Africa is home to a great and thriving art culture. Until recently, African art hasn’t had enough attention, due to scholars’ and art collectors’ emphasis on traditional art, while being part of the most diverse legacies on Earth. Although some people consider African art ‘traditional’, the art actually consists of hundreds of different people groups, cultures, and civilizations. The artwork favors abstraction rather than naturalistic representation because the artwork represents objects or ideas rather than depict them.
Bryant H. McGill once said “Education should prepare our minds to use its own powers of reason and conception rather than filling it with the accumulated misconceptions of the past” (McGill ). There are misconceptions all around us; people look at certain things in a particular manner but what each person sees comes from their background. I have recently come to the realization that there are many misconceptions held about the African continent; my current class has helped me see these misconceptions and understand why they are incorrect and how I formed them. With the help of our Western society, I developed beliefs that Africa was a continent full of poverty, civil unrest, and in desperate need of help. Much of the media coverage in Africa showed droughts, famine, the need for clean drinking water; everything that was exposed to the American population about Africa through these channels carried a negative connotation. I was never taught or informed about the complex culture and fascinating traditions that make up such a diverse continent. The ancient kingdoms of West Africa were complex, developed civilizations that had rich culture, traditions, values, norms and skills that exceeded those of societies of the rest of the world such as European ones. In this paper, I will first further explain some of the common misconceptions that I had about African in general and about their ancient kingdoms.
Africa was the first land inhabited by humans. Africa before the European's made many achievements in economics, culture, and politics.
Africans are far from uniform. In fact, they are quite diverse. This diversity is largely due to the greatly varied and often hostile terrain. Africa is home to deserts, savannahs, tropical rainforests, and other vegetation zones, including a swath across the north of the continent that lies on the Mediterranean Sea and enjoys its climate. Africa’s history is closely related to overcoming hostile environments. The tse-tse fly, which carries “Sleeping Sickness,” prohibited raising of livestock and subsequently the transport of goods over a large portion of the continent. The Sahara Desert provided a natural barrier that prevented all but those accustomed to the largest desert in the world from entering sub-Saharan West Africa. Those who did traverse the desert, mostly Berbers, created trade networks with the people of West Africa. The Berbers also introduced Islam, which was the greatest outside influence on Africa prior to the slave trade, into West Africa. A great empire of West Africa, Mali, was founded by Sundiata in the eleventh century according to oral tradition. With a centralized and militarized government, Mali was a powerful, advanced civilization: the rival of any in Europe at the time. A later ruler, Mansa Musa, was the first make the Haaj. He also made Timbuktu into an important center of learning. As a gold producing empire, Mali was not only powerful but incredibly wealthy. Other West African societies, such as the Igbo, were so-called “stateless” societies because they lacked a centralized state with a recognized ruler. They were “quasi-democratic” and were ruled by assemblies. Although such societies could be quite advanced, Europeans considered them to be uncivilized due their lack of hierarchal government.
Although historians initially believed that Islamic Arab immigrants were responsible for establishing trade on the east African coast, it was later discovered that the indigenous Africans originally developed early coastal trade and spreaded the Swahili culture (128). From ‘Anzania’ at the start of the Common Era to a violent Portuguese rule by 1600, coastal east Africa endured many revolutionary changes that shaped not only the trading patterns and wealth of the region, but also its culture and society.
The need for African cultures to find a common historical root that could unify the people of Africa cannot be overemphasized. In this globalized world, cultures continue to be defined with a focus on the present and the future. Like Kwesi Dickson stated, “The Africa of today is not the Africa of yesterday. Times have changed”. Both of these writers, Kwame Anthony Appiah and Frantz Fanon, explore the notion of cultural identity and the importance of it. There is no easy solution to what they are arguing, however it is possible to look forward by being informed about the past and the present.
This chapter of Africa by Phyllis Martin covers the beginning of Africa as a group of ideas, the physical landscape of the continents, how it’s interaction of its people and others around the world have changed it. It also goes into detail about the geography of the continent in terms of its climate and biomes.
Angeles, Los. (2009). African arts. Volume 28. Published by African Studies Center, University of California.
In African context, Nigeria presents the largest concentration of everything that is traditionally African from tourism, traditions, customs and belief respectively. To elucidate this point, Ghanaian American writer Kwasi Sarkodie-Mensah points out:
The culture of Africa is impacted by the way that the West had total ignorance of sub-Saharan Africa. The West was unaware of sub-Saharan Africa because of the geographical, political, religious and economic differences. Africa is isolated geographically where early communication would have been a problem, but the West was still ignorant as of relatively recent times.
Kingdoms of West Africa developed and prospered in the middle ages. Government, art and literature, and family helped these African civilizations thrive. Both large empires and smaller city-states and villages expressed these key factors and helped them become successful villages throughout this time period.
What is culture, one might ask? According to Merriam-Webster Dictionary, culture is the “customary beliefs, social forms, and material traits of a racial, religious, or social group or the characteristic features of everyday existence (as diversions or a way of life} shared by people in a place or time” (Culture). Five major characteristics that define a culture include culture is learned, culture is shared, culture is symbolic, culture is all-encompassing, and culture is integrated. Culture depends on the human capacity for cultural learning that encompasses shared rules for conduct and that are dependent upon symbols. Cultures can be integrated by using “social and economic forces, core values, and key symbols” (Mirror for Humanity, 2002). This essay will elaborate on the physical geography and military history of Sub-Saharan Africa, an analysis of its weather, and an overview of the ASCOPE acronym.
Africa is the place where you would think that it is all about animals,farming,and very hot climates. Actually Africa is a very interesting and historic place. It has many regions, two of them are North and West Africa. Even though West Africa is a little smaller than North Africa. West Africa is still an amazing place to visit on an vacation. In North and West Africa there are many differences and comparisons of each other such as:the climate,the rivers,the major physical features,and the history.
Toyin, Falola. “The Power of African Cultures.” Woodbridge, Suffolk, United Kingdom: University of Rochester Press, 2003. Print