Pan-Africanism
This was a name given to a series of movements dealing with African Nationalism, freedom to both the continent and the people as individuals themselves, political aspects throughout the country, and leadership. All of those events ultimately led to the independence of Africa's countries. This was both good and bad, because it either brought people together or it turned them against each other and gave them reason to argue and fight. It originated in conferences from 1900-1923 in London and other cities. Over time there were many unions formed for African Rights and groups of people who believed in freedom and what is right for themselves, their families, their friends or even strangers who seemed deserving of fairness and equality. The main belief of many Pan-Africanists is that "African peoples, both on the continent and in the Diaspora, share not merely a common history, but a common destiny”. Pan-Africanism truly stresses the idea that self-reliance is key otherwise you can't get anywhere; you can't rely on others to help, change or fix you, you must do so to reach your ultimate achievements. Pan-African Movements do not only symbolize what good things may lie ahead for the future, but also what has happened in the past. Struggles that people faced with slavery, poverty, racism, colonialism and just not having any freedom or independence what so ever. They came up with the idea of Afrocentrism, it was inspired by African and American ideology and their views which highly differed from the long lasting and prior views of Eurocentrism which dominated in the world for a while. This on the other hand consisted of views that which of Europe and also connecting to Ethnocentrism in China. The movements created were used to gain independence to the people, made life better and brought unity to all the countries within Africa.
|
ApartheidThis took place in South Africa. Prior to this, Africa was being colonized by the English and Dutch, while the native people of those areas were being forced to move and fight for independence in their own homelands. This conflict eventually led to war resulting in Africa getting independence from England, however that did not solve many of their problems. National Party strategists came up with the idea of the Apartheid as a way to "cement their control over the economic and social system. In the end, the truth is that the Apartheid was created to maintain white domination while extending racial separation. The Apartheid came with laws, almost 100% about racial discrimination. The irony of this whole situation is that the African countries are almost totally free of restrictions from other countries and other trying to take them over, and now that they are finally free of all that, people of their own countries are doing the exact same thing. Race laws interfered with almost every aspect of life. White and "non-whites" could not marry, many jobs were "white only" jobs. And to make things even worse they were then categorized into three different classes, white, black(African) or colored(of mixed decent). Classification into these categories was based on appearance, social acceptance and ones decent. Living like this with these strict laws about segregation clearly made the lives of colored or black people very hard, stressful and always having things be intangible for them. All blacks, and only blacks making this again more segregation, had to have on them at all times a "pass book" containing their fingerprints, photo and general identity information, especially when entering non-black areas. The Bantu Authorities Act was established by the government which created African Reserves known as Homelands. Each African person was forced and assigned to a homeland. They did this, because being part of a Homeland took away all of ones political rights, including their right to vote and undeclared them a citizen of South Africa, since they were now citizens of their Homelands. By doing this it denationalized about 9 million prior South African citizens. In order for the people to enter back to South Africa, they needed a passport, this was ridiculous they had literally become aliens of their own country. It got worse as time went on, as penalties and physical beatings were given to those who were "bad" or defied the law. The white and empowered South Africans had no intentions of easing or relieving their harsh and unjust laws and continued on their superiority.
|
Marcus Garvey
Born on August 17, 1887 he was a great social activist for the Black Nationalism and Pan-Africanism movements. He founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League. Garvey came up with a more advanced philosophy on Pan-Africanism which later inspired not only other National activists like himself, but he inspired the world as a whole in his mass movement which came to be known as Garvyism. It inspired others to do similar things such as the Nation of Islam to the Rastafaru movement. Garvey was self-educated, therefore he was very determined to do well when he set his mind to it. In the U.S. he launched several businesses to promote a separate black nation. When he was younger he took part in strikes for a job in which he worked for. This experience most likely kindled in him passion for political activism which he obviously later in life partakes in. When he read about exploitation of workers on plantations he was inspired and went to London to write and work on the African Times which then advocated Pan-African Nationalism. Inspired he was, so he went and founded different associations and unions. With out Marcus Garvey the African peoples would have not been able to achieve any type of freedom and would have been discriminated for all the rest of their lives, and their children's, and their children's and so on. With out Marcus Garvey, no movements or organizations would have been formed, nor would anyone ever gain freedom.
Review Questions:
1. What was the reason for the creation of Homelands?
2. Define in your own words what Pan-Africanism truly means.
3. How did Marcus Garvey help and impact the Pan-African and Black Nationalism Movements?
2. Define in your own words what Pan-Africanism truly means.
3. How did Marcus Garvey help and impact the Pan-African and Black Nationalism Movements?