What is Race?

            What is “race”? Before I started taking this course, I thought that “race” is the result of differences among people, differences such as color, language, and culture. However, after I started taking this course, I realized something different, something that changed how I think about race. I realized that there was nothing as “race”, because human was once all Africans, “racism” was not the result of people’s differences, and slavery was not because of racism.

When I was in middle school, my science teacher taught us about evolution, and my history teacher taught us the origin of human. Both of my science and history teachers used evidences to prove to us that human was originated from Africa and then spread out into different continents, and that evolution was still occurring while the homo sapiens migrated. Human who lived in different continents had changed their physical features depending on their level of evolution. My science teacher brought in models of skulls from monkeys, apes, various homo sapiens, and humans of different eras, pointed out the similarities among them, and organized them by their chronological orders. We, as students, could easily see that there were changes taking place while time traveled on, and that, was called evolution. 

In addition, I used to believe that “slavery” was the result of racism. After I took the course and did a presentation on the article “Africans, Slavery, and Race”, I realized that slavery was not something I thought how it happened. According to the article, “the Spanish, did not develop significant slave societies in its colonies. “    Columbus had tried to made the native Americans work for him, but he did not succeed. The British, however, imported indentured servants from Britain to work the land because these people are used to the European way of farming. The Portuguese imported slaves from Africa to work their land.  Slaves were captured not because of their race, but because they lacked the technology to fight against the Europeans. In addition, in European’s eyes, Africans were in a lower class than Europeans: they did not dress the same way as Europeans did, eat the same way Europeans did, look the same way Europeans did, and was able to fight against the Europeans. It was after the Bacon’s rebellion that “racism” got connected with “slavery”. Prior to Bacon’s Rebellion, “slavery” had nothing to do with “racism”; slaves were slaves because they were unable to fight against the Europeans, and that “racism” came into existence because the European upper class was afraid that slaves and lower class Europeans could work together and threaten their social status, so they reduced the class of blacks to make the lower class unwilling to work with and discriminate against the blacks.

By understanding that we were all once Africans and the origin of “race”, I realized that we cannot claim to be different from each other just because our surroundings changed our physical features. We, as humans, all have five fingers on each hand, five toes on each foot, a pair of eyes, a pair of ears, a nose, a mouth, and similar body parts. Our internal organs are identical. The only differences are that of skin colors. But that does not mean anything. Race is nothing to me, because we are all the same- we are all human beings. 

What is Africa to me?

Africa- Origin of Human and Civilization
Eryck Hung
WRA 125, Section 001
Professor Troutman
December 07, 2010




Africa - Origin of Human and Civilization

Africa, to many people, is known as the “Dark Continent”.  The countries of Africa are those of third world countries and the lands are occupied by people who are behind in technology, as seen from the video clips taken by volunteers of Tsu Chi Charity Foundation. Underground, valuable natural resources are everywhere; but the residents do not have absolute control over such resources, or else South Africa would not be filled with Europeans looking for diamonds. Politically, there are many civil wars going on within countries, and many innocent civilians were killed because of that; to fund the civil wars, many militias sell “blood diamond” in order to get money as portrayed in the movie Blood Diamond. “Blood diamond” is “a diamond that is mined in a war zone and sold to finance an invading army’s war efforts (a warlord’s activity) in Africa. (Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_diamond) On the other hand, I’ve learned in middle school and high school  that Africa is the first birth place of human kind.  Through understanding the origin of human and recognizing the fact that Egyptians were black and they have a great impact on today’s civilization, it is possible to correct some people’s perspective on Africa to: the Dark Continent, and ultimately, develop a sense of respect toward Africa and its residents.

            The “Out of Africa Theory” is the theory that states human kind is originated from Africa. The bones of Eve, dated more than 100,000 years ago, were found as the first generation human bone. According to the documentary “The Real Eve” (2002), Africa is the birth place of human kind, where the people of today came from. The first humans were hunter gathers: they moved around as they hunted for food, a characteristic that helped the future generations to migrate out of Africa. Many people today do not believe in  this “Out of Africa”, as they think it is impossible for people of lighter skin to originate from that of darker skin. In addition, the face and physical features of different races of people look very different, so people find it hard to believe in the "Out of Africa Theory". In addition, through history, many scholars refused to believe that human kind originated from Africa as well. For example, as seen in the film The Real Eve, a professor at Cambridge University refused to teach his students the "Out of Africa" Theory because he believes different races originated from different areas. As quoted from the  book Great African Thinkers (2007) that includes many essays from Dr. Chiekh Anta Diop, “The first ‘homo sapiens’ which inhabited Europe is unquestionably a Negroid migrant, having come from outside, about 40,000 years ago, just as R. Verneaux demonstrated. The first ‘white’, the Cro-Magnon, appeared in the same region 20,000 years afterwards” (P180). This says a lot about the origin of European: the first European is black who came from Africa. They lived there and expanded their families and eventually, migrated across the continent. And then, eventually, their skin color change as they spend more time on the continent 20,000 years after the arrival of first “homo sapiens”. However, some people suggest that the race of white is originated from Europe and have nothing to do with the “homo sapiens” of Africa. Some scientists of 19th Century actually created a model of the skull of a modern man and a jawbone of a monkey to support the hypothesis of “pre-Sapiens”, the hypothesis that the race of white is originated from Europe instead of evolving from “homo sapiens” of Africa. This skull, also known as the “Pelt-Down Man”, is put together by Charles Dawson, who was so talented in using technology to change the common belief, to make the right thing, such as Out of Africa" Theory wrong and the wrong thing right. (Diop, 2007, P 180) In the end, this pre-Sapiens theory was dismissed as scholars realized that the model was man-made and was not convincing at all. As the “pre-Sapiens” theory was found false, and some people choose to believe the “Out of Africa Theory.”

            As time passed on and as Africans migrated, they moved to Egypt and settled there. The race of Egyptians has been a mystery; stories and paintings depict Egyptians as a race with red skins. Yet, according to Dr. Diop's book, African Origin of Civilization, “Eyewitnesses of that period formally affirm that the Egyptians were Blacks. On several occasions Herodotus insists on the Negro character of the Egyptians and even uses this for indirect demonstrations. For example, to prove that the flooding of the Nile cannot be caused by melting snow, he cites, among other reasons he deems valid, the following observation: ‘It is certain that the natives of the country are black with the heat…’” (Diop, 1974, P1). This shows that the race of Egyptians is black instead of red. In addition to the African migration, the Egyptians are the first civilization to invent basic elements of human life. They’ve invented hieroglyphics, the Egyptian writings that appear on the walls of pyramids and tombs of their rulers. They invented mathematics, the same mathematics that we use today: the Egyptians found the value of π, the Pythagorean Theorem, quadrature of a circle, trigonometry, and many other mathematical topics that people use today in nearly every aspect of life (Diop, 2007, P. 77). They’ve invented the 365 days calendar, the same system of calendars people use in the modern world. They were the first people who used astronomical calculations to calculate the distance between earth and other planets. These are all the contributions Egyptians made toward human society. As well, the Egyptian technology is so advanced that human of modern world cannot compete with: Japanese had tried to build Egyptian pyramids with the most up-to-date tools; they successfully built the pyramid, but failed to build one that is as perfect as that of Egyptians. How the Egyptians built the pyramids without damaging the construction materials, such as pyramid stones, as the Japanese did to their stones using modern technologies, remained a mystery. The only answer to that question may be that the Egyptians had the technology and skill that are far more advanced than that of today’s, but for some reason, that skills or the technologies were not recorded down and passed down.

            Finally, according to the book Black Athena, today’s knowledge and life styles are mostly based on the foundation of Ancient Egyptians. It is believed that today’s knowledge are mostly based on the teachings of Ancient Greeks, but the author of Black Athena, Martin Bernal, suggests that Ancient Greeks had been influenced by Ancient Egyptians. There are three models regarding how the Ancient Greeks got influenced: the Ancient Model, the New Model, and the Revised Ancient Model. The Ancient Model is the conventional view on Greeks of Classical and Hellenistic ages; according to the Ancient Model, the Greek culture has been influenced by the colonization by Egyptians at around 1500 BC. (Bernal, 1987, P1) The New Model, however, denied that Egyptians had any influenced over Ancient Greek and that the Greeks were influenced by the Aryan from the North (Bernal, 1987, P2). The author created the Revised Ancient Model and it accepts that the Greeks had been influenced by Egyptians, but it also accepts that the Greeks had been influenced by the Aryans. The Revised Ancient Model put together the ideas of Ancient Model and the New Model and stating that Greek culture is actually a mixture of other civilizations. (Bernal, 1987, P2) In addition, Ancient Greeks had borrowed all the elements of Egyptian civilization, including but not limited to the cult of the gods and archeological design trends. These evidences suggest nothing but the fact that today’s civilization is more or less influenced by Ancient Egypt, such as the 365 days calender, the value of π, the Pythagorean Theorem, quadrature of a circle, and trigonometry. Based on previous evidences that Ancient Egyptians are Africans, a conclusion can be arrived: Ancient Egyptians had tremendous influence over today’s civilization by influencing the Ancient Greek.

            In conclusion, Africans should be viewed as equal as occupants of other continents. Human is originated from Africa and that Ancient Egyptians’ technology was the most advanced of all- there might be more skills and technologies that were lost as time travels on. For instance, the ability to build pyramids without damaging the building materials, the invention of calendars and mathematics are all examples of superiority and advancement of Ancient Egyptians. Therefore, it can be concluded that human originated from Africa and that people should thank the Ancient Africans for what they have today and help the Africans to develop modern day living style.