iron horse” simply tied to a tree to rot!? Where as their sense to curiosity and adventure? Nobody took the horse to see exactly how it worked?

Ironically they referred to it as a “horse” and not a God, hence I do not believe it was out of fear it was not touched, but simply out of non-interest. Why? This is part of when I say we need to look beyond the advent of colonial rule at how our people though and reasoned. It appears we may not have been a “curious” people in certain ways. And this lack of curiosity prevented us from our true and full potential. And that has nothing to do with Colonial rule and foreign religious influences.

I will end with this. Many Nigerian / African tradition have as their most important ceremony of the year the feast of the new harvest. Or the New Yam Festival (be laik say nah only "yam" our people de chop!) It is so heavy celebrated as the “Gods” smiled upon the people and sent plentiful rain and blessed the soils. But I would ask, when the rains did not come or when they fell to hard, why did not any one think about creating dams and water reservoirs to hold the water in times of drought, so no matter the case, a decent harvest was assured? Why? Of course this would offend the Gods! Why did we simply leave it to the “Gods” to decide if we could water our crops or not? And by extension, if we survived or not!

[Eja]

N.A.R. hope you are feeling a lot better.

You made good points. I will respond more fully later.

[N.A.R.]

Eja,
Thanks for your enquires, I am better but still at home. Ironically as I have had to stay home sick its a luxury that I rarely am able to have! I want to connect what I wrote earlier to your comments so that it would not appear that I neglected what you wrote.

Of the two sets of African peoples you have referred to:

What you say about the irrelevance of the past is a description held in common by two sets of diametrically opposed types of people:
• Beneficiaries of tainted victories who wish to be able to enjoy the fruits of their crimes with conscience quietened.

With this group of people you may be referring to those Africans who have benefited from the slave trade, so you may be making reference to the likes of The then King of Dahomey and Oba Kosoko of Lagos who was against the ending of the slave trade as he profited greatly from the trade. I would assume his descendants would not want the source of their wealth to be known. I use this example to point out further the fact that we cannot segregate when it comes to the slave trade. Indeed the British and Portuguese may be the larger culprits when it comes to the trade, but how about the Africans that participated and perpetuated the slave trade as well? Why do you not also castigate them?

• Those who have been so throughly defeated that they now wish only to be left in a state where memories of their downfall (and consequent actual status) no longer troubles their self-awareness.

In this group we may find the larger of the Africans at home and in Diaspora. Again I will go back to Things Fall Apart. The ending of that landmark novel seems to say a lot as to have Africans have continued to exist in this world to date. Okonkowo ends up committing suicide. Why? Because it seems obvious that rather than go to war with the white man and exact the revenge that was clearly called for, the clan was split and would not have gone to war. So Okonkowo first carried out his own revenge and secondly killed himself in order not to face the wrath of the white man. Now not that would fear the retribution, but probably becuase again his people would not stand up for him if he was killed. This seems to be how most Africans think today. They do not challenge authority but seek solutions to their own peculiar problem and leave the collective on their own to continue loosing its way.

And this is largely where I fault the focus of your critism. You are so focused on the crimes and injustice of the slave trade that you seem to neglect the more important fact that we Africans have been the architects of our own misfortune, in the past an to date. And you lay this blame still at the feet of the colonialists or the religious invaders.

One problem that I see as a major problem for the Africans peoples is our dependence on the supernatural. When things go wrong, we ascribe it to the supernatural. This was the case in the past and this is still the case today. This is why we have mega churches all over Africa. Our people have simply replaced their belief in Ifa and Chukwu with Christian and Islamic beliefs. Research and development do not seem to be part of the African way of life. If the rains do not fall, its God punishing us, if a woman has a miscarriage, she has offended the Gods. Case in point, look at the story on the Anambra election and a journalist writes in a national daily telling us all to “pray for Anambra State” are you freaking kidding me? You can see what is wrong with your politics loud and clear and instead of figuring out a solution, you ask for prayers as the only way out. So my take if we need to shift the focus on what the white man did to us and concentrate in what we need to do to ourselves to solve our problems.

[N.A.R.]

Eja,
You see, its stories like this that make me wonder why so many of you expend so much energy on accusations of the White man or even the Christian and Islamic colonialist. Look at how brutal we are to ourselves. What has the White man if Christianity and Islam have to do with such babaric behaviour?

African view: Guinea's rape horror

Witnesses and survivors say the troops forced themselves on women of all ages in and around the stadium - students, professionals, market women, opposition campaigners - even grandmothers.

Guns, bayonets, knives and other weapons were used to rip off their brightly coloured boubous (traditional West African gowns) - even their trousers.

And some of those weapons were used to sexually violate them.

She said she managed to get out of the stadium, but was followed to her hiding place by a group of men in uniform.

"At that moment, I said a final prayer," she confessed, "because I believed my last hour had come."

But one soldier said, "Forget it, leave her alone," and they took off.

She said she was shaking, wearing only an underskirt because her wraparound cloth had been torn off her.