http://www.tysknews.com/Depts/Our_Culture/happy_kwanzaa.htm
Here is my reply to the article:
As an American who is of African slave ancestry, I almost see your point when you mention that the philosophical standpoints that are and have been taken by the previous annual celebrations of Kwanzaa are full of idealisms and are lacking in actual substance of legitimacy. I also agree that such standpoints have been taken by the “big men” of post-colonial Africa’s history as mere slogans, but very much to the disadvantage of their respective citizens’ human and individual rights.
However, I must say that such similarities end there. In your article, you have ignored many facts that were in need of your prior consideration before such a demagogy were directed against a cultural celebration of the likes of Kwanzaa.
First off, as you had criticized the “tribal” concept of collective work, and contrasted it so much against the specialization and division of labor, you must have forgotten that it was through the same system (the one which you had praised for its ensuring of the prosperity of the Western world for the past 200 years) that the many slave trades occurred, particularly the Transatlantic Slave Trade (TAST). Such slave trades, if you understand, were not only the processes through which human capital and potential (economic-wise) were systematically drained from an already environmentally-disadvantaged sub-Saharan Africa, but were the same that put sub-Saharan Africa on such a standing as is considered stereotypical of that same region today. I’m sure that those chiefs who sold their POWs to European slave traders had some sort of good grasp of “specialization and division of labor”…
So is the so-called “tribal” concept working for sub-Saharan Africa? Not at the least. But has the imposition of free-market economies worked in post-Cold-War Africa? Not at any rate whatsoever (look at Bolivia in South America and see what happened). And furthermore, from what I’ve read, the “collective”, “cooperative” approach toward economics that has been espoused by Maulana Karenga is not necessarily the kind as was espoused by Karl Marx or Mao Tse-Tung, but rather the kind that has been espoused by those families who’re of West Indian and African ancestry (particularly those who are first-generation immigrants to the United States) in order to fund their fledgling family-owned businesses (and strangely enough, the same kind that is used by East Indian and East Asian families [again, especially those who are first-generation immigrants to America] for the starting-up of their convenience store businesses). It involves the pouring in of capital by family members and friends into the founding and financial maintenance of such businesses, and sometimes, even the collective ownership of these businesses by family and community members.
And I must strongly object to your verbal slamming of Kwanzaa as a combination of Jewish and Christian (and may I add, Muslim) rites, rituals, and symbols with “pagan” rites. HOW DARE YOU.
How dare you call a legitimate set of spiritual beliefs “pagan”, as if they are abhorrent and pre/under-civilized. I doubt that you’re at any point of advantage to denounce another people’s way of life in that manner; I doubt that you’re even of African ancestry, unless you can prove me otherwise. If you don’t have any experience in the field, then you can’t talk as if you do, and Heaven forbid that you can lay your mouth on it, so to speak. I take it that you are Christian in your religious beliefs (prove me otherwise if necessary), so you can criticize your own religion, its theology, and those who adhere to it, but can you say the same concerning Islam and its theology? Can you say the same concerning Judaism? Hinduism? Not unless you have been an adherent of either religions within your own lifetime. Thus, to call the religious beliefs of a people “pagan” (that is to say, “pre-” or “uncivilized”) without being an adherent of that same spirituality robs your argument of all scholastic legitimacy. And furthermore, such “pagan” beliefs were the beliefs of my own ancestors, so such a statement as you have made in your article regarding my ancestors’ way of life are personally INSULTING to me and my family, not to forget my people. I doubt that you would find it amusing if I were to lower myself to your level in that manner, so I will not do such in this written reply.
Also, as you praise “the Western tradition of private property, personal freedoms, and the rule of law”, you tend to forget that private property didn’t exist in Black Africa until it was introduced by the Asiatics (Middle Easterners) and Europeans; to traditional sub-Saharan Africa, the land belonged to all, and was not owned by any particular person, not even the chief or head of the people, but any division of land among families or individuals were regarded as leases, not permanent ownerships.
And as for personal freedoms and the rule of law, such was already in force long before the Europeans and Middle Easterners. The people who have violated such are truly evil men, especially in the eyes of their own people. But those are individuals, not an entire group of people, and the people who desire and have desired for democratic change in their political, social, and economic lifestyle have struggled, continue to struggle, and have accomplished their strivings for such; so to say that sub-Saharan Africa does not have any sense of democracy (which I take it from you to mean “human/civil rights”) is totally devoid of legitimacy and truth.
And finally, do you have an alternative? Do you have a substitute for Kwanzaa, one which would espouse your just-as-potentially-abhorrent Western values instead of our “backward”, “degraded” ancestors lifestyle? Throughout your criticism, no speck of a solution is found, so what is your point? Are you saying that African-Americans should only stick to holidays which are of American or European origin, as those are the only holidays, celebrations, or festivities which “should” naturally be acceptable to Afro-Americans? Then I must wholeheartedly disagree, as I could use the same argument against those same cultural celebrations, and against you as well.
But if that was the point, and if you couldn’t provide an alternative celebration of some kind which celebrates African tradition and both African and Afro-Diasporian history, then I eventually fail to see the legitimacy of your critique, and, because you have failed to fully enlighten me, and I doubt most other people, you have ultimately and scholastically failed in your attempt to discredit Kwanzaa as a celebration of culture, history, and the importance of family and community.
I reiterate, you have failed.
Have a nice day.
Sincerely,
Harry C.D. Underwood
age 17, high school senior and graduating valedictorian, Warner Robins
hey im brasilian
hey my names sara and Im brasilian….well im half but dont tell anyone..shh I cuold translate htings to you if you want…okay?? well I guess ill talk to you later…or not…
*oh and I looked under interest and I found you….if you were wondering where I found you and why im writing to you… oh and why are you interested in all that african-afo brasilian stuff just wondering*
Re: hey im brasilian
well, im a descendant of african slaves, just like a great minority of your own people are.
in fact, your country received more slaves within its own borders than any other nation, even long before your nation became independent.
Thus I have a strong interest in other descendants of the Transatlantic Slave Trade and their Creolized cultures, wherever they may be (Jamaica, the US, Haiti, the Guyanas, Brazil, Cuba, or wherever throughout the New World).
Re: hey im brasilian
well, im a descendant of the transatlantic slave trade, just like a great minority of our own people are, so i have a very strong interest in the creolized cultures of other descendants of the transatlantic slave trade, be they in brazil, jamaica, haiti, cuba, or the united states.
oh, and kwanzaa yenu iwe na heri! ;-D
Reply to your reply
To: Harry C.D. Underwood
Cc: Patrick S. Pool
Re: “My reply to an article I found ()” AND “Happy Kwanzaa! ()
Mr. Underwood:
As an American of slave-holding ancestry I can readily see why you took offense to this article. I must confess that your response “ignored many facts that were in need of your prior consideration.”
You attacked Mr. Poole’s statement that “specialization and division of labor… has allowed the West to flourish over the past two hundred years,” and that “It is the reason why Masai and Zulu tribesmen still live in grass huts, wear animal skins and must walk everywhere.” Despite any misgivings you may have about these statements, they are valid. Only in societies that produce a surplus of food can people devote a significant amount of effort to non-subsistence activities, in this case modernization and industrialization. No matter how much you dislike it, very few African cultures ever made it beyond subsistence farming. Interestingly, the two that he mentioned, the Masai and the Zulu, are two common examples of this sort of pre-modern society. Other African tribes did produce a surplus and did create dynamic civilizations (the Kongo Kingdom, the Ethiopians etc.), but for the large part these were exceptions, not the rule.
You further attributed the western system of super-subsistence industrialization to the slave trade. You must have also forgotten that slave trading was first done by African nations with other African nations. I am not condoning the slave trade and the millions of people that died as a result of the trans-Atlantic slave trade, but I am reminding you that African kings first approached the Portuguese, not the other way around. Furthermore, the slave trade only served to bolster the economy of the so-called “environmentally-disadvantaged sub-Saharan Africa.” The population boom brought on by calorie rich New World crops (maize, beans, squash and yams (yes, were brought to Africa by Europeans from South America)) and the massive infusion of money into the slave trading kingdoms proved to be the best thing, economically speaking, that could have happened to those governments. If the process was so “draining” why did the kings and chiefs continue to supply European traders with a prodigious amount of human cargo, delivered to the ports ready to ship?
You used strong language to respond to his reference to “pagan rites associated with the first fruits of harvest.” The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary defines pagan as follows: “Heathen; especially: a follower of a polytheistic religion (as in ancient Rome).” There is anthropological evidence that “Sub-Saharan Africa” did indeed hold multiple gods in high esteem and were thusly non-Christian and therefore “heathen.” A comparison is also drawn, but not by Mr. Poole, between the African pagans and the Roman pagans. The Romans are widely considered the pinnacle of ancient civilization; you might take it as a compliment in disguise.
Also, what does it matter weather or not Mr. Poole was of African decent? He is advocating a particular viewpoint with facts to back it up to boot. He has the right to do so, regardless of his ancestry.
(continued in next post)
Re: Reply to your reply
(continued form previous post)
You address the concept of personal ownership and assert that “black” Africa (was there another sort?) had no concept thereof. Simply put that statement is wrong. Among Ju/’hoansi bushmen of the Kalahari (Namibia, Botswana, Angola, Zambia, and Zimbabwe), the hunter who’s arrow killed a piece of game owned that animal, regardless of who shot the arrow, or even if he was present at the hunt (Cultural Anthropology, The Human Challenge Haviland, page 187). The hunters that were present were obligated for that man to arrive before butchering the kill. The Ju/’hoansi also defined their territories based on natural features like water holes (Haviland 186). Other groups were allowed to come and go but were expected to show proper respect to the claiming parties. If this is not a system of ownership I do not know of one.
You also request of Mr. Poole an alternative for Kwanza and condemn his critique as illegitimate. This is highly inappropriate, as he was not giving reasons for why people should or should not celebrate Kwanza. Rather, he was simply stating the inconsistencies within its practice. You also put the words “backwards” and “degraded” in quotes implying that Mr. Poole had condemned your “ancestors” as these things. Nowhere in his article does Mr. Poole ever use those words, in any context. This begs the question: what were you quoting?
I reiterate, you have failed.
Sincerely,
Horatio E. Seafort
age 18, first year undergraduate history student, University California, Riverside
Re: Reply to your reply
Let me respond to the statement concerning ther terms “backwards” and “degraded” and why I put them in quotation marks. I did so because the term “pagan”, when used within that context that would be used by a fundamentalist Christian or fundamentalist Muslim, is used exactly to mean “backwards”, “degraded”, “primitive” (a term that is also associated with the famous “Stone Age cavemen”), “idolatrous”, “witchcraft”, and other similar terms. In the mind of the average Westerner (and, I’m sure, the average Middle Easterner), these words garner a response of disgust, repudiation, and grimaces (something like “eeww, don’t touch me with that!”). One of the best examples of this atypical attitude toward “paganism” would be the first-impluse reaction toward “voodoo”. Voudoun (the more scholastically preferred way of spelling it) is, by itself, a spirituality that is of African origin (specifically coming from the nation of Benin, formerly known as Dahomey) and is just about as legitimate as any other spirituality. However, in the Western world, “voodoo” is an equivalent to “witchcraft”, “zombies”, “voodoo dolls”, or anything else that we may have seen on that accursed “Scooby-Doo” series of series.
So of course Mr. Poole didn’t call my ancestors “backwards” or “degraded”, as that would have been VERY ignorant, more than it would have been racist. But did he say that my ancestors way of life was such, even in different terms? Yes, most definately. THAT was what I was trying to denounce.
And, he being American, I doubt that he would be ignorant of the images that “pagan” or “voodoo” often conjure up in the minds of average Westerners. I’ve seen it myself, I’ve seen the attitude taken by average Americans toward “pagan” and “voodoo”, and it is EXACTLY how I just described it to you.
Yes, I recognize that this is the West, and the West (especially the part known as the U.S. of A.) is generally going to regard the spiritualities and lifestyles of the African people (both on the continent and the Diaspora) in the way they typically will. But I take this stance concerning Black Africa, paying special concern toward the history of the Black African people: let those who live the lifestyle have the final say-so on it’s legitimacy. I haven’t gone through (nor do I look forward to do so) what the Black African peoples of sub-Saharan Africa and the Third-World Americas have gone through, so even I can’t have the final say-so on the so-called “discrepancies” of their lifestyles (hell, I don’t even think there really is a final say-so, when I think about it).
However, as much as it is institutionally disadvantageous to me, I am a member of the African Diaspora, a descendant of the 12-24 million Africans who were sold by (yes) African royalty to European or Arab traders (as these POWs were only obtained by African royalty in the first place through interethnic war) who then transported my ancestors throughout the Transatlantic world. So do I have some sort of right to say my piece concerning an issue that affects Africa or the African Diaspora? In more than a few ways, yes.
But the main chagrin that I maintain against Mr. Poole’s article is the fact that, first off, he’s not even of African ancestry (or then again, I could be wrong about that, and I won’t deny such if I am, but I am going off of mere presumption in this particular area). If he’s not of African ancestry, then why would he criticize a practice that is not even observed by most Americans of African ancestry if he himself is not even of that ancestry? (Geez, I wonder if he has something similar to say about the “discrepancies” of the Chinese New Year or Hanukkah!) Is Kwanzaa a celebration that affects him somehow in a negative form, fashion, or way? Or better, is Kwanzaa something that negatively affects other ethnicities other than African-Americans? And best, does Kwanzaa negatively affect African-Americans THEMSELVES?
If not, in neither three cases, then why the hell demean it (like he did) in the first place?
(Continued in next comment. damn this new character number limit!)
Re: Reply to your reply (Continued)
I’m going off of scholasticism and philosophical reasoning (and maybe a bit of objective common sense somewhere) when I maintain that an attack on this particular celebration (Kwanzaa) by this particular guy (Mr. Poole) was in no ways warranted or needed, the same going for the way that he attacked it. Emotion, of course, was involved in my critical response toward his article, something that I wanted to avoid implicating in my argument, so I agree that the words that I myself had used shouldn’t have been used or should have been toned down a bit at the least. (But I was particularly angered by the last paragraph, and the references toward the zawadi- oops! I mean “Christmas gifts”- and kinara- oops! I mean “menorah”. Now that was just- err…I won’t say what I felt right then…)
But in response to what you said concerning my using the term “illegitimate” to describe the content of his article, I say this: Within the realms of scholasticism, I explain my reasoning based upon patterns, so I look at/for patterns before looking at/for specifics, since specifics are, if you look at them, a jumbled mess that cannot be summed up or easily comprehended at any rate. Only if you see similarities, I believe, then (and only then) you can look at the specifics of things, all of which will be sorted out if given necessary time and necessary effort/energy.
From what you wrote concerning the issue of private property, I could tell that you looked in the directly opposite direction, using specifics (such as using the Ju/’hoansi Khoisan of the Kalahari region as “the exceptions”, so to speak) in order to explain why my argument concerning the concept of private property was not true. On the basis of the fact that we, you and me, take different, almost opposite outlooks and approaches concerning this article’s content, I will not say that your point of view is wrong, as I regard myself as being unfit to say such a thing (so I would definately be surprised if you were to say that mine WAS).
However, I ask that you at least give some sort of consideration to my argument, as I actually WANT to give some consideration to yours (hell, I even gave some to his). I will continue to defend Kwanzaa as not being a “fake holiday” or “a black (copy of)Christmas/Hanukkah”, as many have described it as, as I will continue to strongly defend my ancestors way of life and spirituality against any verbal onslaught (as disadvantageous as it may have been), but I am willing to say that my argumentative approaches may not be best or most advantageous, neither for myself nor for others who may find concern with the subject at hand.
And as far as celebrating Kwanzaa is concerned, I want to celebrate it for the memories and culture, not to live in the past or to dedicate myself to utopian ideologies that, because of the present state of the world, I cannot see any immediate hope in. Just for the culture and celebration involved…
(And by the way, what exactly have I failed in?)