BOOKS about Black people (past and present) who have lived outside of Africa and North America > Likes and Comments
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KOMET wrote: "Two days ago, the following book arrived for me in the mail - courtesy of Amazon ~Black Tudors: The Untold Story by Miranda Kaufmann
It always fascinates and th..."
I've heard about this book and I'm really interested in hearing your thoughts. We're everywhere and always have been, they just wanted to write us out of history. Unless we're slaves, history doesn't seem to be interested in the Black experience.
I agree, its nice know we existed other places besides Africa. The book sounds interesting. I look forward to your review
Nope, I'm right there with ya. It's time for us to make it known if they won't.
I feel the same way, and I think a lot of others people feel the same way, as well. I studied abroad in Denmark for a semester during my undergraduate year, and it was so enlightening. I was the only Black American at the Copenhagen Business School during that semester, and the Danes who were of African descent were really excited. The wanted to know about Black culture in America, and would watch television shows like The Braxtons in an effort to gain insight about us. I was asked so many strange questions, but it was so much fun. I wanted to know more about them, and the English who were Black. Many Danes were shocked that I was not from Africa, but from America and my southern drawl was intriguing to them.
Jaguar wrote: "I feel the same way, and I think a lot of others people feel the same way, as well. I studied abroad in Denmark for a semester during my undergraduate year, and it was so enlightening. I was the on..."If you don't mind my asking, (and you might) what were some of the strange questions they asked you?
There's also a book about African Americans who decided to re-locate to Russia. Blacks, Reds, and Russians: Sojourners in Search of the Soviet Promise
Bobby wrote: "Jaguar wrote: "I feel the same way, and I think a lot of others people feel the same way, as well. I studied abroad in Denmark for a semester during my undergraduate year, and it was so enlightenin..."Hi Bobby,
I don't mind at all. I guess "strange" may not have been the most accurate word. I truly enjoyed the discussions and was just taken aback by some questions. I had to keep in mind that many Danes had never encountered a Black American other than me. The Danes who were considered "Black" were from first or second generations Danes from Africa. I will start with some of the more serious yet interesting questions.
1. I was asked how many generations had my family been in America? I was confused a bit because I never thought about it that way. I was born in the state of Georgia. Both my maternal and paternal grandparents were sharecroppers. I have ancestors who were born into slavery, and it surprised me that she thought my family had recently migrated to America.
2. I was asked why did I call myself African-American, and not just American? I have several friends from different countries and have been asked this more times than I can count. My Nicaraguan friend says that although they have people who have different skin colors, they are still with just "Nicaraguan".
3. Why do we (Americans) eat so much fast food? I chalked it up to convenience... lol
4. Was everyone as warm as me? Meaning nice? Some of the Danes had met other students who came from America, but they didn't speak much. These girls thought that it was because the student was from Minnesota, which they assumed was not a very friendly part of the United States. They told me he would not smile back at them, and didn't speak to them when they greeted him.
5. Is there really a shortage of Black Men to Black Women? They heard this all the time. It took me a while to explain this because there are several factors to this statement....lol
6. Why don't I talk like the Black people on television? 98% of Danes understand and speak English, but they choose an accent an stick with it. The speak with English or American accent, and they sound. So when I talked to them they would sound like Americans from the Midwest, practically no accent at all. I traveled to the Netherlands, and the would switch to English to speak to me, and I was very surprised at how American they sounded. I am sure they heard my southern drawl when I said certain words.
6. Why do Americans not care about the environment? Why do we buy big cars? Why do we have such big houses?
7. Why don't Americans wear real shoes? Why do we wear sneakers so much? They considered real shoes, leather shoes with hard bottoms.
8. One girl from Uganda asked me why was my hair curly? Was I truly African, because a true African don't have curly hair. Ironically, another girl from Somalia who had curly hair thought nothing about my hair because majority her people had curly hair like mine.
9. I was approached by men who asked me if I was the kind of African who was from the United States? I am almost 6 feet tall, and heavyset which brought a lot of attention. Many assumed I was American, while other guessed I was from Africa, and tried to speak to me in French. I was stared at by everyone, and not just a casual glance, but truly stared down by kids, women, and men. I opened my mouth to speak, and they would be shocked that my accent was American.
10. Why did I want hot foods in the morning and for lunch? They pretty much cold foods for breakfast and lunch. They drink a lot of coffee and tea in the morning and for lunch. The hot foods are reserved for dinner, which is often a candlelit dinner. I found the dinners very cozy, intimate and nice.
I lived with a Dane who was an older woman, and her adult daughter. They asked more political type questions. Most Danes are not religious, and the country has a very good welfare system that takes care of its citizens. The income inequality is very low, in past years it has been the lowest. A doctor makes no more than a cashier at the local grocery store after the taxes are paid. So people pursue jobs that make them truly happy, especially since tuition to most universities is free.
Why do we (Americans) allow citizens to carry guns?
Why don't I incorporate more of the African culture in my culture? (It was hard for them to understand that my culture is just American (country-southern American). I don't They thought I should incorporate some type of drums into a ritual dance... or have drums in my home. (I was so perplexed by this and tried to explain my culture)...
Why do Americans have a problem with LBGT community? Why is such a big deal? Why are we so behind? Why did we take so long to allow people of the same sex to marry?
Why does the sexuality/ religion matter in our politics? Why can't we separate the two?
Why don't we have universal healthcare?
Do we care that we destroying the environment with our "big cars"?
I hope I didn't write too much. I am actually thinking of going back to live there in the near future. They have a very simple way of living, and it is about being truly happy with your life. I experienced culture shock, but in the end I didn't want to leave, after being there over four months. The winters are harsh, but to me it a very nice place to live.
One thing living abroad reveals to an American is that in some places (Korea for example, and apparently Denmark too) it's just totally normal to ask people about their people (ethnic group, nationality, etc.) and to broadly generalize about the experiences of groups. Sometimes the open racial stereotyping can be shocking, and sometimes on the positive side we can say people are communicating and expressing sincere curiosity. They don't follow the American model of being inhibited and keeping racist assumptions silent while pretending tolerance and understanding.I think in America we tend to blunder between two extremes, between hypersensitive and insensitive. I.e., many white folks won't come out and say anything or ask anything related to race while talking with black folks or people of other ethnicities, just thinking "Oh my God, they'll think I'm in the KKK if I ask too many questions about black barber shops" or something. While others go to the other extreme, thinking, "Oh, hey, I've known you for about 25 seconds, so now you'll be okay with me mouthing off racist nonsense and playing it off for a joke, right?"
Well, anyway, in Korea, black folks are outsiders even more so than white folks, they stimulate even more curiosity, and it can come out in good or bad ways, and it depends on one's sensitivities. But all of us foreigners are objects of curiosity. People tend to err much more on the side of uninhibited and insensitive. Some can sometimes blurt out outrageously racist things without even thinking anyone would object. As a white guy, the most offensive thing I've been exposed to was having a middle-school student tell me that "Korean women would rather die than have a child with a foreigner," and this student knew that I have a Korean wife and we've had children... it may have slipped his mind at the time. I honestly don't think he was even trying to offend (obviously some teens will, but not him, I think), and he was just sharing an interesting fact that would help me understand "the Korean mind." My black friends have been exposed to other offensive comments and questions, and I've heard some doozies... some students said their high-school teachers had taught them that African underdevelopment was a result of smaller brain size, for instance... and yet I'd still say 95% of questions and comments come from innocent curiosity mixed with misinformation and ignorance.
Meanwhile, to address the original question, I'm sorry I don't have any good answers. If England is included, then I reckon there are plenty of books about black people in England. Zadie Smith? In other non-American, non-African settings, I don't know what to suggest. The only thing I could think of was Giambattista Basile's Pentamerone, which has several black characters in it, but expresses extremely vulgar racism of the worst kind, and if it ever contradicts its own racism, it's at best patronizing, i.e., someone might be good despite being black. I'm afraid there may be a lot of European literature of this kind.And then there's always Othello.
Over the past almost 30 years, I’ve visited Brazil 10 times. I have found that Brazilians have been very receptive to meeting me, an African American. It helps that I can speak some Portuguese, too, and have a keen interest in Brazilian culture and history. I think now of an experience I had in Salvador, Bahia (a coastal city in Northeastern Brazil) in December 2001. A vendor (a Brazilian brotha) came up to me, trying to interest me in buying one of the items he was selling. I bought 3 necklaces from him, one of which was shaped like a berimbau, which is a musical instrument. He was glad to know that I was an American and told me that in Brazil, Afro Brazilians suffer. In Portuguese, I told him that in the U.S., African Americans also have their struggles. Brazil is a bewildering paradox. It says that it is a “racial democracy”, yet many Afro Brazilians are socially disadvantaged and marginalized. (As far as I know, there is only one Afro Brazilian – Benedita da Silva – serving in Brazil’s Congress.) I cannot say that I have experienced any overt racism while there. Brazilians are so amazingly diverse and on their census, are many more categories for people than in the U.S. Census. There also seems to be no big deal about interracial dating and relationships. Southern Brazil is perhaps the most Europeanized region in Brazil, with many Brazilians of Italian, Polish, Ukrainian, and German ancestry. (If you decide to visit Southern Brazil in August, bring your winter clothes. It does snow there from time to time in what is our summertime period in the U.S. I learned that the hard way in August 1990, when I travelled there by bus from Northeastern Brazil.) The State of São Paulo has the largest number of Brazilians of Japanese descent outside of Japan.
On the whole, Brazil never ceases to fascinate me, on so many levels.
Great post. I have enjoyed reading the comments.
This is an amazing thread, I'm almost afraid to post a book in it, but I will. This is a book that I hope to read in the future called Sonata Mulattica by Rita Dove. It is a narrative poem about the life of George Bridgetower and his broken friendship with Beethoven. Bridgetower was of West Indian and German-descent.
That sounds like an interesting read Ken! Looking forward to your review.
Here is a memoir about a remarkable man, Hans Massaquoi, an Afro-German man who grew up in Nazi Germany. Destined to Witness: Growing Up Black in Nazi Germany
Indeed, in the years leading up to the Second World War, there were a significant number of Afro-Germans, children born as the result of liaisons between German women and French African troops in the immediate post-First World War years, when the French had occupation troops stationed in the Ruhr and Rhineland.
My father, who served in Europe with the U.S. Army during the War, befriended several Afro-Germans he met when he worked as a civilian aide in the U.S. Air Force during the late 1940s. I grew up enthralled with his stories of hanging out with Sengalese troops in France (my father spoke fluent French, as well as German), as well as his travels in Italy, Switzerland, Morocco, the UK (during the war), and Germany.
"THE NEW EQUATION"... the book draws its intelligence and intellectual from the ancient African philosophy, global achievements, universal spiritual truths and AI/ Technological changes we witness today...it dares to explore proposing a new world order that is based on human equality, social justice, and the AI use for the benefit of all.....[https://a.co/d/7x5Catd]
I read a couple books in college about the black perspective in England, one called Small Island, by Andrea Levy, principally about Jamaican immigrants, racial tensions, colonial legacies, love, hope, and the complexities of navigating the English landscape post war. The other one called Pilgrim's Way, by Abdulrazak Gurnah. I had to look it up to recall the details, its been a while, but I do remember that it was a very moving reading experience. I hope this helps. I'm very interested in reading the Black Tudor's, sounds right up my alley.
Yes, this is an interesting topic! I can't remember if I read this here or on my own, but a book by an African woman who was in the States but relocated to Scandinavia is In Every Mirror She's Black, and of course there are the books by Zadie Smith such as White TeethI think it's important to read books by black authors from the countries themselves, so there isn't an American perspective. If we're not familiar with a culture we can miss bias and racism in a country that's far more polite or discreet than over here or even misconstrue some that isn't there from some people due to a different set of manners and customs.
It's true that Germany still deals with racism, and not just of Afro-Germans. All of northern Europe does to one degree or another; I know less about Southern Europe.
Zadignose wrote: "Meanwhile, to address the original question, I'm sorry I don't have any good answers. If England is included, then I reckon there are plenty of books about black people in England. Zadie Smith? In ..."The Bone Readers by Jacob Ross although he moved from Grenada to the UK.
Talia Hibbert is British.
That's all I can think of off the top of my head for England.
Black Tudors: The Untold Story by Miranda Kaufmann
It always fascinates and thrills me to learn that Black people have resided in places outside of Africa and North America --- in this case, England --- for far, far longer than any of us had reason to believe in before.
Am I alone in feeling this way?