Posté le: Jeu 02 Fév 2006 23:35 Sujet du message: Les africains-anglophone et la responsabilité....
....africaine dans l'esclavage.Lisez un peu ce que disent des frères anglophone,nigérians et trinidadiens, à propos de la soi-disante traite inter-africaine.
Very often, the embalmers of Western history have tried to gloss over the sordid trade in African slaves by Europeans, for over four centuries, by putting up the argument that lot of Africans also made a fortune in the dealings. From these 'mythorians' we often hear the stories that slavery was rampant in Africa before the Europeans came along. Not only is slavery been argued away, the colonial oppression of Africa is also been massaged to make it appear less cruel. We are told that the colonies also enjoyed the fruits of colonization. Christianity and Western-styled education are often cited as the 'benefits' Africans derived from colonialism. These apologists then asked why must it be that all the opprobrium are directed against Europeans alone?"
Even more unfortunate is the fact that some Africans, especially those in the diaspora, have bought into these pseudo-arguments.
In this essay I shall try to put slavery in proper historical perspectives, and show how the chattel slavery introduced by capitalism differs from all other forms of slavery.
To those who said Africans benefitted from slavery and colonialism, one can argue, with the same [twisted] logic, that the countries conquered by Nazis also enjoyed the fruits of Nazism. We can say that Holland, which was conquered and oppressed by German Nazis, also benefitted from their forced oppression. We can argue that the French, the Belgian, and the Dutch people who were forced into labor camps also benefitted! This manner of thinking is, of course, simply outrageous
As any student of history knows, it was not only in Africa that slavery was rampant in ancient times. The Hebrew, Greek, Roman history tells of slavery. Watching slaves butchered each other was a game enjoyed by the decadent rulers of the Roman Empire. The institution of slavery got mentioned several times in the Christian Bible: 'Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their that are with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession.' (Leviticus, 25, 44-46). 'If thou buy an Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve: and in the seventh year he shall go out free for nothing. If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself: if he were married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master have given him a wife, and she have born him sons or daughters; the wife and her children shall be her master's, and he shall go out by himself. And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free: Then his master shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an aul; and he shall serve him for ever.' (Exodus XXI, 2-6). These are just two of the examples of the Hebrew god's opinion of slavery. The quotations are from the Christian bible.
The Jews, like many other people, have been enslaved several times. But does the fact that they have been oppressed several times in the past lessen the enormity of the holocaust? We should be careful. In middle-age Europe almost everyone was a serf. And it is often conveniently forgotten, by Western mythorians, that two out of every three Europeans that migrated to the New World was a serf - until Africans were introduced as slaves.
The Atlantic slave-trade was different from all these earlier slavery in several respects. Most enormously important is that it was the first form of slavery that was solely motivated by commercial incentives. In earlier times slaves were used as domestic workers and soldiers, since there were no plantations or industrial factories where millions of slave-labor was needed. The African slave-trade was a capitalist invention. Readers are directed to Slavery and Capitalism by Eric Williams.
It was the large-scale capitalist mode of production which required cheap labors that induced the slave trade. It was the Industrial Revolution in Europe that made it necessary to traffic in human lives on a colossal scale.
Slaves in earlier times enjoyed social and individual rights - like marriage, freedom to raise a family, speak their language and worship their gods, rights which were denied the African slaves exported to the Americas. Africans captured and taken into the new world were stripped of all their personality and humanity - they could not even bear their own names.
It was capitalism that introduced chattel-slavery. "In the welter of philosophical arguments for and against the slave trade, the one cogent and inescapable argument in favor of it is easily hidden: in spite of its risks, illegality, and blighted social status, slave trading was enormously profitable. Despite the popular assertion that free labor was cheaper, the price of slaves continued to go up and to compensate for the risks of the trade." - The Slaver's Log Book, original manuscript by Captain Theophilus Conneau, Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1976, p. iv.
In older times, slaves were not regarded as properties of their masters, manumission was possible and occurred frequently. Since slaves in those days were generally captured soldiers, they're treated humanely, because the possibility always existed that a military or spiritual giant could arise from their tribe and turn the tide in their favor. Moses was such a figure. We read about the account of his leading the Hebrews out of Egypt in the Christian Bible. These are some of the qualitative differences, between the Atlantic slavery and earlier forms of slavery. They are important differences which the ideologists, masqeurading as scientists and historians, want to gloss over.
"Slaves became profitable after the discovery of the New World had established a seemingly insatiable demand for workers on the plantations. Slavery was not new to Africa, but it had existed primarily in its domestic form-involving rights as well as duties.In Bornu the kings sent slaves to govern their provinces and Hausa kings also often ruled through slaves. In Yorubaland, slaves of the ALAFIN often attain great power. It was the Europeans who turned slavery into an industry and introduced such well-documented barbarities as the rigors of the 'middle passage' (across the Atlantic)." Walter Schwarz, Nigeria, Pall Mall Press. p.69).
People have asked why Africans themselves engaged in the slave trade. Given the function of slavery in African societies, the origin of their participation is not too difficult to understand.
First and foremost, slavery was not confused with the notion of superiority and inferiority, a notion later invoked as justification for black slavery in America. On the contrary, it was not at all uncommon for African owners to adopt slave children or to marry slave women, who then became full members of the family. Slaves of talent accumulated property and in some instances reached the status of kings;Jaja of Opobo (in Nigeria) is a case in point. Lacking contact with American slavery, African traders could be expected to assume that the lives of slaves overseas would be as much as they were in Africa; they had no way of knowing that whites in America associated dark colors with sub-human qualities and status, or that they would treat slaves as chattels generation after generation. When Nigeria's Madame Tinubu, herself a slave-trader, discovered the difference between domestic and non-African slavery, she became an abolitionist, actively rejecting what she saw as the corruption of African slavery by the unjust and inhumane habits of its foreign practitioners and by the motivation to make war for profit on the sale of captives.
What these imperialist mythorians are striving to achieve is a situation whereby Black people will continue to blame themselves for all the enormous crimes visited on them by the white people. While African chiefs who got corrupted and sold their folks are bandied about with glee, no mention is made of many great African Kings and Queens who died fighting the slave-raids. Mani-Congo, the ruler of a Congo state wrote king John III of Portugal entreating that, "... we need from your kingdom no other than priests and people to teach in schools, and no other goods but wine and flour for the holy sacrament: that is why we beg of Your Highness to help and assist us in this matter, commanding the factors that they should send here neither mercenaries nor wares, because it is our will that in these kingdoms, there should not be any trade in slaves or markets for slaves."
Slavery in Africa was punishment; as even a barbarian like Conneau recognized, ". . .it was meted out to violators of serious tabus, to criminals, and especially to enemies captured in war. Muslims in particular used slavery in lieu of death sentence. Bondage instead of death was the punishment for truly heinous offenses, as well as a solution to the problem of getting rid of one's captured enemies. . ." Conneau, op. cit. p.viii.
Language, they say, defines those that uses it. The fact that slavery in Africa does not have all the negative connotations and brutalities associated with the chattel slavery, could be seen from the Yorubas who have the same word 'ERU' for both slaves and prisoners of war. To them both are unfortunate victims of wars. They are kept to serve terms and there are strict rules on how they should be treated. They are never engaged in plantations (there were none) with their mouths padlocked, they are not chained like cattle in pens.
And whereas Africans who participated in slavery had been well-documented, those who fought tenaciously against it remain unsung. Let's contrast this with the interpretation given to Europeans slave-drivers. Every West African student knows the name of William Wilberforce - the 'Great Abolitionist,' the role of Queen Victoria and other European Royalties and 'Noblemen' who built their wealth on African slaves remain relatively unknown. How many Americans would like to know that the 'Great Libertarian,' Thomas Jefferson, was a slave-owner?
It is natural for the guilty to look for parallels, so as to diminished the enormity of his crime, so it is with the Europeans. They are busy collecting bogus anthropological findings and presenting same as historical fact to lessen their culpability in the greatest crime ever committed against a people, in the history of the world. Their assault on history should not be allow to go unanswered.
I do not write this to exonerate the African chiefs who sold slaves to the Europeans. The fact we all have to bear in mind is that the Europeans never launched a direct, frontal attack on Africa. In all the places they conquered, they first divided the people by looking for a Judas among them. With the promise of material benefits, such Judas' are always the instrument used to destroy their own societies. For those who would like to know more about this, I strongly recommend The destruction of Black Civilization, by Chancellor Williams - published by Third World Press. We can see this trend continuing today in Angola, where Savimbi is serving the purpose of destroying his fatherland, in the interests of those who make their living from the misfortunes of other people.
We should excuse our fathers if they appeared to have been swindled by the Europeans. Many of us, especially the immigrants from Africa, are also victims of Euro-American propaganda. We were swayed by the images of a paradisiacal Europe where streets are paved with gold and every white man is a god. We believed the smiling missionaries who told us tales about European hearts being filled with brotherly love and compassion. How many of us would have believed that we are going to a society where human beings are only as important as their bank accounts? How many of us would have believed that in the European paradise, there are jobless, homeless, copeless and hopeless people? How many of us would have believed that Cecil Rhodes was not a philantropist but a pirate? How many of us would have believed that in Euro-America exist homophobes, parading the streets with lynching intentions? How many of us would have believed that Europeans, after all, are capable of lying?
I shall end this piece with the following quotation: "When someone removes the cataracts of whiteness from our eyes, and when we look with unclouded vision on the bloody shadows of the American past, we will recognize for the first time that the Afro-American, who was so often second in freedom, was also second in slavery.
Indeed, it will be revealed that the Afro-American was third in slavery. For he inherited his chains, in a manner of speaking, from the pioneer bondsmen, who were red and white.
The story of this succession, of how the red bondsmen and of how white men created a system of white servitude which lasted in America for more than two hundred years, the story of how this system was created and why, of how white men and white women and white children were brought and sold like cattle and transported across the seas in foul 'slave' ships, the story of how all this happened, of how the white planter reduced white people to temporary and lifetime servitude before stretching out his hands to Ethiopia, has never been told before in all its dimensions. As a matter of fact, the traditional embalmers of American experience seem to find servitude enormously embarrassing, and prefer to dwell at length on black bondage in America. But this maneuver distorts both black bondage and the American experience. ...In the first place, white bondage lasted for more than two centuries and involved a majority of the white immigrants to the American colonies. It has been estimated that at least two out of every three white colonists worked for a term of years in the fields or kitchens as semi-slaves. A second point of immense importance in this whole equation is the fact that white servitude was the historical foundation upon which the system of black slavery was conducted.
In other words, white servitude was the historic proving ground for the mechanisms of control and subordination used in Afro-American slavery. The plantation pass, the fugitive slave law, the use of the overseer and the house servant and the Uncle Tom, the forced separation of parents and children on the auction block and the sexual exploitation of servant women, the whipping post, the slave chains, the branding iron; all these mechanism were tried out and perfected first on white men and white women. Masters also developed a theory of internal white racism and used the traditional Sambo and minstrel stereotypes to characterize white servants who were said to be good natured and faithful but biologically inferior and subject to laziness, immorality, and crime. And all of this would seem to suggest that nothing substantial can be said about the mechanisms of black bondage in America except against the background and within the perspective of the system of white bondage in America." - Lerone Bennet, quoted by John Henrik Clarke in Introduction to World's Great Men of Color, Collier Books.
massive greetings,
Femi Akomolafe _________________ "tout nèg a nèg
ki nèg nwè ki nèg klè
ki nèg klè ki nèg nwè
tout nèg a nèg
nèg klè pè nèg nwè
nèg nwè pa lè wè nèg klè
nèg nwè ké wéy klè
senti i sa roune nèg klè
mè nèg klè ké wéy klè a toujou nèg
sa ki fèt pou nèg vin' blang?
blang té gen chivé pli long?
pou senblé yé nou trapé chivé plat kon fil mang!!!
mandé to fanm...!
mè pou kisa blang lé vin' nwè?
ha... savé ki avan vin' blan yé té ja nèg!
a nou mèm ké nou mèm dépi nânni nânnan...
chinwa soti, kouli soti, indyen soti, blang soti
mèm koté nèg soti
avan yé sotil koté y fika
AFRIKA!!!"
Dernière édition par Pakira le Ven 03 Fév 2006 00:10; édité 1 fois
Ce texte est le plus interessant.Il est long et date de 2000 mais l'auteur nous démontre que les européens ne font que ce méprendre sur la signification du mot esclaves chez les differents peuples africains,notamment les Yorubas,Hausa,Igbos etc...
Thoughts on the Atlantic Slave Trade:
the Roles of Africans and the Issue of Apology for Slavery
Abdul- Rasheed Na’Allah
Who deserves an apology for the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade? Skip Gates, in his Wonders of the African World video series makes some Africans apologize to him, thus demonstrating his belief that continental Africans need to apologize to descendants of slaves in the Diaspora. President Mathieu Kérékou of the Republic of Benin echoed a similar belief by asking for a conference where continental Africans would apologize to Diaspora Africans for slavery.1 I’m not sure whom the president was speaking for, and whether he was offering to convene such a meeting. In my view, continental and Diaspora Africans have never been enemies and have always worked together for the glory of Africa, and history is rich in examples, Nkrumah to DuBois, Randall Robinson to Moshood Abiola.However, we need conferences, in Africa and abroad, to reconcile our understanding of past events and to ensure that no one sells the African agenda to the highest bidder.Yet, apology will not end the debate and misunderstanding about Atlantic Slave Trade. We need to know whether Africans advertised to Europe that they were slavers, and invited Europeans to buy slaves, or Europeans had their own plan, and enticed uninformed, militarily weaker Africans, to choose between Cane and Carrot, to sell their own brothers and sisters. We need to know whether no African resisted the idea of his own people sold across the ocean. We must know what happened to King Jaja of Opobo and his contemporaries, and whether there was truly no African resistance to slave trade.
Now, who would apologize to continental Africans who lost their brothers and sisters to slavery, to the wife whose husband was sold away and forcefully removed to European and American plantations? To those whose cousins, aunts and nephews were massacred and dumped in oceans for ocean animals to eat. Who would apologize to people whose aso ara “cloths covering their bodies” were forcefully removed and left naked, and their homes, nations and continent, in perpetual hunger for development. If all Africans brought to the New Worlds remained and tilled lands and farmed rivers back home in their ancestral origins, Africa might be better than it is today.
In many spots in “Wonders,” Skip Gates presents many slippery arguments to support his view that Africans practiced, and still practices, their own “terrible slavery”. He interviews some Africans to support his views. In several instances during the interviews, Gates fails to realize that communication practically breaks down between him and his interviewees. For example, he asks one Oumar, “It [slavery] is not illegal?” Oumar responds that it is “traditional”. Gates does not caution himself on whether he has gone too far in defining this specific relationship between the worker and the employer as between slave and the white slave owner in America before abolition. Some songs I have heard in Nigeria which were recently recounted for me perhaps shows how a Yoruba person would have interpreted what Gates calls “slave” and “slave master” episode:
Maso’ga di lebira Olohun,
Gbogbo ohun ti n bami lookanje
Ko bami so d’erin
Koja s’ope.
Gbogbo eni tin wa’se
jeki won ri’se.
Gbogbo eni ti o ri’se saanu funwon.
Gbogbo nto mbami lokan je
Ninu odun tawa yi
je o ni’yanju.2
Oh God) don’t make a master becomes a laborer
All what makes me sad
Let it make me laugh
Let me be grateful (to you).
All those searching for jobs,
let them have jobs.
All those who don’t get jobs, help them.
All what makes be sad
This year that we are
solve them for me (Oh God!).
Even when Oumar uses such words as “friend,” “permission,” “payment” in the process of explaining the nature of this servitude, it does not occur to Gates to check his own preconceived view. Would anyone ever described a slave master as, or compared him to, a slave’s “friend”?Did the European slave master ever allow his slave to earn money for him-/herself by taking on other employment? When was a slave ever paid for his/her labor by a slave master? No, Gates is on the offensive, and seems to be saying, “these people [Africans] are by nature slave hawkers, what morality have they to ask for reparations from the Europeans and the Americans?!” Well, let us examine a portion of Gates conversation with Oumar:
(Gates starts this portion by introducing some natives as dark-skinned slaves, and others as light-skinned masters. This was at Mopti, a market town between Bamako and Timbuktu).
Gates: (Pointing at a native) So, he’s from Timbuktu?
Oumar: (After inquiring from the person concerned) Timbuktu.
Gates: But, how come, Oumar, how come he looks different from
him?
Oumar: No, he’s Bella, things like that
Gates: Is he a slave?
Oumar: Yeah
Gates: Yeah, I see. So, this man owns him?
Oumar: Like that
Gates: So, he’s born into slavery?
Oumar: Exactly. From father to son, to big father.
Gates: It’s not illegal?
Oumar: It is traditional.
Gates: Tradition.
Oumar: Yeah, it’s tradition.
Gates: Hun. My great grand father was a slave.
Oumar: Now, you, in America, is finish for that. But for this people, it is
traditional. Every thing he have to do [that] he have to go to ask a friend, he
have to
ask him. He have to say do that, things like that.
Gates: Does he pay him?
Oumar: He pays him too.
Gates: He pays him too. But this man if he wanted to quit and work on the
river, he couldn’t do that unless he says “yes”?
Oumar: Sometimes he can say “yes”, sometime he can so
“no’.
Gates: And the Bella people, no rebellion? They never want to fight the
Tuareg?
Oumar: They like it.
Gates: (smiles) Yeah, they used to say that about Black American slaves
too.
No right thinking person will condone any practice anywhere that subjects anyone to socioeconomic domination, and I personally condemn any situation in Africa that makes some people lords and some serfs. However, Gates does not seem to want to examine the true situation here. He forces words into Oumar’s mouth, and coats the native’s responses in his own biased colors. In all instances cited above, it is Gates, and not Oumar, who suggests that someone is a slave, and the other is a master.Oumar’s level of understanding of the English language can be judged from the grammatical and phonological correctness of his responses. Yet, Oumar most likely knows the English word “slave” but chooses to use the indigenous language word for lineage or language group to describe every person he identifies for Gates in the video. Yet, in the book that accompanies the video, Gates interprets a dialogue similar (perhaps the same as above) with Oumar about the Tuareg and the Mella as follows:
The man was a Tuareg, dressed in their traditional white gown with a bold indigo turban. With him was another man, very dark, dressed in an indigo gown, who performed all the menial tasks for the Tuareg tradesman. When we had passed them, Oumar told me that the Bella man was a slave. The word “slave” is not used but is the only one that accurately describes the traditional relationship between these two peoples. (p. 119)
Gates sounds really determined to give biased meanings to anything Oumar says. Oumar’s frequent addition of “things like that”, to his responses to Gates shows that he is not about to accept many of Gates’s translations of his speeches. I am particularly impressed that on the contrary, Oumar answers Gates’ questions only after first confirming from those natives actually concerned.
I grew up constantly hearing a powerful Yoruba adage in my multicultural, multiethnic Ilorin: eniyan l’aso, humans are cloths unto one another. This saying, from the repertoire of Yoruba cultural expressions, can be very extensive, and the core meaning would be that people are there to defend each other, to be their brothers’ and sisters’ keepers, and that humans are more important to themselves than money is to them. Basically eniyan l’aso is a Yoruba philosophy which clearly denotes that Yoruba people would rather have people around themselves than accept money from a highest bidder. My thesis is not to negate the theory of a willing horse in Africans, or specifically among the Yorubas during the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. Rather it is to establish that there is nothing inherent in Yoruba culture that people should sell their own people for money and materials. I like to further Joseph E. Inikori’s opinion4 that “conditions” were created by Europeans for the crudest act of trading in human beings and for transporting “captured and bought people” across the Atlantic in the most inhuman conditions possible.
Again, I am not about to deny that Africans practiced a kind of servitude before the European intrusion. However, as Ali Mazrui said in his documentary, The Africans: A Triple Heritage, the degree of callousness of the European enslavement of Africans was unknown to Africans.Let me go once again to Yoruba rhetoric. Eni to l’eru lo l’eru, eni leru lo l’eru. “To whomever belongs the ‘slave,’ belongs the slave’s properties, and whomever has slave’s properties has the ‘slave.’”. T’aa ba ran ni ni’se eru afi t’omo jee. “When a person is sent on an errand that portrays him/her as a ’slave’, he or she should deliver it as a freeborn.” It is not yet time or place to analyze every phonemic, morphological and syntactic structures of these Yoruba adages, neither do I need now explain what socio-cultural meanings they give. What is crucial for the purpose of this discussion is that Yoruba has a word, eru, often wrongly translated as equivalent to the English word “slave,” by many contemproary Yoruba scholars. As Toyin Falola once said, eru is not always the same as “slave”,5 neither is a person called eru mi “my eru” the same as way an American white slave owner would call “my slave”. O s’eru sinmi, means, “he/she served me”, or, O s’eru sinle baba re, he/she served his/her country, as in the case of the one year national youth service program in Nigeria. Eru Anabi, follower of Anabi (Falola). The question we must ask is whether the Yoruba culture at any time saw eru as less human as Black slaves were treated in Europe. Since historians have repeatedly reminded us that Europeans practiced slavery of their own before they enslaved Africans, we may also want to ask, did Europeans treat European slaves as less human as they treated Black slaves? Did any non-Europeans create any “condition” for Europeans to be shipped abroad? How many of them were massacred as Blacks were? How many got thrown into the Atlantic Ocean, beheaded like chickens! Where on earth were European slaves taken and maltreated in such devastating degrees as Blacks were?
The philosophy of eniyan (enia) l’aso would prove that Africans (or Yoruba people) who captured opponents during inter- ethnic wars, used them to boost their own population. Some powerful warriors married female captors, and other captors served their masters in various economic and cultural capacities. Without doubt, this attitude is terrible and degrading of their fellow human beings, but it is far less callous than the European slavers’ subjugation of Africans. African practice of servitude is not reason enough to initiate or justify the Atlantic Slave Trade. The farms worked, and the economies developed by the indigenous African labor were Africa’s. Descendants of hitherto laborers have become political leaders in many parts of Africa. If our searchlights are sharp enough we will find among contemporary African presidents some whose foreparents were domestic farm workers.
When Africans practiced indigenous servitude, I’m not sure the African master had manufactured chains and padlocks to further dehumanize fellow Africans. Part of the “conditions” Europeans created for the Atlantic Slave Trade was the importation of chains, padlocks, guns, and various crude gadgets to Africa, and the obvious demonstration of their uses to the Africans. If the account we heard about how Europeans dehumanized King Jaja of Opobo were true, if the story about how they subjugated the proud Kingdom of the Benin people was anything to learn from, Africans had to cooperate when Europeans came to them with carrots asking to ship away fellow Africans. For after carrots would have come heavy canes.
Let us take a brief time to peruse this Yoruba anecdote: O nwa owo lo, o waa pade iyi l’ona. Bi o ba ri owo ohun kini iwo yo fira? “You set off on a journey in search of money, and right on your way, you met prestige/honor. If you had eventually got the money what would you have bought with it?” I am not so sure that the Yoruba people, and indeed Africans, had particular yearnings for materials such that they would be all out to sell their own people for devastation. Of course, the Sese Sekos, the Abachas and the Babangidas of this “neocolonial” generation proved particularly carnivorous. Oral traditions show that good name, prestige and honor were more a preoccupation to them than money, and honor came when they were generous to their own people, when they spent for their people’s welfare, and served them selflessly, not when they sold their brothers and sisters to the highest bidder.
Slavery and the African Kings
Yes, let’s turn one of the Yoruba adages I cited in this paper upside down (isn’t the issue at stake itself ’upside down’?): Won ran Oba n’ise eru, Oba je’se bi eru, the King was sent a message as a slave, he delivered it as a slave. Yes, African Kings and Chiefs were slaves in the hands of the White slavery mongers. As Wole Soyinka suggested in his recent “Intervention”,6 we should not sympathize with the African King- collaborators.We should not speculate either about what could have happened to them had they refused to collaborate with the Slavers. Yes, the Kings should have resisted, and history would have judged them brave warriors? How has history judged King Jaja of Opobo who said “to hell” to the slavers and the colonialists? How did it judge the Benin King, the Chiefs and the masses who insisted that the British must respect their culture and protocol? Yes, the same history and historians today say they deserve no reparations! Did the Europeans enslave King Jaja and the King of Benin, or did they leave them in their kingly robes? How can we understand what informed those Kings’ choices for resistance? How sincere are we when we hail or condemn African Kings and Chiefs either way? Has whatever decision they made nullify the genocide of the Atlantic Slave Trade? Can we discuss Atlantic Slave Trade outside racial reasons? Will it be wrong to say that racism (the belief that Blacks are sub- humans) was at the root of how Europeans prosecuted the trade?
In Ali Mazrui’s recent posting,7 he made references to a respected Nigerian historian’s assertion that African Chiefs were forced into the Atlantic Slave Trade. Mazrui’s lines were interesting:
The formulation is mine, but the logic is what professor Ajayi has brought into the debate.Chiefs were BLACKMAILED (or WHITEMAILED) into becoming slavers for the white man. Since the Trans-Atlantic slave trade was DEMAND- DRIVEN, and the demand was in the West, Africans were forced into collaboration. Often literally at the point of a gun.
The “carrot or cane” policy of White slavers cannot be dismissed with a wave of the hand whenever Africans’ participation in Atlantic Slave Trade is discussed. Yet, I might be among the first to agree that African Chiefs should have chosen to receive the White man’s cane and resisted him to the last. But, would it be the Kings alone that would have been maimed and or put into slavery? Perhaps the entire continent and the black race would have been forced into captivity. No, no speculation.
I think history has proved that a choice to resist European domination may be practicable in African-European’s dealings today--despite neo-colonialism. It could have been suicidal for Africans to dare the white man even before mid twentieth century. I need not repeat the many examples that we already know, and really, I don’t want to speculate!
It seems to me that Africans compete well, sometimes even imitate the White man in many areas, but have refused to degenerate to the level of callousness of the white executors of the Atlantic Slave Trade
Eru is not Slave: A Misuse of Terminology
No scientific discussion can take place if scientific terms mean different things in different regions.”
- Joseph E. Inikori
I am often amused to hear this Yoruba adage, B’Oyinbo mu tii maa m’ekoogbona. Omi gbona kan naa lajo n mu. “If the White man drinks tea, I’ll drink Ekoogbona--hot corn-drink. We both drink hot water/liquid.” It is with this popular saying that I like to return to my previous discussion on the terminology used for the English word “slave” in some African languages, especially the Yoruba language. The eru (there’s another word: iwofa) tradition among the Yoruba is basically a tradition of servitude.Eru is simply a servant. Serf is far better a translation of eru than “Slave”. Eru Oba, King’s servant. The Yoruba persons compete so well with the Europeans and easily locate equivalent cultural element from their locality as shown in the Ilorin Yoruba humorous adage However, never do the Yoruba people, and indeed no African culture to my knowledge, ever even thought of, let alone actually competed with the brutish British and American slavery traditions. Although there was, and still is, Ekoogbona for the tea the English presented to them, never did Africans practiced a debasement of humanity as slavery was. There is no word, apology to the Whorfians, in the thoughts of the Yoruba people (Africans) for slavery!
Among the Hausa people, Yoruba neighbors spread in many areas of West Africa, modern writers often use for “slave” bawa, or baiwa. Like eru, bawa simply means servant, not slave.Many contemporary Hausa scholars have used bauta for slavery. However, bauta in Hausa gangariya, deep-rooted Hausa, is worship or service, and many will say, na bautawa Allah, “I worshiped God.” Na bauta wa sarki, “I served the king!” Na bauta maka can even be extended to mean “I served/respected you”. Perhaps Eru Oba will be the same as Dogarin Sarkin in Hausa, or bawan sarki. Because of the importance of the “service” meaning of the word bawa, many Hausa people today answer to the name Bawa. I don’t think any person will like to be called “slave”, in terms of the Atlantic Slave. Uncle Toms won’t use the word “Slave” as a first name. Cato, Dr. Gaines’s house slave in The Escape; or A Leap for Freedom (1858) by William Wells Brown, proved at the end of the day, that he would rather answer to a name of freedom.
My American students would forever ask me why Elesin Oba, the King’s Horseman in Wole Soyinka’s Death and the King’s Horseman (1975), was treated with reverence and cultural dignity, when, in fact, he was only a servant, an eru, to the king and was meant to “die” because the King “died”. I would always reply that Elesin Oba was not a slave, that as a servant of the King and the community, he did not, at any time, lose his status as a human being, and that an Elesin actually won greater glory by the share importance of the service of saving human lives and ensuring community harmony through his committing death to accompany the Kabiyesi, King. As Olori Elesin, leader of all King’s Horsemen, his position attracted more honor to him. Certainly no Elesin Oba would ever cease to be regarded as a human being, even if he is terribly disadvantaged in any matter.
Conclusion: Slavery and the Race Question
Anyone who still hasn’t got it that race made the big difference in the execution of the Atlantic Slave Trade should read (or cause to be read to him/her) Soyinka’s poem, “Telephone Conversation”, as evidence of a not too distant past. And I’ll be aback if he or she continues to limit his/her polemics on demeaning the African Chiefs, instead of understanding their predicament. The European slavers did not see Africans as human beings. The darkness of Africans’ skins was what, to them, defined Africans, not the lightness of Africans’ palms. I think if argument for reparation is based on racism alone, it’ll still be genuine. The French on overpowering the English dined with the English, encouraged their own princes and princesses to marry British princes and princesses, and the Romans did not chain the Greeks to trees, or pack them like sardines across oceans and seas. The European Slavers considered that subdued Africans weren’t human beings, thus they justified perpetuating anything and everything evil on them.
Yes, we need more studies into the kinds of eru traditions in Africa. We need Metalanguage scholars (the Awobuluyis, the Bamgboses, and the Dalhatu Muhammads in Nigeria) to get equivalents for some foreign words.
References
Brown, William Wells. The Escape; or A Leap for Freedom. Black Theatre USA. New York: The Free Press, 1974.
Gates, Henry Louis. “Wonders of the African World.” PBS Home Video. Wall to Wall Television, 1999.
---. Wonders of the African World. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1999.
Mazrui, Ali. The Africans: A Triple Heritage. Boston: Little, Brown, 1986. (Also in Video).
Soyinka, Wole. Death and the King’s Horseman. New York: Hill and Wang, 1975.
Soyinka, Wole. “Telephone Conversation.” A Selection of African Poetry. Introduced an annotated by K.E. Senanu and T. Vincent. Longman, 1976, 116-9.
ki nèg nwè ki nèg klè
ki nèg klè ki nèg nwè
tout nèg a nèg
nèg klè pè nèg nwè
nèg nwè pa lè wè nèg klè
nèg nwè ké wéy klè
senti i sa roune nèg klè
mè nèg klè ké wéy klè a toujou nèg
sa ki fèt pou nèg vin' blang?
blang té gen chivé pli long?
pou senblé yé nou trapé chivé plat kon fil mang!!!
mandé to fanm...!
mè pou kisa blang lé vin' nwè?
ha... savé ki avan vin' blan yé té ja nèg!
a nou mèm ké nou mèm dépi nânni nânnan...
chinwa soti, kouli soti, indyen soti, blang soti
mèm koté nèg soti
Slave? What Slave? - Part 1
A Study of the Traditional Systems of African Servitude
November 02, 2003
by Ayanna Gillian
Self Empowerment Learning Fraternity, Trinidad and Tobago
The argument that slavery was a system endemic in Africa, to which the Atlantic Slave Trade was simply incidental, was one that was used by anti- abolitionists, slave traders and later Eurocentric historians in an attempt to justify chattel slavery in the Americas and downplay the damage done to the African continent and its indigenous societies by European capitalist intervention. Similar sentiments expressed by these interest groups also stated that not only was slavery widespread and an entrenched element of African societies before and during European intervention, but that the European trade simply shifted the location and not the character of slavery, giving the impression that slaves were abundant and simply awaiting purchase by Europeans from their African masters. It was even stated that greater good was done by exporting Africans to the Americas where they would be under the " civilizing" influence of Europeans (Inikori, 156) . As we examine the question of the existence of slavery in African society before the 1400's and attempt to determine the nature and extent of such a system, the supporting views stated above must be taken as extensions of the 'conventional view' of African slavery in order for us to put it in its proper context. The creators of this view, in dictating that their slave trade was legitimate because it already existed among the people they intended to enslave, assumed a uniform definition of slavery and attempted to equate a uniquely European term and system with a very different system in Africa. Upon closer examination of the nature of the indigenous African systems of servitude in comparison with European and Arab chattel slavery, we will see that the word " slavery" in this context is not at all applicable and creates a distorted view of the complex systems of dependency that existed on the African continent for centuries. While it will be shown that varying states of 'unfreedom' did exist as part of complex, kinship-based traditional African societies, not only were the systems incomparable to European and Arab chattel slavery, but they existed on a relatively small domestic scale until the intervention of European interests. It was only when European interests became more deeply entrenched in the societies by the 17th and 18th century, that we see the increased external demand for labour and the resulting exploitation of African power structures, significantly altering the nature of the systems and causing them to resemble the chattel slavery of the Europeans.
A critical examination of the complex nature of African systems of servitude raises several questions. What have we defined as slavery? Is this definition uniform in time and space? And indeed if such slavery was endemic in Africa before the Atlantic Slave Trade, what were its defining characteristics? If these characteristics were found to be more dynamic then static, what were the influences that altered its character? The word "slave" is said to have originated in Europe when Slavic peoples of Eastern Europe were seized and exploited for their labour in conditions that resembled that of European chattel slavery in the Americas. It can be said that this was not just linguistic commonality but that the term 'slavery' was then synonymous with that particular system of chattel slavery. If one examines the nature of systems of so-called slavery throughout history, we will observe well-ordered, complex systems of servitude that did not involve the severe dislocation, inhumanity, and the creation of a continued underclass, as did that of the Atlantic Slave Trade.
It is critical that a working definition of slavery be sought. J.D Fage asserted that, "a slave was a man or woman who was owned by another person, whose labour was regarded as having economic value, and whose person had a commercial value" (Fage, 156). Others see the term slavery as applying strictly to chattel slavery, where the rights of the individual are completely absent. While the common link between almost all the definitions of slavery has been the ownership of the individual by another and this may seem to be a perfectly logical definition, the complexities and differences in the states of such people, the conditions of such ownership and the preservation of inalienable human rights varied so widely from country to country that it is difficult to develop a static idea of what constitutes slavery. In African societies, servitude was akin to an arranged marriage, whereas Chattel slavery was a state organized Economic institution. While there were persons who did exist in various states of bondage and sometimes purely as commodities, many of them possessed and effectively retained the inalienable human rights of free men and women. In traditional African systems of kinship, the members of lineage groups " owned" their members who then constituted lineage wealth. Everyone in the community is dependent upon or bound to another to some extent, whether slave or free. To say that a slave is simply the property or another does not adequately describe the condition of bonded dependents in an African context.
It is clear that European explorers, merchants and slavers who observed systems of what they termed 'slavery' operating in African societies had a poor understanding of the communal nature of the African ethos and the nature of family and kinship ties. Mbaye Gueye makes an astute observation: "The African ideal is that of a community existence based on powerful family ties with a view to a well ordered secure life. People only count as far as they are part of a harmonious, homogenous entity" (Gueye) What we see is a focus on community over individuality; persons' individual rights only exist as far as it benefits the community. As observed among the Fulani and the Bu Kerebe tribes, children who were abandoned by their own people were taken under servitude, in which case the child would then owe his saviors lifelong service. Also, adults and children could be bartered for grain in times of famine to save the rest of the group. To complicate the issue even further, the nature of these dependencies varied decidedly from state to state, in terms of acquisition, the factors that would allow someone to legally become 'enslaved', and the condition of these bonded individuals. Unredeemed hostages taken in times of war could end up in servitude, and in compensation for homicide a child of the offending clan could be taken into servitude by the clan of the victim. This particular circumstance was immortalized in the novel based on Igbo culture, Things Fall Apart (Achebe), where a child of the offending clan was sent to serve the family of one of the leading clansmen of the wronged clan. This was a sort of peace offering to prevent the clans going to war. What is to be noted in this example is that, for the most part, the child was incorporated into the family and was seen as a son. The servants/dependents did not form a separate class of labourers for the clan. The dependent could play as minor or as major a role in the clan as the elders saw fit. Some provided extra wives and children to expand a kin group, were labour to till the fields, soldiers for warfare, or they served as trading agents and officials at court.
In what was probably the most comprehensive of all the studies on the nature of African systems of servitude and dependence, authors Igor Kopytoff and Suzanne Miers in their seminal work, African Slavery as an Institution of Marginality, explore this unique systemin contrast to the European concept of enslavement. It is important to note that the African slave in the West was first and foremost a commodity. His rights as a human being were completely denied and he was granted no disability privileges, His reason for being was the extraction of his physical labour in the service of his master. His enslavement was a divinely-sanctioned condition, the result of his inferior race, culture and undeniable spiritual paucity. While his labour began as simply the meeting of a demand for much needed human resources, the racism and inhumanity that swept the western world as a result of the European slave trade and slave systems were unique to that system. The African slave in the Americas was a class apart. His progeny inherited his status, without exception. He had no means of becoming free, and no control over his destiny. His enslavement was life-long, and he could be killed and mistreated with impunity.
In the hierarchical and complex social organization of African states, the concepts of freedom and slavery were often difficult to disentangle. The Kopytoff– Miers' work borrows an anthropological term, 'rights-in-persons' which describes the strictly organized right of each person within the context of his or her social environment (Kopytoff-Miers) An excellent example of this is the tradition of the 'bride price' in patriarchal societies and the complete right of husband over the bodies of his wives and children and other members of his household. In matrilineal societies, the right to claim the children of the offspring is in the hands of the mother's line and is not transferred to the father. This shows the intrinsic dependency of each person in the society on another. While the wife is bound to her husband who can demand her labour, loyalty and sexual fidelity in exchange for protection and shelter, she cannot be called a 'slave' in the European sense of the word. Thus we see that persons are bound along a continuum of disabilities and are bound or restricted to a greater or lesser degree. (Uchendu). It is this basic premise that forms the foundation of the social organization of most African societies and what Europeans observed and erroneously termed African slavery.
What marks the dependent's condition in African contexts is the versatility and multiplicity of his status. Slaves were used to support, build and assist at all levels of the society, and thus in many societies that were still pre-currency, the human resource was the most powerful determinant of wealth, and ensured the effective survival of the clan. This is a world apart from the circumstances and conditions of African slavery in the Americas. There, slaves served the sole purpose of provision of labour, and would forever remain in an exploited underclass. There was no mobility or prospect of freedom and the reasons for acquisition were uniform. Slaves in the Americas were not human beings; they were merchandise. Thus when European slavers, anti-abolitionists and historians stated that the slave condition was already present in African societies and all they did was shift the location of the labour, they were not only wrong, but engaging in a mischievous distortion of the facts. While many Africans did exist in various states of bondage, it is there that the comparison with European-American slavery ends. African servitude cannot be fully understood simply within the triad of land, labour demands and capital (Miers & Kopytoff) While in the Americas slaves were an exploited underclass that propped up the economic and social fabric of the society, African dependents were part and parcel of the fabric of society.
While we have explored the nature of the indigenous African systems of servitude and distinguished them clearly from the slavery that existed in the Americas, attention must be paid to the prevalence of this type of servitude. Just how widespread and deeply entrenched were these systems of servitude in African societies before the 15th and 16th centuries? The answer is not so easy to determine and scholars vary in their conclusions. Walter Rodney is one of the historians most strident in his claim that there is little to no evidence that supports the existence of large groups of slaves or indentured servitude systems before European intervention. Early European slave traders who provided the fodder for the so-called 'conventional' view in question would have us believe that African rulers already had large stocks of slaves that were peripheral to their societies and available for 'fair trade' with Europeans, that "many Negroes transported to the Americas had been slaves in Africa before captivity" (Rodney 62) Rodney however was struck by the absence of literature from the period of European first contact that speaks of this widespread slaving phenomenon on the Upper Guinea Coast. Wherever the few references to 'slaves' did exist, upon investigation we find that they refer to small groups of "potential clients in the households of chiefs or refer to the subjects of absolute chiefs" (Rodney 63) and other domestic servants bound to the households.
Portuguese chroniclers were some of the earliest Europeans to explore the African coast and were notably scrupulous record-takers with respect to matters of trade. Yet in detailing all the products and commodities traded up and down the Guinea Coast, no mention is made of large numbers of slaves involved in this commerce. While Rodney asserts that non-mention in such circumstances us presumptive of non existence," others like William Phillips counter this view by stating that Muslim traders for whom these systems of slavery were a normal part of life did not record them because the slavery systems were so commonplace (Williams 114) The truth is probably somewhere between these two extremes. What these differing views do indicate however is that while small groups of domestics did exist in various complex systems of 'unfreedom', they certainly did not exist in large quantities and certainly did not form an instrumental, widespread part of African commerce with Europeans before the 15th century. While the broad continuum between slavery and freedom had probably existed in Africa from earliest times, the widespread exploitative trade in black bodies was of 'recent' invention and directly tied to external economic forces.
The role of Islamic traders on the African continent is one that is crucial in bridging the gap between indigenous servitude systems and the genocidal European-generate slave trade. According to Kwaku Parson Lynn, when Arabs arrived in Africa in earnest in the name of spreading Islam, this brought a whole new dimension to the African systems of servitude. To understand the profound effect Islam had on the nature of slavery in Africa, one must understand the Islamic ideology of slavery. All who were non-Muslim were seen as kufr, or infidels. While a Muslim could not enslave a fellow Muslim, all others were acceptable. While in traditional African servitude systems the dependents retained certain rights and privileges and were not seen as outsiders in the clan, in the Islamic world-view all slaves by virtue of their non-belief were outside of the strict lines of lineage and genealogy and were "without honour and praise and identity – moved by savage and irrational instincts; swayed by animal propensities; indeed... outside civilized life if not outside humanity itself" (Willis 4) Probably one of the best indicators of the conditions of slaves under this Islamic code was that of the Zanj. Runoko Rashidi tells of Zanj slave revolts in Baghdad:
"Here were gathered tens of thousands of East African slave laborers called Zanj. These Blacks worked in the humid salt marshes in conditions of extreme misery. Conscious of their large numbers and oppressive working conditions the Zanj rebelled on at least three occasions between the seventh and ninth centuries... The rebels themselves, hardened by years of brutal treatment, repaid their former masters in kind, and are said to have been responsible for great slaughters in the areas that came under their sway". (Rashidi)
ki nèg nwè ki nèg klè
ki nèg klè ki nèg nwè
tout nèg a nèg
nèg klè pè nèg nwè
nèg nwè pa lè wè nèg klè
nèg nwè ké wéy klè
senti i sa roune nèg klè
mè nèg klè ké wéy klè a toujou nèg
sa ki fèt pou nèg vin' blang?
blang té gen chivé pli long?
pou senblé yé nou trapé chivé plat kon fil mang!!!
mandé to fanm...!
mè pou kisa blang lé vin' nwè?
ha... savé ki avan vin' blan yé té ja nèg!
a nou mèm ké nou mèm dépi nânni nânnan...
chinwa soti, kouli soti, indyen soti, blang soti
mèm koté nèg soti
Slave? What Slave? - Part 2
A Study of the Traditional Systems of African Servitude
November 02, 2003
by Ayanna Gillian
Self Empowerment Learning Fraternity, Trinidad and Tobago
"Here were gathered tens of thousands of East African slave laborers called Zanj. These Blacks worked in the humid salt marshes in conditions of extreme misery. Conscious of their large numbers and oppressive working conditions the Zanj rebelled on at least three occasions between the seventh and ninth centuries... The rebels themselves, hardened by years of brutal treatment, repaid their former masters in kind, and are said to have been responsible for great slaughters in the areas that came under their sway". (Rashidi)
The conditions described in this extract seem to resemble the chattel slavery of Europeans that Africans would be subject to in the Americas. It is important to mention as well the prevalent view that many Arab traders had of African people. While several scholars and humanitarians wrote tracts and treatises defending Africans, they could not stem the tide of the negative attitudes that many Muslim elites had towards Africans and other minorities. The strong influence of Jewish tradition on Islamic society can be partially blamed for this, given the exegetical works of the Jewish/ Babylonian Talmud that concur that black people were cursed with blackness by God as punishment for their ancestor Ham, son of Noah. (Willis 66) While extensive scholarship has not been able to fully determine the extent of this negative attitude, one can surmise that the combination of non-belief in Islam and the blackness of Africans did not auger well for future relations.
While in the 15th century the prized commodity traded between Arab and African traders was gold, by the jihads of the 18th century, slaves soon eclipsed gold as the primary commodity. Nehemia Levtzion details the swift change in the mode of the slave trade as well as the social and political relationship between states. Islam not only created divisions between the converted and the kufr, but it also introduced a different element, that of the superiority of some tribes over others." The Islamization of the people of Bagirmi southeast of the Lake Chad made them consider themselves superior to their neighbors; proud of their supposed preeminence and eager for the profits of the slave trade they raided their own neighbors" (Levtzion 183) Islam, as a military and political force to be reckoned with by this time, forced many tribes to appear Islamic or to convert to Islam to benefit from the protection of their forces against other tribes who also were eager to share in the spoils of the slave trade. What we observe here is a dramatic shift in the indigenous African systems of servitude, which operated on a much smaller scale, to a widespread raiding and trading spree. Large portions of the population, instead of being circulated to build and serve in African tribes, were shipped off the continent to labour on plantations in the West and the Far East. This period of Islamization altered the shape of African society, and paved the way for the European entrance.
By the time of increased western European intervention in Africa, the way had already been cleared for a major shakeup in the nature of indigenous African servitude systems. " It was the steadily increasing demand for slaves as a result of foreign intervention in the affairs of the continent which brought about a fairly substantial increase in the volume of the trade, hitherto restricted to transactions on a narrow local scale. The material advantages to be gained by trading in slaves were an incentive to some of the clans to intensify their raids on neighbouring tribes..." (Gueye 150) Contrary to the assertions of early European slavers, the domestic servitude systems did not fuel the Atlantic Slave Trade. To meet the increasing demand for labour by external forces, raiding between tribes increased tremendously during this period. The collapse of Songhai and the breaking up of the land into smaller principalities favoured bitter (often European-fueled) tribal wars in which the capture of slaves became the chief push factor. Traditional laws that governed who could be enslaved, the period of time, and for what offences, were significantly altered to meet the growing demand for slave labour. Petty offenses that would have resulted in fines could now be punishable by life enslavement and debtors, who enslaved themselves and would have been freed upon the settlement of their debt, could find themselves auctioned away from their societies and shipped to the Americas. A society that once treated its dependents with respect, sometimes with even more respect than freed men, now treated them as slaves, mere commodities, and shipped them in large numbers to European-run slave ports. The traditional trade routes were now pathways for gruesome slave trains made up of long lines of " haggard, emaciated men, worn out by lack of food, dazed by the blows they were dealt, doubled over with the weight of their loads; crippled spindled-legged women covered in hideous wounds..." (Gueye 154)
The term 'slavery' cannot be uniformly applied to the systems of servitude that existed in indigenous African societies before the increased intervention of Arab and European economic interests. While people did exist in varying states of 'unfreedom' and were often bound to households, clans, kinship groups or compounds at one time or another, the distinction between a bonded servant and a free man was often so precarious that one could not be told from the other. The level of humanity, rights and privileges, and the possibility of manumission that existed in the African servitude systems were completely absent in the chattel slavery systems of the Americas. Any attempt to equate this distinctly European slave system with the African systems of servitude is not only erroneous, but when taken in the context of the various elements of this 'conventional view,' seems an attempt at willful distortion. It has been shown that the increased involvement of foreign powers significantly altered the nature of these systems and it is then that they began to take on the character of what the West understood as 'slavery'. The Atlantic Slave Trade and its outgrowths defied and altered all other traditional concepts of servitude within a community setting. What existed before in Africa was not comparable. The widespread effects of European chattel slavery ushered in a new and monstrous period of African history.
Continue to:
Islam, Colourism and the Myth of Black African Slave Traders
ki nèg nwè ki nèg klè
ki nèg klè ki nèg nwè
tout nèg a nèg
nèg klè pè nèg nwè
nèg nwè pa lè wè nèg klè
nèg nwè ké wéy klè
senti i sa roune nèg klè
mè nèg klè ké wéy klè a toujou nèg
sa ki fèt pou nèg vin' blang?
blang té gen chivé pli long?
pou senblé yé nou trapé chivé plat kon fil mang!!!
mandé to fanm...!
mè pou kisa blang lé vin' nwè?
ha... savé ki avan vin' blan yé té ja nèg!
a nou mèm ké nou mèm dépi nânni nânnan...
chinwa soti, kouli soti, indyen soti, blang soti
mèm koté nèg soti
Africans in the Diaspora have the challenge of rewriting a history that has been stained by years of distortions, omission and downright lies. One of the biggest challenges of rewriting this history has been the Atlantic Slave Trade, and one of the biggest sore points has been the idea that "Black Africans sold their own into slavery". A lack of information, a paucity of expansive scholarship and an unwillingness to have a serious discourse on Colourism as it existed in Africa even before European intervention, has contributed to this. Diaspora Africans are often quite naïve and will do anything to hold fast to the illusion that " we are all Africans" and ignore the racism that has existed among a group that is far from uniform.
In looking at the issue of Colourism I could not help seeing the links between the role of Islam in Africa and the role of Africans in the slave trade.The book, Islam and the Ideology of Slavery by John Ralph Willis is very helpful in looking at the almost imperceptible link between the enslavement of 'kufir' non-Muslims or infidels, and the belief that Black Africans were not only heathens but inherently inferior. This is not a new thought and certainly not one that originated with the Muslims coming into Africa. Several Jewish exegetical texts have their own version of the mythical Curse of Ham being blackness. Given the common origins of these two major religions, it is thus not surprising that both Jews and Muslims played some of the most important roles in the enslavement of Black Africans next to the Europeans.
In an article by Oscar L. Beard, Consultant in African Studies called, Did We Sell Each Other Into Slavery? he says "Even the case of Tippu Tip may well fall into a category that we might call the consequences of forced cultural assimilation via White (or Red) Arab Conquest over Africa. Tippu Tip's father was a White (or Red) Arab slave raider, his mother an unmixed African slave. Tip was born out of violence, the rape of an African woman. It is said that Tip, a "mulatto", was merciless to Africans."
The story of Tippu Tip who is one of the most widely known slave traders has always posed a problem for historians, especially Afrocentric historians in the Diaspora trying to find some way to reconcile themselves to the idea of an 'African slave trader'. The fact that Tippu Tip was not only Muslim, but 'mulatto' is vital. The common ideology of Judaism and Islam where Black Africans are concerned is certainly no secret.While in some Islamic writings we see an almost mystical reverence for Africans, especially an over sexualized concept of Ethiopian women who were the preferred concubines of many wealthy Arab traders and Kings, in others there is distinct racism. Add to this the religious fervor of the Muslim invaders, their non-acceptance or regard for traditional African religions, and the obvious economic and political desires for which religion was used as a tool, and we get an excellent but little spoken of picture of Islam in Africa.
Historians did not often record or think of the ethnicity of these 'Africans' who sold their brothers and sisters into slavery. As part of our distorted historical legacy, we too in the Diaspora buy the idea that all Africans were uniform and 'brothers', but the true picture, especially at this time was not so. Centuries of contact with Europe, Asia, North Africa produced several colour / class gradients in the continent, divisions fostered by the foreigners. This may have been especially prominent in urban and economic centres. When we combine the converting, military force of Islam sweeping across western and eastern Africa placing a virtual economic stranglehold on villages and trading centers that were Kufir, with the intermixing of lighter-skinned Muslim traders from the North and East Africa creating an unprecedented population of mixed, lighter skinned Africans who began to form the elites of the trading classes we can see how a society begins to change.
Some historians have tended to downplay, or completely ignore the potential for change in scenario. It has even been suggested that one cannot transplant a modern day problem outside of its historical context. However, we see this creeping problem of colourism occurring all over the continent. In the Portuguese colonies of Angola and Mozambique where European traders and administrators were encouraged to intermarry, the elitist, trader class was largely Mulatto and Catholic. If we look at the situation in Ethiopia with the age-old oppression of the original Ethiopians, the Oromo of indigenous Cushitic stock, by the more Arabized Amhara this too has its roots in colour prejudice. There were hints of this occurring in many other instances at crucial points of contact between indigenous black Africans and lighter-skinned foreigners or mixed Africans and the most significant of these were in the areas of severe Islamic incursion.
Many towns and villages converted to Islam because of the protection that the military banner of Islam could offer them in a changing economic, political and social landscape. But the more damaging result was the many light skinned, converted Africans, children of mixed encounters that now felt a sense of superiority over their dark skinned, black African counterparts. Colourism is indeed of ancient vintage. The truth of the matter is that fair skinned Arabs' racist attitude towards Blacks existed even before they invaded Africa. The evidence for this can be found in how they dealt with the Black inhabitants of Southern Arabia before they entered Africa as Muslims. Discerning readers and thinkers can look at this and many other accounts of this time and get a clearer picture of the inherent racism of this situation. When we combine this with the desire for African slave labour by Europeans it was no large feat for these often lighter skinned, Islamized Africans to enslave the black kufir, whom they barely endowed with a shred of humanity. And of course jumping on their bandwagon would have been those black Africans with deep inferiority complexes, who would have been only too eager to do the duty of the 'superior' Muslims in an effort to advance themselves. These facts are certainly not hidden and the patterns are everywhere, even today but it is we who do not like to see. For centuries we certainly have not been conditioned for Sight.
This leads us to another direct way colourism played itself out in the slave trade and this is in the 'type' of Africans who were enslaved. The biggest victims of slavery were undoubtedly the darkest Africans of what was called the "Negroid" type. If you look at old maps and documents by early European explorers you can note that the parts of the continent that they explored was divided by their crude definitions of what they saw as different African ethnicities. The regions of West and Central Africa were seen as the place of the "Negroes" which was distinct from Ethiopian Africans and even more so the lighter, more Arabized North Africans. We cannot say that NO Africans we taken from the north, but by and large most slaves that came to the West Indies, Americas etc were of the type mentioned above.
Beard continues, "In reality, slavery is an human institution. Every ethnic group has sold members of the same ethnic group into slavery. It becomes a kind of racism; that, while all ethnic groups have sold its own ethnic group into slavery, Blacks can't do it.When Eastern Europeans fight each other it is not called tribalism. Ethnic cleansing is intended to make what is happening to sound more sanitary. What it really is, is White Tribalism pure and simple."But the thing is that this thing we call 'slavery' never was a uniform institution. When people speak of slavery they immediately think of chattel slavery as practiced as a result of the Atlantic Slave Trade and apply this definition to indigenous African servitude systems, which bore little or no resemblance to chattel slavery. It is misleading to say, "Every ethnic group has sold members of the same ethnic group into slavery. It becomes a kind of racism; that, while all ethnic groups have sold its own ethnic group into slavery, Blacks can't do it" as it denies the complexities of that particular colonial, chattel slavery situation that existed between Africans and Europeans.
Servitude systems that existed in Africa, and in other indigenous communities cannot be compared to racist slave systems in the Western world and to this day we attempt to try to see this slavery in the same context. People bring up accounts of Biblical slavery, of serfdom in Europe and yes, of servitude in Africa and attempt to paint all these systems with the same brush. However NO OTHER SLAVE SYSTEM has created the never-ending damaging cycle as the Atlantic Slave Trade. West Indian poet Derek Walcott has stated his feeling that our penchant for forgetting is a defense mechanism against pain, that if we were to take a good hard look at our history, at centuries of victimization, it would be too much for us to handle and we would explode. Well I say we are exploding anyway and in many cases from bombs that are not even our own. We have begun the long hard road of rewriting our ancient history, of recovering our old and noble legacy. Let us not stop and get cold feet now when the enemy now appears to take on a slightly darker hue. We must look at the slave trade in its OWN context, complete with all the historic and psychological peculiarities that have made it the single most damaging and enduring system of exploitation and hatred ever perpetrated in the recent memory of mankind. Until we do we will not escape its legacy.
ki nèg nwè ki nèg klè
ki nèg klè ki nèg nwè
tout nèg a nèg
nèg klè pè nèg nwè
nèg nwè pa lè wè nèg klè
nèg nwè ké wéy klè
senti i sa roune nèg klè
mè nèg klè ké wéy klè a toujou nèg
sa ki fèt pou nèg vin' blang?
blang té gen chivé pli long?
pou senblé yé nou trapé chivé plat kon fil mang!!!
mandé to fanm...!
mè pou kisa blang lé vin' nwè?
ha... savé ki avan vin' blan yé té ja nèg!
a nou mèm ké nou mèm dépi nânni nânnan...
chinwa soti, kouli soti, indyen soti, blang soti
mèm koté nèg soti
Les Africains dits anglophones sont , je crois un peu plus en avance que Nous les Africains soi-disants francophones ,surtout dans ce combat de restitution de l'Hitoire de l'esclavage . Grioo est une exception ...
Abdul- Rasheed Na’Allah montre une différence dans les termes que je cherchais depuis un bout , il parle de servitude et d'Esclavage , un servant n'est pas un Esclave !
Il y a entre ces deux termes le mot Déshumanisation , comme ces stars qui pour mousser leur image humainise des animaux ( qui les boufferaient au moindre creux...) en les défendant contre vents et marées , les EUropéens esclavagistes ont fait le chemin contraire , ils nous ont mis en servitude , mais , le must fut de nous déshumaniser.
Pakira a écrit :
Citation:
When Africans practiced indigenous servitude, I’m not sure the African master had manufactured chains and padlocks to further dehumanize fellow Africans. Part of the “conditions” Europeans created for the Atlantic Slave Trade was the importation of chains, padlocks, guns, and various crude gadgets to Africa, and the obvious demonstration of their uses to the Africans. If the account we heard about how Europeans dehumanized King Jaja of Opobo were true, if the story about how they subjugated the proud Kingdom of the Benin people was anything to learn from, Africans had to cooperate when Europeans came to them with carrots asking to ship away fellow Africans. For after carrots would have come heavy canes
.
La servitude subie par certains Africains (dûe la plupart du temps par après les guerres tribale ) ,n 'avait rien avec l'Esclavage telle qu'imaginée par les Européens .
Quant à Mathieu Kérékou , que sait-il sur l'Histoire pour se prononcer sur un tel sujet ? _________________ "Always be intolerant to ignorance but understanding of illiteracy (..)in those homely sayings (mother wit) was couched the collective wisdom of generations" I know why the caged bird sings, p99, Maya Angelou
Je vous prie de bien vouloir m'excuser car je n'ai pas lu entièrement tous les textes de ce fil, ma maîtrise de l'anglais n'étant pas assez importante.
Non ! tu n'es pas excusé ...vu les trucs à deux cents que tu vas nous sortir . Quant à ta non-maîtrise de l'anglais , tu n'as qu'à t'en prendre à toi-même !
Lebourse l'unilingue a écrit :
Citation:
Cependant, je crois qu'il y a une certaine hypocrisie dans l'emploi des termes de "servitudes" et "d'esclavage
Effectivement , quand on ne comprend rien à une langue et qu'on veut passer pour intelligent , on se permet alors comme toi de paraphraser d'autres , pour raconter des ignominies comme ceux-là !
Lebourse le fameux unilingue écrit encore :
Citation:
En effet, l'esclavage en Afrique ne ressemblait certainement pas au commerce triangulaire tel que le pratiquaient les européens avec sa déshumanisation, son nombre absolument effroyable de morts...
Tu as avoué ne pas savoir lire l'anglais , fallait ajouter que tu ne savais pas non plus lire le Francais...
Mais qui t'as parlé d'esclavage entre Africains ? J'ai repris l'auteur qui parlait de Servitude , je l'ai même mis en gras , je ne vois pas où diable peut-il avoir de confusion dans les termes pour que tu repètes autre chose ?
Lebourse le francophone unilingue a écrit :
Citation:
Cependant, la définition de "servitude" recoupe très exactement celle de l'esclavage tel qu'il était pratiqué en Europe durant l'antiquité. Les esclave en Grèce ou à Rome n'étaient pas déshumanisés, ils avaient même des droits, la possibilité de les faire valoir en justice (ce qui aurait été totalement improbable durant la traite des noirs à l'époque moderne et contemporaine), faisaient même partie de la famille
Si servitude voulait donc dire Esclavage , pkoi l'auteur aurait pris la peine de différencier ces deux termes ?
La grèce antique ? mais qui t'as parlé de Grèce antique ici ?
L'auteur repète bien qu'il a existé de la servitude parceque beaucoup des nôtre ont fait des guerres et mis en servitude les perdants et leurs femmes , mais ...aucun de ceux qui mettaient ces autres en servitude n'ont crée des chaînes et des cadenas pour plus tard les déhumaniser . Les conditions crées par ces barbares qui ne repondaient au goût du lucre étaient-ils les mêmes que celles que les Romains ont fait aux leurs ? Est-ce qu`'après 500 ans cette haine qu'avaient les romains contre ceux qu'ils avaient mis en Servitude ( comme tu dis !!) perdure jusqu'à aujourd'hui ?
Lebourse a encore écrit :
Citation:
En conclusion, j'ai l'impression que l'on cherche à nous dire que ces gens n'ont pas été ce qu'ils ont été pour d'autres raisons que celles qui président à la recherche historique. Un peu comme si les victimes des guerres napoléoniennes n'étaient pas des victimes de guerre parce que Hiroshima était pire ou plus abouti d'un point de vue technologique
Si au moins la documentation n'existait pas pour te repondre convenablement , elle existe et elle est sous tes narines , mais comme tu n'es pas capable de la lire , que veux-tu qu'on fasse ?
L'auteur ne dis pas que la Servitude en Afrique n'a pas existé , il dit qu'elle a existé ,mais elle ne fut pas ce qu'on veut nous faire croire .
Trêve de discussions, demain je te reviendrais avec des passages du texte ( si j'ai le temps ) que j'essaerais de te traduire pour te faire comprendre exactement de quoi on parle ici .
Je suis un peu brûlé , et il se fait tard , à demain donc ... _________________ "Always be intolerant to ignorance but understanding of illiteracy (..)in those homely sayings (mother wit) was couched the collective wisdom of generations" I know why the caged bird sings, p99, Maya Angelou
Mon post sera long , j'espère que tu prendras le temps de me lire ...
Je rentre directement dans le vif du sujet ...
Femi Okomolafé fait d'abord un rapide tour sur toute la panoplie de terrorisme Historique sur lesquels certains Historiens Occidentaux sont passés pour se dédouaner , entre autre que les Africains eux-mêmes se sont enrichis pendant L'Esclavage , que l'Esclavage existait déjà avant leur arrivée , que par rapport à tout ce que cela a pu améner de bien , la colonisation fut une bonne chose pour l'AFrique.
...En fait , les mêmes Historiens se demandent en définitive , pkoi serait-il bon que ce soient juste les Européens qui devraient s'excuser, si tous avons participé à tous ces drames ?
L'auteur précise que malheureusement que beaucoup d'Africains de la diaapora sont aménés à penser comme ces mythomanes Occidentaux .
Il termine ce paragraphe en voulant bien sûr mettre tout au clair en mettant les choses dans leurs contextes historiques , de telles manières qu'on comprenne , la différence entre L'Esclavage et Servitude ( la dernière phrase est de moi pourque tu comprenne où on va ) .
Je passe sur "les avantages du Nazisme"...pour ne pas melanger les choses
Citation:
Very often, the embalmers of Western history have tried to gloss over the sordid trade in African slaves by Europeans, for over four centuries, by putting up the argument that lot of Africans also made a fortune in the dealings. From these 'mythorians' we often hear the stories that slavery was rampant in Africa before the Europeans came along. Not only is slavery been argued away, the colonial oppression of Africa is also been massaged to make it appear less cruel. We are told that the colonies also enjoyed the fruits of colonization. Christianity and Western-styled education are often cited as the 'benefits' Africans derived from colonialism. These apologists then asked why must it be that all the opprobrium are directed against Europeans alone?"
Even more unfortunate is the fact that some Africans, especially those in the diaspora, have bought into these pseudo-arguments.
In this essay I shall try to put slavery in proper historical perspectives, and show how the chattel slavery introduced by capitalism differs from all other forms of slavery.
To those who said Africans benefitted from slavery and colonialism, one can argue, with the same [twisted] logic, that the countries conquered by Nazis also enjoyed the fruits of Nazism. We can say that Holland, which was conquered and oppressed by German Nazis, also benefitted from their forced oppression. We can argue that the French, the Belgian, and the Dutch people who were forced into labor camps also benefitted! This manner of thinking is, of course, simply outrageous
------
Je passe sur la définition dans la religion chrétienne et juive de ce qu'est un esclave ( j'Y réviendrais ) , en me focusant sur l'idée maîtresse de l'Esclavage tel que pratiqué par les Occidentaux .
Il montre d'abord que c'est le seul "Esclavage" ( celui des Noirs ) , qui fut établi à des fins purement commerciaux , donc une pure invention Capitaliste .C'etait une mode capitaliste que tout soit fait avec gigantisme , il n'en fallait pas plus pour constater que les Esclaves étaient dans ce commerce la matière première .
Les Africains mis en esclavage , n'avait aucun droit , ne pouvait se marier , ils étaient dépouillés de leur personalité et leur humanité .
Comme référence il donne l'auteur Noir Éric Williams ( Slavery to Capitalism ) .
Citation:
The Atlantic slave-trade was different from all these earlier slavery in several respects. Most enormously important is that it was the first form of slavery that was solely motivated by commercial incentives. In earlier times slaves were used as domestic workers and soldiers, since there were no plantations or industrial factories where millions of slave-labor was needed. The African slave-trade was a capitalist invention. Readers are directed to Slavery and Capitalism by Eric Williams.
It was the large-scale capitalist mode of production which required cheap labors that induced the slave trade. It was the Industrial Revolution in Europe that made it necessary to traffic in human lives on a colossal scale.
Slaves in earlier times enjoyed social and individual rights - like marriage, freedom to raise a family, speak their language and worship their gods, rights which were denied the African slaves exported to the Americas. Africans captured and taken into the new world were stripped of all their personality and humanity - they could not even bear their own names.
------
Fémi donne en bas , certaines pistes pour comprendre qu'on ne peut pas , sous pretexte que certaines pratiques de servitude existaient même dans l'ancienne Grèce , EUrope ect...justifier l'Esclavage tel que pratiqué par L'Occident sur l'AFrique.
Les versets de la bible sont mis pour expliquer qu'au delà de la servitude , un "Esclave" pouvait parler sa langue , garder son nom , ne pas être dépouillé de son humanité de sa personnalité , et pouvait même être libre après un certain moment , toute chose qui n'a rien à voir avec ce qui s'est pratiqué pendant la traite Africaine Outre-ATlantique ...
Tout ca pour te montrer la différence entre ces deux notions ( Esclavage et servitude )
Malgré que les juifs furent mis en esclavage plusieurs fois au cours de l'Histoire , justifie t-il l'Holocauste ? comme pour dire , est-ce parceque la servitude a existé en AFrique que cela justifie la forme d'Esclavage dont nous fûmes victimes ?
Citation:
As any student of history knows, it was not only in Africa that slavery was rampant in ancient times. The Hebrew, Greek, Roman history tells of slavery. Watching slaves butchered each other was a game enjoyed by the decadent rulers of the Roman Empire. The institution of slavery got mentioned several times in the Christian Bible: 'Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their that are with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession.' (Leviticus, 25, 44-46). 'If thou buy an Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve: and in the seventh year he shall go out free for nothing. If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself: if he were married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master have given him a wife, and she have born him sons or daughters; the wife and her children shall be her master's, and he shall go out by himself. And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free: Then his master shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an aul; and he shall serve him for ever.' (Exodus XXI, 2-6). These are just two of the examples of the Hebrew god's opinion of slavery. The quotations are from the Christian bible.
The Jews, like many other people, have been enslaved several times. But does the fact that they have been oppressed several times in the past lessen the enormity of the holocaust?
------
Pour préciser son idée , Fémi apporte d'autres arguments :
Il explique que dans l'ancien temps , les esclaves ( je n'aime pas l'appellation faite ici , mais comme c'est ce que l'auteur ecrit...) étaient en majorité capturés à la guerre , donc c'étaient avant tout des guerriers , et comme tels , ils n'étaient pas vus comme la propriété de leur maître , mais ils étaient bien traités par ceux-ci parcequ'on ne savait jamais quand un des leurs pourrait se lever et reprendre les reines du pouvoir , il cite Moïse comme l'un de ces esclaves ...
En AFrique le gouverneur de Bornu , l'ALafin du Yorubaland et les grands rois Haoussa gouvernaient par des esclaves diriger la plupart de leurs provinces , certains même devenaient très puissants... « j'ajouterais perso, que cette pratique se voit très souvent en Afrique , en fait , l'esclave qui ne dépend que de toi , aura moins tendance à essayer de t'évincer que ton Neuveu ou ton frère ».
Vois-tu , par rapport à cet "esclavage" ( que l'autre auteur nomme Servitude ) plus haut n'avait rien de commercial , l'Esclavage Africain fait par les Occidentaux , à la grande différence avec ces autres manières de Servitudes Africaines , eu besoin pour se justifier et perdurer, d'idéologues , de scientifiques et d'Historiens.
Citation:
In older times, slaves were not regarded as properties of their masters, manumission was possible and occurred frequently. Since slaves in those days were generally captured soldiers, they're treated humanely, because the possibility always existed that a military or spiritual giant could arise from their tribe and turn the tide in their favor. Moses was such a figure. We read about the account of his leading the Hebrews out of Egypt in the Christian Bible. These are some of the qualitative differences, between the Atlantic slavery and earlier forms of slavery. They are important differences which the ideologists, masqeurading as scientists and historians, want to gloss over.
"Slaves became profitable after the discovery of the New World had established a seemingly insatiable demand for workers on the plantations. Slavery was not new to Africa, but it had existed primarily in its domestic form-involving rights as well as duties.In Bornu the kings sent slaves to govern their provinces and Hausa kings also often ruled through slaves. In Yorubaland, slaves of the ALAFIN often attain great power. It was the Europeans who turned slavery into an industry and introduced such well-documented barbarities as the rigors of the 'middle passage' (across the Atlantic)." Walter Schwarz, Nigeria, Pall Mall Press. p.69).
------
L'auteur après avoir fait la différence entre l'Esclavage AFricain fait par les Occidentaux et la Servitude entre Africains, repond à une question que beaucoup d'AFricains outre-mer se posent :
Pkoi les Africaisneux-mêmes ont-il participé à ce traffic ?
Étant donné que dans la notion Africaine de l'Esclavage ( celle expliquée plus haut ) il n'y n'avait pas la notion de supériorité ,invoquée par les Occidentaux pour se justifier , et qu'il était très en Afrique habituel de constater que des enfants de Servants pouvaient être adoptés par le maître du Servant , et que le maître pouvait même marier une femme-Servante , et que les enfants qui naissaient de cette Union pouvaient s'ils sont talentueux devenir même Roi comme le Roi Jaja Odopo du Nigéria , ces Africains qui pratiquaient cette forme de Servitude , ne pouvaient que s'en tenir à ce qu'ils savaient de la Servitude des Africains Outre-mer !
Pour eux donc , il ne pouvait pas existé une autre sorte de Servitude que celle faite en Afrique ( s'ils savaient ...! ) .
Fémi donne l'exemple de Madame Tinubu qui était bel et bien une slave-trader ( ca ne me tente pas de traduire ce mot !) est devenue une fervente Abolitioniste lorsqu'elle s'est rendu compte de la différence entre l'Esclavage des Noirs en Amérique et ce que les Africains pratiquaient entre eux !
Citation:
People have asked why Africans themselves engaged in the slave trade. Given the function of slavery in African societies, the origin of their participation is not too difficult to understand.
First and foremost, slavery was not confused with the notion of superiority and inferiority, a notion later invoked as justification for black slavery in America. On the contrary, it was not at all uncommon for African owners to adopt slave children or to marry slave women, who then became full members of the family. Slaves of talent accumulated property and in some instances reached the status of kings;Jaja of Opobo (in Nigeria) is a case in point. Lacking contact with American slavery, African traders could be expected to assume that the lives of slaves overseas would be as much as they were in Africa; they had no way of knowing that whites in America associated dark colors with sub-human qualities and status, or that they would treat slaves as chattels generation after generation. When Nigeria's Madame Tinubu, herself a slave-trader, discovered the difference between domestic and non-African slavery, she became an abolitionist, actively rejecting what she saw as the corruption of African slavery by the unjust and inhumane habits of its foreign practitioners and by the motivation to make war for profit on the sale of captives.
-------
L'auteur dit que les mythomanes Occidentaux dans leur cabale contre ceux d'entre nous qui nous blâmons nous-mêmes , qu'ils ne font jamais mention de ces grands Reines et Rois Africains qui se sont battus contre eux pour arrêter l'Esclavage.
Il donne l'exemple de Mani-Congo qui demandait au Roi portuguais Jean-3, de ne plus avoir d'esclaves ou de marché d'esclaves dans ses terres.
L'auteur cite un esclavagiste , qu'il qualifie de Barbare ( ce mot qui est utilisé à d'autres fins aujourd'hui ), du nom de Conneau qui dit lui-même qu'être en Servitude en Afrique était énéralement en guise de punition ,
pour ceux qui avaient violé de serieux tabus , pour les criminels , mais spécialement pour les prisonniers de guerre , il explique aussi qu'il existe des règles claires pour la manière avec laquelle un ERU doit être traité , il n'est absolument pas question qu'il travaille dans un champs ...
Citation:
no mention is made of many great African Kings and Queens who died fighting the slave-raids. Mani-Congo, the ruler of a Congo state wrote king John III of Portugal entreating that, "... we need from your kingdom no other than priests and people to teach in schools, and no other goods but wine and flour for the holy sacrament: that is why we beg of Your Highness to help and assist us in this matter, commanding the factors that they should send here neither mercenaries nor wares, because it is our will that in these kingdoms, there should not be any trade in slaves or markets for slaves."
Slavery in Africa was punishment; as even a barbarian like Conneau recognized, ". . .it was meted out to violators of serious tabus, to criminals, and especially to enemies captured in war. Muslims in particular used slavery in lieu of death sentence. Bondage instead of death was the punishment for truly heinous offenses, as well as a solution to the problem of getting rid of one's captured enemies. . ." Conneau, op. cit. p.viii.Language, they say, defines those that uses it. The fact that slavery in Africa does not have all the negative connotations and brutalities associated with the chattel slavery, could be seen from the Yorubas who have the same word 'ERU' for both slaves and prisoners of war. To them both are unfortunate victims of wars. They are kept to serve terms and there are strict rules on how they should be treated. They are never engaged in plantations (there were none) with their mouths padlocked, they are not chained like cattle in pens.
Euh...Je te laisse sur cette partie du texte du Sieur Fémi , je dois aller quelquepart , je te reviendrais surement plus tard .
Comme tu l'as remarqué je n'ai pas traduit le texte de Abdul Rashhed , pour la simple raison que j'ai pris ce qui m'intéressait dans le sien , juste pour dire que quelquesoit l'auteur les reponses à tes questions se retrouvent partout .
Désolé pour les fautes , je ne me suis pas relu ... _________________ "Always be intolerant to ignorance but understanding of illiteracy (..)in those homely sayings (mother wit) was couched the collective wisdom of generations" I know why the caged bird sings, p99, Maya Angelou
Lol,tu raconte n'importe quoi mon gars Sincerement il ya des centaines de topic sur ce forum qui doivent mettre la puçe à l'oreille des gens:
L'esclavage que les blancs nous ont infligés est le plus grand crime de l'histoire de l'humanité
On a, à ce jour jamais connut une telle barbarie dans l'histoire de l'humanité!!!!!!
Pour la première fois des considération raçiales en été mise en avance
Citation:
.In Bornu the kings sent slaves to govern their provinces and Hausa kings also often ruled through slaves. In Yorubaland, slaves of the ALAFIN often attain great power. It was the Europeans who turned slavery into an industry and introduced such well-documented barbarities as the rigors of the 'middle passage' (across the Atlantic)."
^^^^A Bornu,des "esclaves" était gouverneur!!!
Et je co-sign les explications de Gnata.
Mais comme je l'ai dit le texte le plus interressant est celui de Abdul- Rasheed Na’Allah
Citation:
The philosophy of eniyan (enia) l’aso would prove that Africans (or Yoruba people) who captured opponents during inter- ethnic wars, used them to boost their own population. Some powerful warriors married female captors, and other captors served their masters in various economic and cultural capacities. Without doubt, this attitude is terrible and degrading of their fellow human beings, but it is far less callous than the European slavers’ subjugation of Africans. African practice of servitude is not reason enough to initiate or justify the Atlantic Slave Trade. The farms worked, and the economies developed by the indigenous African labor were Africa’s. Descendants of hitherto laborers have become political leaders in many parts of Africa. If our searchlights are sharp enough we will find among contemporary African presidents some whose foreparents were domestic farm workers.
Eru is simply a servant. Serf is far better a translation of eru than “Slave”. Eru Oba, King’s servant. The Yoruba persons compete so well with the Europeans and easily locate equivalent cultural element from their locality as shown in the Ilorin Yoruba humorous adage
Le mot "Eru" en Yoruba signifie servant,ou plus particulièrement serf,rien avoir avec le statut que nous avions chez les blancs.
Citation:
Many contemporary Hausa scholars have used bauta for slavery. However, bauta in Hausa gangariya, deep-rooted Hausa, is worship or service, and many will say, na bautawa Allah, “I worshiped God.” Na bauta wa sarki, “I served the king!” Na bauta maka can even be extended to mean “I served/respected you”. Perhaps Eru Oba will be the same as Dogarin Sarkin in Hausa, or bawan sarki. Because of the importance of the “service” meaning of the word bawa, many Hausa people today answer to the name Bawa. I don’t think any person will like to be called “slave”, in terms of the Atlantic Slave. Uncle Toms won’t use the word “Slave” as a first name. Cato, Dr. Gaines’s house slave in The Escape; or A Leap for Freedom (1858) by William Wells Brown, proved at the end of the day, that he would rather answer to a name of freedom.
Chez les hausa,le mot "bauta" qui est traduit à tord par "esclave",signifie servant aussi,ils disent: "na bautawa Allah" je sers allah;"Na bauta wa sarki" je sers le roi ....
Bref,continuez à penser que les européens veulent qu'il y'ait équitter,c'est parce que nous avons survécus qu'ils vont continuer à nous détruire mentalement,ils veulent se déculpabiliser au maximum.Est qu'ils emmerdent les amérindiens?Non,car ils ont pratiquement disparus,ils ne gênent pas,nous nous gênons... _________________ "tout nèg a nèg
ki nèg nwè ki nèg klè
ki nèg klè ki nèg nwè
tout nèg a nèg
nèg klè pè nèg nwè
nèg nwè pa lè wè nèg klè
nèg nwè ké wéy klè
senti i sa roune nèg klè
mè nèg klè ké wéy klè a toujou nèg
sa ki fèt pou nèg vin' blang?
blang té gen chivé pli long?
pou senblé yé nou trapé chivé plat kon fil mang!!!
mandé to fanm...!
mè pou kisa blang lé vin' nwè?
ha... savé ki avan vin' blan yé té ja nèg!
a nou mèm ké nou mèm dépi nânni nânnan...
chinwa soti, kouli soti, indyen soti, blang soti
mèm koté nèg soti
Lebourse , Mon texte avait l'air un peu baclé vu le peu de temps que j'avais , mais bon tu as saisis l'essentiel , c'est tant mieux.
Lebourse dit :
Citation:
- D'une part, je ne vois pas quel recul prennent ces auteurs par l'emploi du qualificatif de mythomane concernant les auteurs européens. Encore faudrait-il savoir de quels auteurs européens il s'agit, et quand bien même cela augure d'un parti pris pour le moins malheureux. Il n'est pas besoin d'insulter pour contredire.
Si tu avais déjà lu ce que la plupart des Occidentaux ont écrit sur l'esclavage , tu ne viendrais pas nous paler de "recul devant ces mythomanes" .Je te recommande donc le livre de Pétré-grenouilleau sur la traite négrière ...Qui insulte qui lorsqu'on raconte n'importe quoi juste pour se dédouaner de tout le mal fait pendant l'esclavage ?
Lebourse a écrit :
Citation:
- Deuxièmement, cette atténuation de l'esclavage interne à l'Afrique, en le remplaçant par le terme de "servitude", devient franchement ridicule, au point même qu'il embarasse les auteurs, le lecteur, et ce, dans la seule perspective de ne pas appeler les choses par leur nom. L'esclavage connait bien des avatars, il ne s'est pas uniquement traduit dans l'histoire dans sa version commerciale de l'époque moderne, on peut même dire que ses formes les plus basiques concernent les prisonniers de guerre et les personnes qui connaissent une déchéance. Est-ce par voie de conséquence une spécificité africaine? La réponse est non. Est-ce que le fait qu'il n'y ait pas de haine pour l'esclave, que celui-ci ait une ...
Le terme Servitude , est justement ce qui ressemble le plus à ce qui se pratiquait dans ces temps en Afrique , nous savons tous l'explication du terme Esclave dans le sens Occidental , et vus les explications ici , ce sont deux choses différents .
Dans ma précipitation , j'ai émi de noter le terme ÉRU en Yoruba qui veut dire autant servant que prisonnier de guerre , Pakira l'a noté ! il a noté aussi le terme Haoussa Bauta ...
Bref , libre à toi si toutes ces explications te semblent risibles , nous n'avons malheureusement pas le même macabre sens de l'humour que toi.
Certains "détails" de l'Histoire sont fondamentaux pour comprendre mieux ce qui c'est vraiment passé , et tous ces détails mis ensemble par ces auteurs , nous font réaliser qu'il y a eu trop de mythomanie autour de ce drame .
Mais bon comme l'a dit Pakira , tu peux continuer a nier ce qui semble beaucoup plus compréhensible que ces fantasmes d'historiens mythomanes qui ont traversé le temps , depuis qu'ils voient que nous n'avons pas disparus , ils tentent toout pour se dédouaner .... _________________ "Always be intolerant to ignorance but understanding of illiteracy (..)in those homely sayings (mother wit) was couched the collective wisdom of generations" I know why the caged bird sings, p99, Maya Angelou
il y a une certaine hypocrisie dans l'emploi des termes de "servitudes" et "d'esclavage
Ah bon?
Citation:
l'esclavage en Afrique ne ressemblait certainement pas au commerce triangulaire tel que le pratiquaient les européens avec sa déshumanisation, son nombre absolument effroyable de morts...
Donc c'était pas la même chose, pourquoi alors vouloir tout mettre sous le même terme?
Citation:
la définition de "servitude" recoupe très exactement celle de l'esclavage tel qu'il était pratiqué en Europe durant l'antiquité.
Alors, là il faut savoir... c'est pareil ou c'est pas pareil?
Citation:
Les esclave en Grèce ou à Rome n'étaient pas déshumanisés, ils avaient même des droits, la possibilité de les faire valoir en justice
N'est-ce pas Aristote qui a défini l'esclave grec comme un cheptel humain?
Citation:
j'ai l'impression que l'on cherche à nous dire que ces gens n'ont pas été ce qu'ils ont été pour d'autres raisons que celles qui président à la recherche historique.
Non, plus exactement, ils n'ont pas été ce qui t'arrangerait qu'ils aient été.
Sérieusement: les pays fondés sur l'esclavage national ne peuvent pas vendre leurs esclaves en masse, ils en ont besoin avant tout pour les corvées étatiques...
Donc même ta propre idée va à l'encontre de ce que tu avances.
Ensuite, j'insiste: pas d'esclave ou de catégorie sociale endogène assimilable. C'est un fait. L'usage du terme répond à une pauvreté du langage ou de la langue française à ce niveau. Mais laisses-moi te préciser quelque chose:
le serf n'est pas un esclave juridiquement, socialement, philosophiquement. Ses conditions de vies sont trop au-dessus de celle d'esclave tout en restant misérable et privé des libertés fondamentales.
Côté africain, il n'y a pas de catégorie sociale privée de libertés. Comment tu fais l'équivalence entre un élément inexistant et un élément spécifique à une civilisation?
Citation:
"Esclavage: état, condition d'esclave. ->servitude...
Soumission à une autorité tyrannique.-> asservissement, oppression, servitude..."
Rien de tel en Afrique sinon merci de préciser quelle époque, quels royaumes, quels fondements, quelles lois, quels catégories sociales etc...
En parlant de catégories sociales, l'esclave est en marge de la société... en Afrique pré-traite, personne ne l'est, si bien que même l'étranger a des droits -alors qu'en terre des "droits de l'homme..." ce n'est toujours pas le cas en 2006...
Citation:
L'esclavage ne pouvant et surtout ne devant être le fait que des européens, il devient impensable de le prononcer à l'égard d'africains.
Ne serait-il pas plus correct de transcrire ta pose victimaire par "l'esclavage ne peut pas être le fait uniquement des européens. Il faut que les noirs aussi l'aient pratiqué, puisque nous l'avons pratiqué".
Sauf que l'on ne le dira jamais assez, l'esclave provient étymologiquement de l'exploitation des slaves... (le nom est resté tel quel en anglais) et leur vente sur les places publiques.
Pas de correspondance en Afrique pré-traite.
Citation:
J'espère que l'on peut évoquer Balzac dans le forum littérature!
Pour la note d'humour c'est raté, le sujet est "littérature négro-africaine"... la prochaine fois peut-être
Citation:
Etait-ce dans un but utilitaire, oui, comme l'esclavage mis en place par les nations européennes, et ils touchaient les perdants aussi.
C'est ça. Nicolas V écrit grossomodo "expropriez-les, asservissez-les à perpétuité ainsi que leurs propriétés, possessions, biens et principautés, îles et duchés", dans son romanus pontifex, 8 janvier 1454 à Alphonse du Portugal, pour exproprier etc... les noirs et les asservir à perpétuité.
But utilitaire? Non, c'est avant tout une conquête et la précision "utilitaire" est parfaitement superflue, personne ne fait de conquêtes inutiles. Toutes les conquêtes, tous les assassinats, tous les meurtres, génocides, crimes ont un but "utilitaire". Ce qui les rend criminels c'est précisément de faire passer cette fin "utilitaire" au-dessus du respect d'autrui, de la dignité et de la vie humaine.
Drôle de plaidoyer, motivé à mon sens par une culpabilité et un racisme latent mal assumés.
Citation:
Est-ce que le fait qu'il n'y ait pas de haine pour l'esclave, que celui-ci ait une possibilité d'élévation sociale par l'adoption, le mariage, les fonctions qui lui sont confiées, constituent une spécificité africaine?
Et le fait qu'il ne soit pas privé de libertés, plus précisément privé d'aucune liberté? Comment tu concilies ça avec la notion d'esclave? Ensuite, quel est le but de vouloir absolument dire aux africains "si on cherche bien on peut trouver des esclaves aussi chez vous même si c'était pas comme ce qu'on vous a fait"? Je ne saisis pas. Quel est le sens de ce bavardage peu scientifique? On veut amadouer qui, monsieur?
Citation:
D'où mon rappel de l'esclavage tel qu'il était pratiqué sous l'antiquité.
revoilà l'eurocentrisme au galop. L'antiquité, laquelle? la vôtre? l'antiquité africaine c'est la naissance des civilisations de Nagada, Méroë, Kmt, etc... vers -10000. L'antiquité à laquelle tu fais référence c'est l'initiation de la grèce à Kmt, vers -500 et si pendant cette dernière "on" (vous, encore vous) pratiquait l'esclavage de manière très répandue (chez vous indo-européens), ce ne fut pas le cas chez nous.
Citation:
je ne vois pas quel recul prennent ces auteurs par l'emploi du qualificatif de mythomane concernant les auteurs européens.
Par exemple Pétré Grenouilleau ou Manning, qui inventent une traite intra-africaine, invente un chiffre de ... 14 millions de déportés par ces traites qui n'existent que dans leurs exprits, dont l'un fait dire à Plasse le contraire de ce qu'il écrit, par exemple? Ou quand les deux mentent par ommission en faisant croire aux naïfs que les africains n'ont jamais résisté à la traite qui n'aurait été qu'un commerce, ignorant que toute la documentation dont on dispose sur la traite fait un état de résistances et de lutte perpétuelle contre ce système européen du début à la fin.
Je te laisse enfin apprécier encore et encore les posts de Pakira et gnata et les autres sujets touchant à l'esclavage débattus sur grioo.
La prochaine fois, à moins de revenir avec du concrêt, abstiens-toi.
salut. _________________ ----«Le Jeune Africain Moderne sera armé de savoirs, pas de fusils importés.»
Si vous partagez ce rêve, aidez-nous à en faire une réalité. Soutenez l'initiative Vitu, sur :
http://igg.me/at/vitu
A ne manquer pour rien au monde:
-------->http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24ZO1HlvmpQ
---> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjDua-fqSUg
Vous ne pouvez pas poster de nouveaux sujets dans ce forum Vous ne pouvez pas répondre aux sujets dans ce forum Vous ne pouvez pas éditer vos messages dans ce forum Vous ne pouvez pas supprimer vos messages dans ce forum Vous ne pouvez pas voter dans les sondages de ce forum
RSS
FAQ
Rechercher
Liste des Membres
Groupes d'utilisateurs
S'enregistrer
Profil
Se connecter pour vérifier ses messages privés
Connexion
Sincerement il ya des centaines de topic sur ce forum qui doivent mettre la puçe à l'oreille des gens:
