I might be able to compile a bibliography of less than 3,500 words. Over the next few weeks. Let me give that a whirl. hmmm, random selection from the stacks ...
Jan Carew, Fulcrums of Change (1988)
Peter Martyr, the first major historian of the Americas, and a reasonably reliable source considering that he never set foot in the Indies or the mainland territories, mentions in passing that the Pinzón brothers of whom Martin Alonso was Columbus' chief pilot and one of his principal partners in his "Enterprise of the Indies," were everywhere known as "Negro Pinzóns." These brothers, as both their Spanish names and their reputations as renowned seamen indicates, were Afro-Spanish and middle-class. They were also much better off financially than Columbus since they could afford to make a substantial monetary investment in his first voyage. ... After the first voyage, the chronicle of the Black presence takes on new dimensions: In 1513, thirty Negroes helped Balboa hack his way throught the tropical undergrowth to reach the Pacific Ocean. There were Black soldiers with Ponce de Leon, when he set out to find the Fountain of Youth, and inadvertantly landed on the Florida coast. Langston Hughes in his Famous Negro Heroes of America [1958], wrote: 'When Hernando Cortez invaded Mexico in 1519, one of the Negroes in his army of 700 found in his ration of rice one day some grains of wheat. These he planted, and is so credited with introducing the first wheat onto the mainland of the New World. And by 1523 there were so many Negroes in Mexico that it was decided to limit their entrance since it was thought they might try to seize the ruling powers from the Spaniards --as indeed some in 1537 were accused of plotting to do.' ... Herrera [y Tordesillas, Antonio] had actually lived and travelled extensively in the New World. Here is his chronicle of events that took place between 1531 and 1548. Negroes born in America were found to be better laborers than those brought from Guinea. The king (of Spain) had sent the force of two ships to make war on the Caribs ...It was the general opinion that the troubles on this land [Puerto Rico] were caused by negro slaves, Wolofs and Berberici, and so the king was asked to send more. '1533. The Wolofs of San Juan were declared to be haughty, disobedient, rebellious, and incorrigible, and could not be taken to any part of the Indies without express permission. In Quivira, Mexico, there was a Negro who had taken holy ecclesiastic Orders. There was established at Guamanga, three Brotherhoods of the True Cross of Spaniards, one for the Indians, and one for Negroes. An uprising of Negroes took place in Sand Pedro of Honduras.'*
After the first voyage, the chronicle of the Black presence takes on new dimensions: In 1513, thirty Negroes helped Balboa hack his way throught the tropical undergrowth to reach the Pacific Ocean. There were Black soldiers with Ponce de Leon, when he set out to find the Fountain of Youth, and inadvertantly landed on the Florida coast. Langston Hughes in his Famous Negro Heroes of America [1958], wrote:
'When Hernando Cortez invaded Mexico in 1519, one of the Negroes in his army of 700 found in his ration of rice one day some grains of wheat. These he planted, and is so credited with introducing the first wheat onto the mainland of the New World. And by 1523 there were so many Negroes in Mexico that it was decided to limit their entrance since it was thought they might try to seize the ruling powers from the Spaniards --as indeed some in 1537 were accused of plotting to do.' ...
Herrera [y Tordesillas, Antonio] had actually lived and travelled extensively in the New World. Here is his chronicle of events that took place between 1531 and 1548.
------ * L. Weiner, Africa and the Discovery of America, vol I (1920)
See also
Zora Neale Hurston, WPA ethnography
Adam Clayton Powells, Sr, Jr
Barbara Walters, Audition
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Not whatcha call "our better history," eh? Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
Well, you have to start somewhere. And you don't have to be comprehensive.
"What is the centre of black politics in America today" is a rather limited question. Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
If the answer to the question, "What is the centre of black politics in America today?", is money --capital gain, bebe-- then the next surely concerns the so-called ingenuity of the "post-racial" individual American.
Which should "represents" nothing of race. And kinda problematizes the "intellectual debate" about nationalizing "our better history." If there were a debate. Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
Your answer makes the point that the difference between the situation in US is a just a tiny little bit different to that in Europe. But still people insist on comparing the situation of African-Americans with much smaller populations of recent immigrants.
Which isn't to say the situation in Europe isn't wrong in many ways (as it still is in the US), it's just not useful to make glib, illiterate comparisons between the two situations.
I've notice there is no commentary to this diary addresses singular political events that propelled Afro-European migrations
Declarations of independence 1947 - 1968. 1960, in particular
See Franz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks (1952) concerning people who "speak French properly".
Uncanny. Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
Now seriously, I suspect black politics is a big blind spot for most of us here. It certainly is for me. We don't have to wait for Black History Month to have black history diaries.
Please? Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
