African and Asian Studies A A S African and Asian Studies 7 (2008) 259-288 www.brill.nl/aas A Matter of Identity: Africa and Its Diaspora in America Since 1900, Continuity and Change1 Godfrey N. Uzoigwe, D. Phil., Oxon Professor of History, 203 Williamsburg Drive, Starkville, MS 39759, USA E-Mail: [email protected] Abstract Using Africa and its Diaspora in America as a paradigm, this article looks at the triple manifesta- tions of consciousness in the dialectic of relationships between the two groups since 1900, and notices both continuity and change that can be traced back to the 1700s. In Africa, this con- sciousness is reflected in the conflicting demands of continental Pan-Africanism or Mega-Nation- alism, Racial or Black Pan-Africanism (in a multi-racial continent), and Mezzo-nationalism of the continent’s present multi-nation states. In America it also has always had three faces (and not two as DuBois said) – American, Black-American and African. Studying these complex relationships that often contradicted one another and cut across class and ideological lines is a difficult and frustrating task. Th e article therefore suggests that a more rewarding effort is to focus attention on such issues as cultivating mutual respect, stressing common historico-cultral heritage, empha- sizing economic cooperation, and putting in place coordinated, effective political action between the groups that hopefully will lead to their solidarity and empowerment in the 21st century. Th e African Union should assume the initiative of constructing a more relevant and realistic Pan- African ideology based along the lines sketched above to achieve this goal. To start with, however, it must first publicly express, on behalf of Africa, remorse and apologise to the descendants of enslaved Africans wherever they may be for African participation, to whatever degree, in the Saharan, East African, and trans-Atlantic slave trade. Keywords Pan-Africanism, diaspora; organization of the African Unity; African Union 1 Th e issues raised in this article are a synthesis of papers I have delivered in the last decade at conferences held respectively at California State University, Sacramento under the auspices of the Center for African Peace and Coalition (1997, 1999); Lincoln University, Pennsylvania under the auspices of the Global Studies Institute (March, 2001); and the 44th Annual Meeting of the African Studies Association held at Houston, Texas (November, 2001). To these institutions, the African Studies Association and the participants at these conferences and meetings I extend grateful thanks for their comments and suggestions. I thank also Dr. Stephen Middleton, Direc- tor of the African-American Studies Program at Mississippi State University, who read a draft of this paper and provided some insights. I wish, finally, to express my appreciation to the anony- mous reviewers from the African and Asian Studies for their helpful suggestions. © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2008 DOI: 10.1163/156921008X318718 260 G. N. Uzoigwe / African and Asian Studies 7 (2008) 259-288 Introduction Every student of Africa and its Diaspora is familiar with the chequered history of the Pan-African Movement as well as the epistemological problems associ- ated with the Pan-African ideology.2 Th e article focuses, nevertheless, on the historical and dialectical relationships between Africans on the continent and the people of African descent in the United States of America (henceforth America) since 1900, as well as on the construction of a more relevant Pan- African ideology for the 21st century. Although the African Diaspora has global dimensions, as has been well demonstrated,3 it is only in the United States, and to some extent in the West Indies, that people of African descent presently have become a very distinctive potent, political, economic and social force. As indeed it has rightly been pointed out, “Th e very concept of Diaspora was essentially linked in the minds of many, and certainly. to Africans in the United States and the Caribbean.”4 2 Many of these issues are discussed and expanded in Joseph E. Harris, ed. Global Dimensions of the African Diaspora. Washington, D.C: Howard University Press, 1992. Cf. American Society of African Culture, Pan-Africanism Reconsidered. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1962; J. Ayodele Langley, Pan-Africanism and Nationalism in West Africa, 1900-1945: A Study in Ideol- ogy and Social Classes. London: Oxford University Press, 1973; Langley ed., Ideologies of Libera- tion in Black Africa, 1856-1970: Documents on Modern African Political Th ought from Colonial Times to the Present. London: Rex Collings, 1979; Ali A. Mazrui, Towards a Pax Africana: A Study of Ideology and Ambition. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1967; George Shepperson, “Th e African Abroad or the African Diaspora” in T. O. Ranger ed., Emerging Th emes of African History. London: Heinemann, 1968; Immanuel Geis, Th e Pan-African Movement: A History of Pan- Africanism in America, Europe and Africa translated by Ann Keys. New York: Africana Publishing Company, 1974; P.O. Esedebe, “Origins and Meanings of Pan-Africanism”, Presence Africaine, 73(1970); Esedebe, Pan-Africanism: Th e Idea and the Movement, 1776-1963. Washington, D.C: Howard University Press, 1982; Vincent Bakpetu Th ompson, Th e Making of the African Dias- pora in the Americas 1441-1900. London: Longman, 1987. 3 See reference 2 above; cf. J. Green, Black Edwardians: Black People in Britain 1901-1914. London: Frank Cass, 1998; H. Adi and M. Sherwood, Pan-African History: Political Figures from Africa and the Diaspora since 1787. London: Routledge, 2003; Adi, West Africans in Britain – Nationalism, Pan-Africanism and Communism, 1900-1960. London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1998; Joseph E. Harris, Th e African Presence in Asia; Consequences of the East African Slave Trade. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press, 1971; Carlos Moore et al. editors, African presence in the Americas, a publication of the African Heritage Foundation. Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, 1995; Molefi Asante, Afrocentricity. Buffalo: Amulefi Publishing Company, 1980. 4 Abdias Do Nascimento, “Th e African Experience in Brazil”, in Carlos Moore et al. editors, African Presence in the Americas. Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, 1995, 97. Not even in Brazil that contains the second largest black population in the World (the first is Nigeria and the third is America) do blacks constitute such a force. Th e conservative estimate, certainly the official figure of the Brazilian government, is that the black population in 1980, both pretos (blacks) and pardos (mulattoes), was 44.34% of the total, an impressive percentage. Nascimento claims, despite the deliberate effort of the Brazilian government over the years, not only to encourage .