Northeastern University Department of History

HST3509 The African Diaspora

Winter 1995
Wednesday, 4:30-6:30 p.m.
206 ME
Patrick Manning

This course provides an exploration of Africa and the African diaspora in the modern period. It focuses on two sets of themes, each within a distinct time frame. First, we will consider the peopling of the African diaspora through the slave trade and other movements, for the period from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries; in that period we will also consider the cultural patterns and changes of various diaspora communities, and the relationship of culture in the diaspora to that on the African continent.

Second, we will consider pan-African politics and identity in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We will focus on nationalism and nation-building in Africa and abroad, but also on other elements of pan-African identity, as reflected in music, dress, and speech.

Assignments.
The course will proceed through reading and discussion. A common set of assigned readings will form the initial basis for discussion. Each week, students will present oral reports on additional readings: each student will report on one reading in the first half of the course, and on two readings in the second half of the course, for a total of three oral reports.

Written work for the course consists of two interpretive papers of about ten pages each, one on each of the major sections in the course: papers are due February 8 and March 15. The papers will be duplicated and distributed to the class for comment.

Texts for Purchase.
The following texts will be read in large part, and purchase is recommended: DuBois, W.E.B. The World and Africa.
Vansina, Jan. Paths in the Rainforests.
Thornton, John. Africa and Africans in the Formation of the Atlantic World.
Klein, Herbert S. African Slavery in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Jahn, Jahnheinz. Muntu: African Culture and the Western World.
Thompson, Robert F. Flash of the Spirit.
Gates, Henry Louis, ed. The Classic Slave Narratives.
Brereton, Bridget. History of Modern Trinidad, 1783-1962.
Esedebe, P. Olisanwuche. Pan-Africanism.
Fanon, Frantz. Wretched of the Earth.
Background.
For general introductions to African history and the African diaspora, see any of the following volumes; all but Curtin are on Reserve. Conniff, Michael, and Thomas J. Davis. Africans in the Americas.
Curtin, Philip D., et al. African History.
Harris, Joseph E., ed. Global Dimensions of the African Diaspora.
Freund, Bill. The Making of Contemporary Africa.
Manning, Patrick. Francophone Sub-Saharan Africa, 1880-1985.
Thompson, Vincent Bakpetu. The Making of the African Diaspora in the Americas, 1441-1900.
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Section I. Peopling and cultural development of the African diaspora.

key: * held in Snell Library
! on Reserve in Snell Library
$ required text
  1. January 4. No class.
  2. January 11. Introduction.
    Required reading:     $DuBois, W.E.B. The World and Africa Optional readings DuBois, W.E.B. The Negro
    Johnston, H.H. The Negro in the New World
    !Harris, Joseph E., ed. Global Dimensions of the African Diaspora
  3. January 18. Diaspora in Africa.
    Required reading:     $Vansina, Jan. Paths in the Rainforest Optional reading: !*Harms, Robert. River of Wealth, River of Sorrow
    !*Hiskett, Mervyn. The Sword of Truth
    !*Law, Robin. The Slave Coast of West Africa
    !*Niane, D. T. Sundiata, an Epic of Old Mali
    !*Wilks, Ivor. Asante in the Nineteenth Century
  4. January 23. Slave Trade and Displacement. Required reading: $Thornton, John. Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World
    $Klein, Herbert S. African Slavery in Latin American and the Caribbean
     Optional reading: *Bowser, Frederick. The African Slave in Colonial Peru
    *Craton, Michael. Testing the chains: resistance to slavery in the British West Indies
    !*Curtin, Philip D. The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census
    Kulikoff, Allan. Tobacco and Slaves
    !*Manning, Patrick. Slavery and African Life: Occidental, Oriental and African slave trades
    Mattoso, Katia M. de Queiros. To be a slave in Brazil
    Miller, Joseph C. Way of Death: Merchant Capitalism and the Angolan slave trade, 1730-1830
    *Palmer, Colin. Slaves of the White God
    *Wood, Peter. Black Majority: Negroes in South Carolina from 1670 through the Stono Rebellion
  5. February 1. Cultural Change and Continuity.
    Required reading:     $Jahn, Jahnheinz. Muntu, the New African Culture.
    $Thompson, Robert Farris. Flash of the Spirit.
     Optional reading: *Bush, Barbara. Slave Women in Caribbean Society. 1650-1838.
    Forbes, Jack. Africans and Native Americans: the language of race and the evolution of Red-Black peoples.
    *Frey, Sylvia. Water from the rock: Black resistance in a revolutionary age
    !*Herskovits, Melville. The Myth of the Negro Past
  6. February 8. Migrations and Culture, 19th and 20th Centuries.
    First paper due in class, in multiple copies
    Required reading:     !*Hall, Gwendolyn. Africans in Colonial Louisiana: The Development of Afro-Creole Culture.
     Optional reading: *Holloway, Joseph, ed. Africanisms in American Culture.
    !*Manning, Patrick. "Primitive Art and Modern Times," Radical History Review
    *Zilversmit, Arthur. The first emancipation: the abolition of slavery in the North.
    Washington, Margaret. A peculiar people: slave religion and community-culture among the Gullahs
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Section II. Politics and identity in the African diaspora.

  1. February 15. Pan-Africanism to 1880.
    Required reading:     $Equiano, Olaudah. The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, in Henry Louis Gates, ed., The Classic Slave Narratives
     Optional reading: Blackett. Building an Antislavery Wall.
    *Curtin, Philip D. The Image of Africa.
    *Curtin, Philip D. Two Jamaicas: the role of ideas in a tropical colony, 1830-1868
    *Fyfe, Christopher. Africanus Horton, 1835-1883.
    *Holt, Thomas. The problem of freedom: race, labor, and politics in Jamaica and Britain, 1832-1938
    Lynch, Hollis. Edward Wilmot Blyden, Pan-Negro Patriot.
    *Rodney, Walter. A History of the Guyanese Working People
  2. February 22. Guest Presentation: Kim D. Butler, Rutgers University.
    Topic and readings to be announced.
  3. March 1. Imperialism and Pan-Africanism, 1880-1914.
    Required reading:     $Esedebe, P. Olisanwuche. Pan-Africanism
    !*Brereton,.Bridget. History of Modern Trinidad
     Optional reading: Bittle, William E. The Longest Way Home.
    Blyden, E. W. Christianity, Islam and the Negro Race.
    Casely Hayford, J. E. The Truth about the West African Land Question
    !*Geis, Imanuel. The Pan-African Movement.
    Hargreaves, John D. Sir Samuel Lewis.
    *Harlan, Louis. Booker T. Washington
    Hooker, James R. Henry Sylvester Williams: imperial Pan-Africanist.
    July, Robert. The Origins of Modern African Thought.
    Kimble, George H. T. A Political History of Ghana.
    *Langley, J. Ayodele. Pan Africanism and Nationalism in West Africa, 1900-1945
    *Langley, J. Ayodele, ed. Ideologies of Liberation in Black Africa, 1856-1970.
    Lewis, David Levering. W.E.B. DuBois.
    Lynch, Hollis. Edward Wilmot Blyden, Pan-Negro Patriot.
    *Meier, August. Negro Thought in America.
    Wheeler, Douglas, and René Pelissier. Angola.
    Woodward, C. Vann. The Strenge Career of Jim Crow
  4. March 8. Nationalism and Socialism, 1914-1945.
    Required reading:     $Esedebe, P. Olisanwuche. Pan-Africanism
    !*Brereton, Bridget. History of Modern Trinidad
     Optional reading: ASAC. Pan-Africanism Reconsidered.
    *Asante, S.K.B. Pan-African Protest: West Africa and the Italo-Ethiopian Crisis, 1934-1941.
    De Graft Johnson. Toward Nationhood in West Africa.
    *Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man.
    *Gilroy, Paul. The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness.
    Harris, Joseph. African-American Reactions to the War in Ethiopia, 1936-1941.
    !*Hill, Robert. The Marcus Garvey and UNIA Papers. Volume 1.
    !*Hooker, James R. Black Revolutionary: George Padmore's path from communism to pan-Africanism
    *Hughes, Langston. The Big Sea.
    *Johnson, G. Wesley. The Emergence of Black Politics in Senegal.
    Manning, Patrick. Slavery, Colonialism and Economic Growth in Dahomey.
    !*Padmore, George. Pan-Africanism or Communism?
    !*Robinson, Cedric. Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition
    Shepperson, George. Independent African.
  5. March 15. National Liberation, Nationhood, and Civil Rights, 1945-1975.
    Required reading:     $Fanon, Frantz. Wretched of the Earth.
     Optional reading: !*Barrett, Leonard. The Rastafarians
    *Cabral, Amilcar. Revolution in Guinea
    *Carmichael, Stokely. Stokely Speaks
    !*Césaire, Aimé. Discourse on Colonialism.
    *Fitch, Bob, and Mary Oppenheimer. Ghana: The End of an Illusion.
    *Foner, Philip. The Black Panthers Speak.
    !*Haley, Alex. The Autobiography of Malcolm X.
    !Makonnen, Ras. Pan-Africanism from Within
    *Mandela, Nelson. No Easy Walk to Freedom
    *Morgenthau, Ruth Schachter. Political Parties in French-Speaking West Africa
    !Nkrumah, Kwame. Africa Must Unite
    *Nyerere, Julius. Freedom and socialism.
    Oxaal, Ivar. Black intellectuals and the dilemmas of race and class in Trinidad
    Oxaal, Ivar. Race and revolutionary consciousness; a documentary interpretation of the 1970 Black power revolt in Trinidad
    *Seale, Bobby. Sieze the Time.
    *Silberman, Charles. Crisis in Black and White.
    *Wright, Richard. Black Power.
    Weisbord, Burton. Ebony Kinship.
  6. March 22. Pan-Africanism and Democratization, 1975-1995.
    Second paper due in class, in multiple copies
    Optional reading:         !*Walters, Ronald. Pan-Africanism and the African Diaspora. Detroit, 1993.
    Amate, C. O. C. Inside the OAU: Pan-Africanism in Practice. New York, 1986.

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Bibliography

key: * held in Snell Library
! on Reserve in Snell Library
$ required text


*Abraham, W. E. The Mind of Africa. Chicago, 1962.
Amate, C. O. C. Inside the OAU: Pan-Africanism in Practice. New York, 1986.
American Society for African Culture. Pan-Africanism Reconsidered.
*Asante, S. K. B. Pan-African Protest: West Africa and the Italo-Ethiopian Crisis, 1934-1941. London, 1977.
*Ayandele, E. A. Holy Johnson, Pioneer of African Nationalism, 1836-1917.
London, 1970.
*Azikiwe, Nnamdi. Renascent Africa. London, 1968.
!*Barrett, Leonard. The Rastafarians
!*Bittle, William E. The Longest Way Home. Detroit, 1964.
*Blyden, E. W. (ed. Hollis Lynch). Black spokesman. New York, 1971.
Blyden, E. W. Christianity, Islam and the Negro Race.
!*Brereton,.Bridget. A History of Modern Trinidad, 1783-1962. Kingston, 1981.
*Bowser, Frederick. The African Slave in Colonial Peru, 1524-1650. Stanford, 1974.
*Bush, Barbara. Slave Women in Caribbean Society. 1650-1838. Bloomington, 1990.
Bush, Barbara. Lost Daughters of Afrik.
*Cabral, Amilcar. Revolution in Guinea. New York, 1970.
*Carmichael, Stokely. Stokely Speaks: Black Power back to Pan-Africanism. New York, 1971. Casely Hayford, J. E. The Truth about the West African Land Question
!*Césaire, Aimé. Discourse on Colonialism. New York, 1972.
*Conniff, Michael, and Thomas J. Davis. Africans in the Americas. New York, 1994.
*Craton, Michael. Testing the chains: resistance to slavery in the British West Indies. Ithaca, 1982.
*Cromwell, Adelaide, ed. Dynamics of the African/Afro-American Connection. Washington, 1987.
*Curtin, Philip D. Africa Remembered. Madison, 1967.
*Curtin, Philip D. The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census. Madison, 1969.
*Curtin, Philip D. The Image of Africa. Madison, 1964.
*Curtin, Philip D. Two Jamaicas: the role of ideas in a tropical colony, 1830- 1868. Cambridge, 1955.
De Graft Johnson. Toward Nationhood in West Africa. *Delany, Martin. Origin of Races and color.
$DuBois, W.E.B. The World and Africa. New York, 1947.
DuBois, W.E.B. The Negro
*Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man.
$Equiano, Olaudah. The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, in Henry Louis Gates, ed., The Classic Slave Narratives
$Esedebe, P. Olisanwuche. Pan-Africanism. Washington, 1982. $Fanon, Frantz. Wretched of the Earth.
*Bob Fitch and Mary Oppenheimer. Ghana: The End of an Illusion. New York, 1966.
Foner, Philip. The Black Panthers Speak.
Forbes, Jack. Africans and Native Americans: the language of race and the evolution of Red-Black peoples, 2nd ed. Urbana, 1993.
*Franklin, John Hope. George Washington Williams, a biography. Chicago, 1985.
*Frey, Sylvia. Water from the rock: Black resistance in a revolutionary age. Princeton, 1991.
*Fyfe, Christopher. Africanus Horton, 1835-1883, West African scientists and patriot. New York, 1972.
!*Geiss, Imanuel. The Pan-African Movement. New York, 1968.
*Gilroy, Paul. The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness. Cambridge, 1993.
!*Haley, Alex. The Autobiography of Malcolm X. !*Hall, Gwendolyn. Africans in Colonial Louisiana: The Development of Afro- Creole Culture. Baton Rouge, 1992.
Hargreaves, John D. Sir Samuel Lewis.
*Harlan, Louis. Booker T. Washington, the Wizard of Tuskegee, 1901-1905. New York, 1983. !*Harms, Robert. River of Wealth, River of Sorrow. New Haven, 1981.
!*Harris, Joseph E., ed. Global Dimensions of the African Diaspora, 2nd .ed. Washington, 1993.
!*Herskovits, Melville. The Myth of the Negro Past. New York, 1941.
!*Hill, Robert. The Marcus Garvey and UNIA Papers.
!*Hiskett, Mervyn. The Sword of Truth. New York, 1973.
*Holloway, Joseph E., ed. Africanisms in American Culture. Bloomington, 1990.
*Holt, Thomas. The problem of freedom: race, labor, and politics in Jamaica and Britain, 1832-1938. Baltimore, 1992.
Hooker, James R. Henry Sylvester Williams: imperial Pan-Africanist.
!*Hooker, James R. Black Revolutionary: George Padmore's path from communism to pan-Africanism. New York, 1967.
*Hughes, Langston. The Big Sea, au autobiography. New York, 1940.
*Hymans, Jacques. Leopold Sedar Senghor: an intellectual biography. Edinburgh, 1971. $Jahn, Jahnheinz. Muntu, the New African Culture. New York, 1961.
Jakobsson, Stiv. Am I not a Man and a Brother?
*James, C. L. R. The Black Jacobins: Toussaint L'Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution. New York, 1963.
*Johnson, G. Wesley. The Emergence of Black Politics in Senegal. Stanford, 1971.
*Johnston, H.H. A History of the Colonization of Africa. New York, 1913.
Johnston, H. H. The Negro in the New World
July, Robert. The Origins of Modern African Thought.
Kimble, George H. T. A Political History of Ghana. $Klein, Herbert S. African Slavery in Latin American and the Caribbean
Kulikoff, Allan. Tobacco and Slaves
*Langley, J. Ayodele. Pan Africanism and Nationalism in West Africa, 1900- 1945. Oxford, 1973.
*Langley, J. Ayodele, ed. Ideologies of liberation in Black Africa, 1856-1970. London, 1979.
!*Law, Robin. The Slave Coast of West Africa. Oxford, 1991.
Lewis, David Levering.
*Lovejoy, Paul E., and Jan S. Hogendorn. Slow Death for Slavery. Cambridge, 1993. Lynch, Hollis. Edward Wilmot Blyden, Pan-Negro Patriot.
!*Makonnen, Ras. Pan-Africanism from Within. New York, 1973. *Mandela, Nelson. No Easy Walk to Freedom. London, 1973. *Manning, Patrick. "Primitive Art and Modern Times," Radical History Review
!*Manning, Patrick. Slavery and African Life: Occidental, Oriental and African slave trades. Cambridge, 1990.
*Manning, Patrick. Slavery, Colonialism and Economic Growth in Dahomey, 1640-1960. Cambridge, 1982.
*Martin, Tony. The Pan-African Connection: From Slavery to Garvey and Beyond. Dover, Mass., 1984.
*Mathurin, Owen C. Henry Sylvester Williams and the Origins of the Pan-African Movement, 1869-1911. Westport, 1976.
Mattoso, Katia M. de Queiros. To be a slave in Brazil
*Meier, August. Negro Thought in America, 1880-1915: racial ideologies in the age of Booker T. Washington, 2nd ed.. Ann Arbor, 1988.
Miller, Joseph C. Way of Death: Merchant Capitalism and the Angolan slave trade, 1730-1830. Madison, 1988.
*Morgenthau, Ruth Schachter. Political Parties in French-Speaking West Africa. Oxford, 1964.
Nascimento, Elisa. Pan-Africanism and South America: Emergence of a Black Rebellion. Buffalo, 1980.
Nascimento, Elisa. Africans in Brazil: a Pan-African Perspective. Trenton, 1992.
!*Niane, D. T. Sundiata, an Epic of Old Mali. London, 1979.
!*Nkrumah, Kwame. Africa Must Unite. New York, 1970.
*Nyerere, Julius. Freedom and Socialism. New York, 1968.
Oxaal, Ivar. Black intellectuals and the dilemmas of race and class in Trinidad
*Oxaal, Ivar. Race and revolutionary consciousness; a documentary interpretation of the 1970 Black power revolt in Trinidad. Cambridge, Mass., 1971.
!*Padmore, George. Pan-Africanism or Communism? New York, 1971.
*Palmer, Colin. Slaves of the White God: Blacks in Mexico, 1570-1650. Cambridge, Mass., 1976.
*Rigsby, Gregory. Alexander Crummell: Pioneeer in Nineteenth-century African Thought. Westport, 1987. *Robinson, Cedric. Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition. London, 1983.
*Rodney, Walter. A History of the Guyanese Working People, 1881-1905. Baltimore, 1981.
*Seale, Bobby. Sieze the Time. Baltimore, 1991.
Shepperson, George. Independent African.
*Silberman, Charles. Crisis in Black and White. New York, 1964.
*Stuckey, Sterling. Slave Culture: Nationalist Theory and the Foundations of Black America. New York, 1987.
$Thompson, Robert Farris. Flash of the Spirit: African and Afro-American art and philosophy. New York, 1983.
*Thompson, Vincent Bakpetu. The Making of the African Diaspora in the Americas. New York, 1987.
Thompson, Vincent Bakpetu. Africa and Unity: the evolution of pan-Africanism. New York, 1969. $Thornton, John. Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World
*Ullman, Victor. Martin R. Delany: the beginnings of black nationalism. Boston, 1971.
*Vaillant, Janet. Black, French, and African: a life of leopold Sedar Senghor. Cambridge, Mass., 1990. $Vansina, Jan. Paths in the Rainforests. Madison, 1990.
*Walters, Ronald. Pan-Africanism and the African Diaspora. Detroit, 1993.
Washington, Margaret. A peculiar people: slave religion and community-culture among the Gullahs
Weisbord, Burton. Ebony Kinship.
* Williams, Eric E. Capitalism and Slavery. New York, 1944.
*Wheeler, Douglas and Rene Pelissier. Angola. Westport, 1978.
!*Wilks, Ivor. Asante in the Nineteenth Century. Cambridge, 1975.
*Wood, Peter. Black Majority: Negroes in South Carolina from 1670 through the Stono Rebellion. New York, 1974.
*Woodward, C. Vann. The Strenge Career of Jim Crow. New York, 1955.
*Wright, Richard. Black Power. Westport, 1974.
*Wright, Richard. Native Son. New York, 1940.
*Zilversmit, Arthur. The first emancipation: the abolition of slavery in the North. Chicago, 1967.

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