This is a work in progress:
All the world is a white stage - Even though whites have never been more than a third of mankind, white history is what matters. Thousands of years of history in India, China, Africa and so on do not matter apart from their Colonial Period and Contributions to Mankind. But throw in a few token chapters so you can put “world” in your title.
“What went wrong” – cover this in the token chapters if you can do it without pointing a finger at white people. Do not forget to use the word “static”.
White Americans and Englishmen - position them as the good guys of history or at least as well-meaning. Take their words at face value. Do not question or frame their actions in any way that would make them appear backward, strange, savage or evil. Power corrupts – except for them
Passing of the Torch Doctrine – do not write about the history of a given piece of land or a given people, from beginning to end. Instead write about the History of Civilization: Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece, Rome, western Europe, America. Like that. Never mind that China and the Muslim world have been, even by Western standards, the most advanced civilizations for hundreds of years. Never mind that Anglos smacked down the Torch, sinking Britain into a dark age.
Technology – How to measure the true worth of a civilization. Compare its technology to how technology progressed in the West. Do not count anything that does not easily fit on that scale.
The three kinds of inventions:
- invention - something invented by a white person. People of colour try to invent stuff but in their hands they are just playthings, precursors or do not work properly. It is not a true invention until a white person makes a few changes and takes credit.
- contribution - something invented by a person of colour that white people learn how to do. Call it an “achievement” for added condescension. Or just leave it out: after all, white people could have invented it if they wanted to.
- mysteries – stuff invented by people of colour that white people do not know how to do. Like building pyramids, making earthquake-proof walls without mortar – or moving heavy things without using wheels.
Honorary whites – what to make brown people in the Middle East and North Africa when they do something important, like invent the alphabet or start a world religion. Same for early man. Make them look white in pictures.
Colonial vocabulary – Use it! You can still get away with words like tribe, chief, hut, Oriental, Asian, warriors, medicine man, exotic, minorities, development and terrorist. But do not go overboard: use ally, interest payments and civilian casualties instead of vassal state, tribute and slaughter.
Trust only white authors and scholars in your research. People of colour are not fair-minded about their own history – or anyone else’s for that matter.
Sources: Max Dashu: Racism, History and Lies, Tips on writing about Asian America, Notes on how not to write about Native Americans
See also:
- people of colour
- white gaze
- reading while white: history and news - reading, the other end of the process
- dichotomous thinking
- Basically Good
- The invisible foot
- The white inventor argument
- What Malcolm X read in prison
- Homi K. Bhabha
Well; by and large the civilizations that had the most effect on a global level are the powerful ones and the conquering ones.
So it makes sense that they would focus on european/white history for the most part.
And I suspest honestly a lot of not teaching a more accurate and negative version of the history boils down to trying to avoid drawing any comparisons to their own time/goverment etc….and ways of doing things.
That and people just not wanting to think of their ancestors as bad people ala the Confederates.
Oh yeah; people from other countries probably biased about their own culture and histories, I mean we are here in the US so why wouldn’t they be over there?
Where ever that happens to be.
@ V-4
I don’t think the point of the post is the reflect on the “whys” of this type of biased telling of history. Anyone who has taken even a few minutes to think about it, can come up with many different reasons why Europeans would do this. I think some people who come here focus more on the “why” aspect to try to understand the reasons behind such actions. To be honest, that aspect of the problem is probably the least important.
The more important focus is the study of the methodology of this type of racism, in order to combat it. I think most people already know the different motivations for racism, but many are ignorant to the methods racists use to dehumanize and dominate.
In my opinion, focusing on this is more important that stating the blatantly obvious.
@abagond: Great post! I may add something here:
These were the greatest cities in England in 1377:
London, pop. 40 000
York, pop. 12 100
Bristol, pop. 10 600
Coventry, pop. 8 000
Norwich, pop. 6 600
Lincoln, pop. 5 900.
Some other famous cities;
Exeter, pop. 2 600
Nottingham, pop. 2 400
Winchester, pop. 2 400.
Compare these to those in China, Japan, India, Middle East, in Mexico, in Africa, or even in Amazonas where they have recently discovered the whole lost civilization with villages spreading wide and far along that great river system with estimated population of thousands and thousands.
No wonder that the chinese viewed Europe during the medieval times as the most distant, dirtiest and disease ridden region in the most distant western peninsula, where those dirty uncivilized supertitious savages were fighting endless wars among themselves and causing untold misery to each other. Because, lets face it, that was the truth.
As for the so called “truimph of the west” or white man, or europeans, one should always keep in mind that this has been very very recent event in the history. Europeans did not achieve anything close to domination untill 1700′s and even then it was pretty slim in many parts. We shoud also remember that there was a little thing called the Ottoman empire just on the door step of Europe and actuall IN Europe for centuries to which the europeans could not do anything.
So at best, the “white domination” of the world is around 300 years old phenomena. And that is, at best. In reality it became reality only during 1800′s.
@ V-4
Like SomeGuy says, the WHY is not particularly interesting. It is the HOW. Knowing the how tells me how I can correct for it.
It is like when they sent up the Hubble space telescope and found out the mirror was made wrong. They did not throw up their hands or make excuses. Instead they set about to correct for it.
A lot of of this bias comes from religion, the europeans actally think that they invented religion and then had the audacity to go and teach it to the so called uninformed savages of africa and south america etc., they taught their white version ie; that Jesus is white and even though God has never been seen he is depicted as being white. Any one who did not follow their doctrin where deemed heathens and where dealt with accordingly, they destroyed any history that was present in these areas and also what was in the peolpe’s minds as though the world had begun in their time. The people where then brainwashed by these missionary’s so as even today black civilization’s and inventions are still being denied. It is the arrogance and fear of the white world of today and yesteryear to embed this ideology in the minds of people all around the world. They cannot accept that modern man evolved from the part of the world now known as Africa and that they themselves evolved from black people.
Yes, great post, Abagond, the picture at the top of the thread is worth a thousand words. Great point about how the ancients built structures that could withstand earthquakes and have stood the test of time.
India , as another example of a country with an incredible past, had tremendous history and developement before the West rose to its present day power
The world owes a debt of gratitude to white men and white supremacy has historically driven civilization.
This isn’t “racist”, it’s just a fact.
Here’s a simple test. Stop what you’re doing and look around the room in which you are sitting. Focus your eyes on any object in the room. It may be your computer, lamp, stereo system, drywall, paint on the dry wall, telephone, calculator, your own shirt, lens of your glasses through which you are peering, ink pens, and tattoo on your ankle. With the exception of the tattoo, virtually everything you see is a direct product of White ingenuity.
White people have reigned supreme in technological advances since the onset of civilization. Why is that a bad thing? Your entire environment is impacted with the positive contributions of White innovation.
If you disagree, you’re a racist.
@ WM
http://abagond.wordpress.com/2009/11/06/the-white-inventor-argument/
I think the title should be “The white racist guide to RE-WRITING history” because they do it to suit their own ends.
Excellent post… Simple, clear, well-written. Made me laugh.
Co-sign the “Mysteries” paragraph.
This is actually how I discovered my “civilization” was based on racism… I started wondering “why on earth do they always talk of “mysteries” when they refer to African facts” ? I was in my late teens. Since then, very time I come across something I am apparently not supposed to try and understand, I know that’s where I need to dig…
My issue is people who are not of a culture claiming to be experts, i.e. Egyptology “experts”. I would be very interested how a white history museum would look. Dead indigenous people, slave ship display, KKK memorabilia, babies born speaking perfect English, wearing a petticoat, carrying a parasol, and singing Singing in the Rain? Columbus bust? What exactly is “white history” or “white culture”? Who is “white”?
@ WM
Thank you for your example of some of the very things this post talks about:
1. Measuring people on a scale of Western technology
2. Knowing almost nothing about China
3. Seeing Egypt as “white”
The last two I gather from your statement: “White people have reigned supreme in technological advances since the onset of civilization,” since otherwise you would see how ridiculous it is.
Great upload! This is so true on so many levels!
@ Aba
I think the most insulting thing for me regarding the re-writing of history is a blonde, blue-eyed man called Jesus. By pirating Him and changing Him into a Germanic form destroyed us in more ways I can write.
Religious warfare has been the foundation of white supremacy. And using The Curse of Ham and Cain as a “whitefication” for degradation is very troubling indeed.
In defense of white people, I have to say that they *do* know how to make pyramids (without using modern technology, even!) Sure, the structures fall apart in a solid breeze, and they can’t be built to even the scale of the least powerful potentates who warranted encryption in a pyramid, but they’re still pyramid-*like*. Pyramid-ish. Pyramidesque. Well, the important part is that they suck and would be torn down in a bad Egyptian summer.
Now, when white people start building submerged churches, get back to me.
Ello from a ‘sarf lunden’ white gal – love yer site … and have been reading about the history of mesopotamia recently … My background is jewish and i think it is even more interesting to find out how biblical ideas were taken from other ethnic groups and civilisations like the ancient iranians/zoroastrians … BUT this idea of evil white english – truly we english are FED UP with seeing the ‘baddies’ in american films as the ones with the english accents – ok it gives jobs to english actors half the time [other half is americans pretending to be english bad guys]. Just sayin.
@WM:
“Here’s a simple test. Stop what you’re doing and look around the room in which you are sitting. Focus your eyes on any object in the room. It may be your computer, lamp, stereo system, drywall, paint on the dry wall, telephone, calculator, your own shirt, lens of your glasses through which you are peering, ink pens, and tattoo on your ankle. With the exception of the tattoo, virtually everything you see is a direct product of White ingenuity.”
Computer? That is most likely manifactured in Asia or some other place outside the West today because the western companies want cheap labour. And also, if we count complex calculating machines as computers, like the first made in the so called west were, the chinese beat us by some two thousand years to it.
Lamp? I think sumerians had first lamps some 4000 years ago. I know that the phoenicians had them some 3000 years ago. Not electricity but lamps. Electricity? Well, there are those famous batteries from Irak, some 2500 years old. Makes one wonder, right?
Drywall? You gotta be kidding. Similar constructions have been used for thousands of years, different materiels for sure, but the same idea, across the globe.
Paint? Well, they have found signs of paint from the graves of neanderthals and some caves from 25 000 years ago, so…
Calculator? Well, check the aswer to computer. Also, just to remind you, the aztecs had better calendar and better mathematics than the europeans who destroyed them. The celts had more accurate calendar than the romans ever did.
Shirts? Cloth was invented in Egypt or Sumer few thousand years ago and first “shirts” were made in Middle East and India couple thousand years ago, at least.
Glasses? Glass was used by the phoenicians some 3000 years ago. Also, the ancient greeks knew a lot about glass and lenses, they even used them as weapons in the battle of Syracuse in Sicily against the romans.
Ink pens? You mean fountain pens? They were western improvement. Inkpens were used in Asia, in India and China way back when.
Tattoos? They have found a frozen female from Siberian tundra who was some 10 – 15 000 years old and she had tattoos on her chest. So that certainly was not western invention, even though the picts and some brittish tribes had them too.
@ Nancy
I think a great deal are acting with a fake accent. I was very disappoint a few years ago to really find out how much stuff American films had stolen from other countries, especially from Korean. I guess considering history I should not really be all that surprised.
“mysteries – stuff invented by people of colour that white people do not know how to do. Like building pyramids”
Building pyramids IS a mystery. Nobody knows how they did it, not just white people.
btw how do you define ‘people of colour’? Are dark skinned Caucasians ‘people of colour’ or just black sub saharan Africans?
Also you might want to add to the list, “Who gets published”, because there is a lot of control exerted as to what type of thought is allowed…
I wonder if the old Catholic Book banning lists are still available? I swear, my father probably used that list as a guide as to what was good to read that week, lol.
[...] "All the world is a white stage - Even though whites have never been more than a third of mankind, white history is what matters. Thousands of years of history in India, …" [...]
History must be easy to write for white racists because the stage has been set for that *starring role*. How time is measured, geography defined and even the very alphabet – and language – we use is an outgrowth of domination.
It’s all taken for granted: time is measured from a place in southeast London, Greenwich. So is the Earth’s longitude.
Wasn’t white western civilization the international standard by which every other civilization has to measure itself against? Other cultures were identified as having reached a stage through which Europe itself had already passed —
- primitive hunter-gatherer;
- early civilization;
- feudalism; and,
- modern liberal-capitalism.
Only Europe was considered to have achieved the last stage.
The Renaissance is considered an outgrowth of European Exceptionalism. A kind of special Miracle. Let’s remember to ignore the Islamic roots of the Renaissance. The Romans were great, too, and so were the Ancient Greeks. But let’s not mention the African education of those Greeks…
White racist history does weird stuff like cut up continents.
I thought “a continent” was a large, continuous landmass separated by expanses of water. The landmass of Eurasia should be a continent, but it is 2 continents: Asia and Europe. Isn’t this an anomaly, as no sea or ocean separates them? An alternative view, that Eurasia is a single continent, results in a 6-continent view of the world.
When I think about China and India, about how diverse they are physically, culturally, historically – both are comparable to the entire European landmass, not to a single European country. It’s like comparing Germany, not to India as a whole, but to a single Indian state, such as Punjab or Tamil Nadu.
But Europe is “important” and more special than places practically nobody has heard from the back of beyond. South itself Asia has often been referred to as a Sub-continent even though, apart from the fact that it has a comparable level of physical, cultural and historical diversity as Europe, it has more reasons to be called a continent from a geographical and geological point of view.
********************************************************************************************
Even the shape and size of the continents was traditionally distorted to reflect the greatness of white and Western civilization.
The traditional map of the world, Mercator projection, distorts areas further from the equator, making Europe and North America and Northern Asia appear disproportionately large compared to areas closer to the equator, such as Africa or Central America. This inflation results in a representation of Greenland, for instance, into a place larger than Africa, whereas in reality Africa is 14 times as large. Greenland might be more comparable in size to, say, Sudan.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mercator-projection.jpg
How it compares to the Gall-Peters projection of the globe:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gall-peters2.jpg
@WM
There’s no doubt that the white man has had tremendous achievements in the last 300 years but you are discounting the work of the ancients that contributed to this. If you look at some of your own examples, you should see that many has their origins in Egypt and India. For instance, Egyptians used paints and colors many centuries ago and are home to the earliest form of lenses. Computers use binary number system whose origin lies in India. India likewise was the origin of the decimal number system and the invention of the number 0 without with mathematics would be cumbersome. The cotton gin too had its origin in India. I don’t discount the fact that white men have had contributed disproportionally in the last 300 years or so but a lot of it was on the shoulders of many other civilizations.
@Abagond
“Trust only white authors and scholars in your research. People of colour are not fair-minded about their own history – or anyone else’s for that matter.”
Not so. It should be “Trust only white authors and scholars” who agree with the accepted historical theories in modern western academia.
I often quote Herodotus, Diodorus and Strabo, who were all very observant and well researched ancient Greek (supposedly white) historians, but they are often discredited by many. Why? Their observations don’t agree with the accepted historical theory in modern western academia.
Beleive me, ancient Africans who discovered the properties of layering polly-rhythms and the affects they have , were mathamatical geniuses
Something as trivial as Elizabeth Taylor being Cleopatra was enough to get me rankled.
The world owes white men a debt of gratitude.
http://www.whitehistorytoday.com/
how about the way that Diana Ross and Michael Jackson were choreographed in the WIZ, the whole weird scene with the strange outfits at the end?
@Bulanik
“the landmass of Eurasia should be a continent, but it is 2 continents: Asia and Europe. Isn’t this an anomaly, as no sea or ocean separates them? An alternative view, that Eurasia is a single continent, results in a 6-continent view of the world.”
Some geographers do consider Eurasia to be a continent and perhaps this is correct. However, you should recognize that ‘Europe’ is not totally arbitrary and has natural geographical boundaries- the Ural mountains, the Caucasus mountains, and the Caspian and black seas. (See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_Europe). This has to be a big part of the reason why Europe is a cultural zone and has populations that are genetically very close to one another.
If you look to the east of eurasia, China is also hemmed in by mountains:
http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?num=10&um=1&hl=en&biw=1280&bih=605&tbm=isch&tbnid=rTl075vjGCZbEM:&imgrefurl=http://dnowlan.ca/VM/science7/planetearth/mountains.htm&imgurl=http://dnowlan.ca/VM/science7/planetearth/mtwrldall2.gif&w=632&h=319&ei=OVw5UJqOJYaf0QWBn4CQDg&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=254&sig=111226889266179293639&sqi=2&page=1&tbnh=81&tbnw=161&start=0&ndsp=18&ved=1t:429,r:3,s:0,i:79&tx=51&ty=58
This is partly why there are two major races (or genetic clusters of populations) on Eurasia- caucasians and east Asians. There tends to be a greater genetic distance between populations that are separated by a geographical barrier, whether it be a sea, a desert or mountains, because people cannot move freely between and mix. Case in point- the Sahara desert, the reason why north Africa is part of the Caucasian zone, more than the black African zone.
Anyway,
“When I think about China and India, about how diverse they are physically, culturally, historically – both are comparable to the entire European landmass, not to a single European country.”
India- yes. China- not so much. Something like 90% of Chinese are Han.
“This is partly why there are two major races (or genetic clusters of populations) on Eurasia- caucasians and east Asians.”
See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_genetic_clustering
Populations cluster into major groups and if there is any such thing as race, these groups are the races. The distance between the clusters, as I explained, is because of geographical separation.
@steve:
Well, there is a small landmass between the Ural mountains and Black Sea, in case you haven’t noticed. Perhaps plus one thousand miles or so. Urals do not connect anything in the south, the only boundaries are the russian river systems, which were not that much of a barrier for mongols or any other before, like the huns or avars.
In China there is plus 100 different ethnic nations and languages but perhaps they do not count since all of them “look the same”, right?
Once more, get rid of that ridicilous term “caucasian”. It is an invention, a fantasy term, invemted by 1800′s racists in their wet dreams. Real caucasians, like the azeris or ossetians or tsetshens would give a racist a real diarreah. You know, suspiciously black hair, brown eyes, foreign religion etc. Only americans use that funny and embarrassing term “caucasian” and nobody knows why they hold into it like a baby on a pacifier.
Also, there is only one humanrace biologically, Steve. I know that bothers racists like morning after chili in the outhouse, but what can you do?
@mary burrell:
I think that Marlon Brando as a japanese, or was it a chinese, is almost as funny as Liz as an egyptian princess. And lets not forget young Charles Bronson as a native american chief. That was way out there.
@ Steve
Did you really say “Caucasian”?
Steve says to Bulanik:
Who says I should do that? I hardly believe that “Europe” is arbitrary.
The United Nations Statistics Division lists transcontinental countries under the continent in which they have the majority of their population.
http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm
But, if natural geographical boundaries, like mountain ranges and seas were the criteria for continental division, then North America ought to be split by the Rockies. You realize, of course, that the Ural Mountains’ highest peak is only about 1895m, yet Mont Blanc in the Alps of Western Europe, is 4810m at its highest? Perhaps we could use Mont Blanc’s “un-crossability” as a criterion to demarcate a continental division instead of mountain ranges that traverse 2 countries….
If what you say is to be believed, you make it sound that it’s almost a foregone conclusion that Europe is rather separate from Asia.
So, how come the Soviet Geographical Society only formally recommended that the boundary between Europe and Asia be drawn in textbooks along the eastern foot of Ural mountains as late as 1958?
http://velikijporog.narod.ru/st_evraz_gran.htm
What evidence is there that the modern border is not a construct, one defined by convention? Tell me, is Turkey Asian or European?
What about Russia?
Or Georgia?
Or Azerbaijan?
What about the republics of Central Asia?
Sounds like every history course I’ve ever taken. I’ve learned not to trust history/social sciences textbooks on much of anything.
Bulanik said:
“When I think about China and India, about how diverse they are physically, culturally, historically – both are comparable to the entire European landmass, not to a single European country.”
Steve said:
Do you mean to India is diverse, but China is not, because they are 90% Han?
I realize that China has a population in excess of 1.3 billion, and 90% of that is rather huge, but, I hope you aren’t REALLY trying to say that the ethnic minorities don’t count because they all “look the same”?
Well, I hope not. Because they just don’t!
From recollection, there are at least 52 ethnic minorities in China, and 40+ of them have their own autonomous territories, there are at least:
- 15 million Zhuangs
- 10 million Manchu
- 9 million Huis
- 8 million, Miao
- 7 million Uyghurs
- 7 million Yi
- about 5.7 million Tujias,
- 5 million Mongols
- about 4 or 5 million Tibetans
- 3 million Buyeis
Integration of ethnic minorities with each other and with the majority Han Chinese varies a lot from group to group. The emperors of the Qing Dynasty, for instance, were themselves Manchu, and not members of the Han majority. I remember people in the north are taller, those in the south shorter. There are other differences, besides.
Sure, people share the same culture, same writing system, same history (?), but distinctly different languages are spoken in different parts of the country.
I don’t mean different accents, but completely different languages. Apart from the dozens of languages spoken by the ethnic minorities, the Cantonese, Shanghainese, and standard Mandarin spoken are completely different languages (all though they do use the same writing system).
Steve, that was quite a dismissive sweep you made there….
http://www.china.org.cn/e-groups/shaoshu/index.htm
http://asiasociety.org/countries/traditions/ethnic-minorities-china
WM (White Man?),
Although you’re obviously very proud of white mens’ “accomplishments”, remember that, for centuries, they banded together (and still do when they can get away with it) to withhold knowledge and education from others (including white women). Believe me, somewhere along the way, many of these brilliant ideas were stolen from non-white-males, and I doubt that we’ll ever know the whole truth behind many of these inventions.
As for the debt of gratitude…thanks for inventing nuclear weapons, white men.
This post sounds like something right up Doug’s alley. One of his main themes is that white people contributed everything great with their inventions.
So do any of you POCs take the time to teach your kids about the history of blacks & other POCs or do you just leave it all up to the school system?
Nevermind, I know what the answer will be, something like “we can’t because the white man is stopping us from purchasing & using books.”
Yawn … Wake me when the black out-of-wedlock rate falls below 40%, when blacks don’t practice colorism as extreme as any white racism, when blacks value intelligence above ignorance, etc.
@Steve
@sam
Steve said:
Steve, by “Caucasian zone”, do you mean most North Africans are white, like ‘European’ white?
How white do you think North Africa is? As you consider the region to be a Caucasian zone, are you saying the barrier of the Mediterranean sea is practically negligible in comparison to the Sahara? The Straits of Gibraltar — the part of the sea between Africa and Europe — is only about 14.5km in distance between the shortest points. The Sahara, in contrast, is about the size of the USA. Going by your theory, then, North Africans should be practically interchangeable with Europeans, as a people, shouldn’t they?
AFAIK finding suggest that – although there is tremendous variation among the populations – the presence of black, south-of-Saharan ancestry in North Africans is of a much higher levels than in Europe.
So why aren’t North Africans whiter, or white as, the Europeans that are geographically nearer to them?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_history_of_North_Afric
Thank you, Mr. Peanut Gallery! Come again, any time you need a booster shot for that weakened ego!
The world owes white men a debt of gratitude.
I’d like to extend my gratitude to the white men for the modern day version of toilet paper, even though the Chinese were the earliest to do so. The white man inverted Cottonelle, 2 ply, sturdy and soft. Toilet paper, one of the greatest inventions ever. Thank you white men(at least for the modern day version)!
templet00 wrote: “Yawn … Wake me when….”
Naah. it’s best that you just “sleep it off” … besides which, your presence is not needed anywhere, and no one will even know that you’re gone….
@ Bulanik
Some really interesting posts and information you’ve provided here. I’ve said this before you really should be writing your own blog. You already have more than enough to data to supply 3 or 4!!!
I was talking to my sister about this website, and it happens that we are at a rrreeaaalllyyy boring conference for work, and so I have a bit of time to get into this blog (which is really not about anything at all).
This blog is written by a black man in the United States, and so that brings up some questions.
I wonder what on Earth good does it do to demonstrate whether this or that thing was invented in antiquity by white people or “people of color” (whatever the hell that means– not all people who are not white are necessarily the same).
If you could go back and demonstrate that black people have contributed something to civilization, how is that relevant to, say black people in Detroit who are idiotically mismanaging their own school districts and have 68% of children who can’t even do basic mathematics? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dBbZFXr05U
How is a mythologized past relevant to a bleak future? In case you missed it, I’ll ask it one more time: How is a mythologized past relevant to a bleak future?
The thing is: If black people (at some time) had invented something so great (in the way of civilization), then:
1. Why doesn’t it still exist? (Greece hasn’t gone anywhere and is still recognizably Greek after over 2,000 years. As is China. As is Israel. As is India….)
2. Why were they such easy prey for colonial powers?
3. Why have they had such a hard time getting anything together in Modern Times? (Chinese people did have a rough past couple of hundred years, but they are slowly bouncing back from it.) Haiti, on the other hand is as poor as when they started at independence– over 200 years ago. Just about everywhere there are black people that are allowed to manage their own government, they destroy it. Detroit. East St. Louis. Nigeria. Mali. Haiti.
I’m also very tired of this term “person of color.” I have lived in China for the last 9 years (and am married to a Chinese woman), and I will tell you that: Chinese people don’t have an overall positive impression of black people ANYWHERE in the Chinese world. It takes speaking Chinese and actively working to leave a good impression to overcome the damage done by the embarrassing/ AIDS infected Africans. So……EVEN IF Chinese people have invented something before some white people somewhere did, they don’t see any camraderie with black people (or with other Asian people) as a result. So, just get it out of your heads.
My Chinese wife is having our first child. It will be: 50.5% Asian. 43% black. 8.5% white. There is a Jewish temple here (there are 5 on the Mainland of China) and they are willing to convert me, and so it will be 100% Jewish. It will also speak Chinese as a first language.
When I peruse this blog and just see the RAW STUPIDITY/ LOGICAL INCOHERENCE that is on here, I just can’t see any hope in trying to raise the child with a positive black identity. So, we’ll teach it to speak Chinese as a first language and then fold in English maybe after it is 6.
@ Disgusted
You are just an Uncle Ruckus, plain and simple.
@ Disgusted
SomeGuy nailed it. Though I think maybe you are just a white troll.
Why not confront my analysis? Why call names? I enumerated my points. You could respond to any one of them.
I’m neither white nor a troll.
@ Disgusted
When black people are brought up on a mythologized past, like you apparently were, they become self-hating. And they pass that down to their children, which makes it harder, not easier, to live in a racist world.
@ Disgusted
Please stick to one user name or you will be kicked off this blog.
http://abagond.wordpress.com/comment-policy/
@ Disgusted
This post has a topic. Stick to it. Or relate your points to it. Like what does people in China looking down on blacks have anything to do with this post? If it is relevant, make it so. Otherwise you are derailing.
Sorry. I didn’t know about the username. I thought that was post titles. I meant “disgusted” to be the title to my post
Ok, to answer your question………….
I grew up around black people and my parents are both black. I REALLY REALLY tried to give us a chance (before I fled the country), but I just kept seeing the same things over and over and over again. It is not history that has made me so disappointed/ disgusted/ avoidant of black people. It is ACTUAL EXPERIENCE. Let me give you some examples:
1. When I was in graduate school, I worked a night job at a gas station to help pay my rent/ bills. The customers were about 60% black and 40% white. 99% of the the theft was black people. Night after night after night.
2. Before that, I went to a church (in which I was deeply involved). Every single member there was black. And the church was generally incompetent and couldn’t get anything done. Yet, if you look at synagogues, you will see that they are well organized and run like a tight ship. Why can these Ashkenazim get things done but the black people (at any number of churches) can’t?
3. There was also Detroit, near which I grew up. That city is a disaster. And it has only gotten worse over time. Corruption and general stupidity are orders of the day. Kwame Kilpatrick was the mayor. Elected by black people. It seems that he was in flagrante delicto with one of his subordinates and the city spent $9 million that it didn’t have investigating this situation (the investigation was ordered and conducted by black people– so there was no racial issue). He was convicted based on text messages that he sent to this woman (that he thought had disappeared and no one knew about). So, he had to go to jail.
Some white people in Texas gave him a job to polish a seat (over $100K per year) if he would just pay the fines and keep his nose clean. He couldn’t even do that and had to go BACK to jail.
So….you have a mayor that was elected to run a crumbling city……that had already been destroyed by another black mayor (Coleman Young)……that once was a functioning city *until the very moment it was taken over by black people.* And I don’t hear anything descriptive from other black people except excuses/ “racism” this/ “captalism” that/ “Western society” this.
4. Lots of rude/ combative/ stupid behavior in general life, for no reason. (I speak very properly.) I never have these problems with non black people.
5. Here in China, most of the exchange students are Africans. And they come here to study medicine. (If you go to a hospital, less than half of Chinese doctors even have a Bachelors’ Degree: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/12/world/asia/12hospital.html). It is almost the flip of a coin if you will even leave a Chinese hospital alive
So, Chinese doctors and engineers are not the best. But they are better than Africans. So, that’s who they train. So embarrassing.
Black people are relying on Chinese people for training and techincal assistance? (Check out some articles on The Economist or The China Daily.)
^ Geez… What’s been going in on here? Is he serious?
“The thing is: If black people (at some time) had invented something so great (in the way of civilization), then:
1. Why doesn’t it still exist? (Greece hasn’t gone anywhere and is still recognizably Greek after over 2,000 years. As is China. As is Israel. As is India….)”
Gosh, people, Im so sorry that I have brought up such frivilous things like drum / dance and the force and power it relates to the ancient dark hued Africans and their genius and one of their contributions and gifts to the world.
When I have brought in an ancient pygmie cerimony of pregnant women, with them doing a dance to a rhythm that has survived thousands of years , including unbeleivable represion in slavery, to be the rumba from Cuba , which is a world wide popular dance ( dont get me started on the importance of it in our past in the 30′s), I forgot, it doesnt really mean anything, its worthless to these discusions and has absolutly nothing to do with contributions to the world, after all its just drumming and dancing, amounting to no value what so ever , so much so , that no one on here can ever really thinks of using it as a great defence to pound it over the dumb statements you hear so often here…
I guess it just doesnt cut it on the high leval discusions of what has value to the world Of course, I know it will never mean anything to the white racists who will always dismiss it as frivilous drumming and dancing, and, I guess it just doesnt really register with anyone else here, but, for those of us who know, its weak in the knees , mind boggling truth that floors us with the huge demensions and ramifications that it really represents. And stands on absolutly equal footing with any contribution known to mankind ever…just take it all away and try living without it
….^ sounds like an American…not in China….making stuff up..
My comment was directed at King who said:
“^ Geez… What’s been going in on here? Is he serious?” in reply to Disgusted.
Disgusted, surely you can take a moment and refute your own arguments. I can’t believe that you think that you’re making sense here. I mean every possible rebuttal seems obvious.
Hey Bulanik!
What in the world… is this normal?
@King, yes, sometimes.
I usually find something else to do when trolls like Disgusted drop in.
“Disgusted
So, Chinese doctors and engineers are not the best. But they are better than Africans. So, that’s who they train. So embarrassing.”
Linda says,
I won’t stay off topic too long but I have to ask, Disgusted:
How did you come to the conclusion that Chinese-trained African doctors are worse practitioners than the native Chinese doctors (who are Chinese trained)?
Did certain cities or Universities in China run studies to ascertain this information or is this just general knowledge passed along by word of mouth in the Chinese circles you interact with.
If a study was done, does it contrast American-trained Chinese doctors to Chinese-trained doctors? Same thing with African doctors–American-trained versus Chinese-trained?
I am just curious to know why you put this out there as definitive knowledge and what it’s based on.
Is the argument here that Greece still exists but that Egypt or Ethiopia don’t exist? What am I missing?
…just being sarcastic, King….I just go berserk when I see people try to imply that black people havent made contributions that are valuable and last in the world…I guess I thought it should be on everyone’s lips , as an absolute stomping to that logic
“I mean every possible rebuttal seems obvious.”
not sure what you mean there
Sorry, B.R. I meant to Disgusted’s arguments…
I get you!
1. Starving, unstable Ethiopia exists.
2. Egypt does exist. As a white/ Arab country. The mythical black people who made Egypt run it no more.
@Linda
**** I live in China and am married to a Chinese woman. The last province I live in was Hunan and there were Africans everywhere.
****** Read the NY Times article (all the way through). That should answer your questions. If you want more, compare the life expectancy of Chinese people in the US/ Hong Kong to Chinese people on the Mainland.
****9 years of living in China.
@ Disgusted
Famine exists in Ethiopia due to natural drought. No amount of technology currently available to mankind can produce water out of thin air.
Thanks, King….and welcome back, you were missed
Um, Israel has this thing called………”desalination.”
Water has been on the earth a very long time. Israel is dry and there are no starving Jews. UAE is dry and there are no starving Arabs.
@ Disgusted
Ethiopia already has a desalination plant. The problem lies in getting that water to the affected areas.
Ok, so they have had a civilization for *that* long and they haven’t come up with anything better than that? After how many thousands of years?
In 2,000 years, Israel has:
1. Had 2 temples destroyed
2. Been rebuilt
3. Had the Hebrew language go extinct.
4. Brought the Hebrew language back to life.
5. Has a developed country that is functioning (even though half of it doesn’t work– Arabs and Haredim).
And yet the Ethiopians can’t even get water to every point in the country. And they have been there for at least a couple of thousand continuous years.
@ Disgusted
It’s funny that you brought up “starving” Ethiopia in the first place. I don’t really know what that has to do with “the-white-racist-guide-to-writing-history”, but it’s very telling about your own whitewashed mindset.
Let me tell you something Mr. Oreo living in China. When those Chinese start cracking down on all those Africans in their country, they aren’t going to take the time to sort out the Negroes. Your Black azz is going in the frying pan along with all the other Black folks and being married to a Chinese wife will not save you.
I can ask Americans basically the same question:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/24/us/midwest-water-wells-drying-up-in-drought.html?pagewanted=all
@Someguy
1. How many obese Americans are starving to death?
2. The Chinese authorities have already started cracking down on Africans in China. The first way is: They give fewer tourist visas. The second way is: For those that they give student visas, they don’t give them work permits so that they can’t stay after they finish studying. (Guangdong does not give work permits to any black people. They have a large African presence that they are trying to clear out.) So, the crackdown is ALREADY HERE. For blacks that have a US passport from Canada / US/ UK, you will be OK. But if you are Cameroon, God help you.
@ Disgusted
Do you know the logistics of water transport from a coastal desalinization plant to an area occupying over a million km? No, you don’t, because if you did, you wouldn’t even open your mouth to imply that the solution is simple. You think you know it all and have every solution, you don’t. Stick to self-hate, it take a lot less knowledge to practice.
Disgusted, do you know the history of Israel, how it was funded, by whom it was protected, how it’s military was built and who supplied the tanks and state-of-the-art fighter jets and attack helicopters?
I’m not even coming to this from an anti-Israel angle… I’m just saying that there is a BIG difference between Israel and Ethiopia and a LOT of the difference has to do with how the U.S., Britain, and the World Bank policies toward the founding and nurturing of the Jewish State form the beginning of Modern Israel. Without this protection and support Israel would not have ever become a nation, or remained one for long.
Not to take away anything from their own hard work, but let’s be honest,
Israelis + hard work – US support = Failure of Israel
@someguy.
No, I don’t know the logistics. Do you know either? I thought not. But wait. What is the land area of Saudi Arabia? 829k sq.mi. wow! And they seem to have figured it out. Nice try, but the Ethiopians just don’t have their shit together.
@king.
Of course I know the history of Israel. it is built, funded, protected and supplied by Israel! If the US fell into the sea, Israel would still be there. They are the people that can and they have been indestructible these last 4,000 years. The US won’t make a bit of difference.
*Cameroonian
@ Disgusted
How much money does Saudi Arabia make from oil? Hmm… nah that can’t be the reason they are in a much better position.
Nice try, yourself. Neener, neener, boo boo!
@ Disgusted
The problem with your arguments is that you are currently in Google mode. In other words, you don’t know sh*t about Ethiopia or the etiology of Ethiopia’s problems, yet you try hard to make your biased point , while googling information between posts. Just stop, you are embarrassing yourself.
lol So very true! Couldn’t have said it better myself.lol I say let these self loathing negroes hang themselves. The more they talk the more they expose their ignorance and stupidity. This guy Disgusted,is a self hating Uncle Tom. A total disgrace to black people worldwide. Coonery at it’s best!lol
Ok, so you ignored the comments as for Israel.
It’s not illegal to look up the land area of Saudi. I mean, didn’t you do it for Ethiopia?
“Etiology” is a term used in pathology/ for diseases. I think you mean “the cause” of Ethiopia’s problems.
So, I am going to have to go now. I was making some orders online and this was a nice distraction. But as I told my sister (and to paraphrase– I believe– Rachmaninov): “Stupid Black people are enough for a lifetime, but a lifetime is not enough for stupid black people.” If all I did was argue with people on the low end of the IQ distribution, then I wouldn’t do anything else all day.
Good night and have fun.
I don’t think this disgusted guy was a)black b) in China c) is married to anyone etcetcetc. Just another trolling White power nerd.
Hahahahaha! Don’t be so pitifully naive!
You really have no idea that the foreign aid to Israel (particularly at in it’s most vulnerable years) is proportionately larger than to ANY other nation (based on per capita)? How about Israeli air power which has been the backbone of their resistance and survival of foreign invadsions? Do you think that the fact the the Israeli’s were flying f4 Phantoms, while it’s Arab neighboring states were flying secon-hand MiG-21s had ANYTHING to do with their survival in the 6-day war? How about the fact that CIA and Mossad have had a cooperative intel sharing agreement for the past 50 or 60 years (including access to approved U.S. military satellite imagery and analysis? Do you think that any of this has had some effect on how Israel has managed to survive all these years in the mideast tempest?
Nobody can be THAT uninformed.
Hey there Sam!
@ Disgusted
King already answered you.
I actually know something about Africa, because I have a great interest in it; unlike yourself who most likely hates having to wake up each morning and look into the mirror to see a Black face.
I meant what I said, ETIOLOGY, which is the study of causes; something not solely confined to pathology. Sorry, if you can’t handle my fancy rhetoric.
You call people who disagree with you stupid, because you cannot properly defend your weak argument. Next time, come prepared.
That’s right, leave when you are losing. Take your toys with you and go home.
“Disgusted
Linda says,
Did you post a link to this NY Times article you are referring to? is this your source? Did Abagond accidently erase it?
Being that I asked you where you got your information, if it was a study or from your personal experience from heresay, I don’t see why you would refer me to an article that you did not even post.
and also, what does “technological advancement” of African countries have to do with African students studying in a foreign country? Their clinical studies in China have nothing to do with their home country, especially if they are being employed in China.
I am attempting to engage you in a nice way, so please lose the attitude. Telling me there are Africans everyone does not explain your statement that Africans are worse doctors than Chinese.
Did you get your information from a credible clinical study or are you just making your statement based on your own generalizations?
Do you have Chinese doctor friends who tell you that these African doctors that practice in Chinese hospitals suck? How many African doctors are working in your Province in Chinese hospitals?
You can post links/articles from China if you like, being that many of us here are non-black and non-American, someone will able to translate.
@Linda
What we are not being told is why Chinese doctors are bad.
Disgusted makes no mention of the public perceptions, or the impact of government funding on performance.
Or the way many doctors generate extra income.
There is no mention of the impact of zero financial kickbacks available to Chinese doctors from the pharmaceutical companies, for instance.
“Bulanik
@Linda
What we are not being told is why Chinese doctors are bad. Disgusted makes no mention of the public perceptions, or the impact of government funding on performance.”
Linda says,
Exactly. I was willing to listen to him because I thought he could provide an actual “boots on the ground” insight into Chinese society as it relates to foreigners
but after reading his statements on the “Asian Americans” board, I realize he’s white American and not black American, so now, I am not interested–can’t stand liars.
When will these white ‘race realists’ learn that they give themselves away everytime they open their mouths.
I’m starting to think you are right, Linda. Furthermore, the more he posts, the more I suspect he has been here before under a different name.
It amazes me to think they convince anyone for more than…a paragraph.
….or, think they do.
Abagond said:
Exactly. The Essence of white racist history-telling is the story of great chain of cultural transmission from Mesopotamia to Egypt to Greece to Rome to western Europe to the USA. Leave out vast gaps where the history of the rest of the world should be. Places like Samoa, Sumatra, Malawi or even “white” countries like the Balkan states (Albania, Bosnia, eg.) are made history-less sideshows at best, in the process.
This makes the underlying doctrine of history about “PROGRESSION”. Progress is sequential or else something is “wrong”.
Example: “They were a stone age people who never discovered the wheel!” A stone agers with no wheel will not progress.
It’s as if there is some kind of “template” of real history that goes:
Old and New Stone Ages, then
Bronze Age, then
Iron Age, then
Industrial Revolution, then -
Space Age.
Is it possible that a culture can have the technology of metallurgy, but not invest in militarism because it doesn’t believe it’s the best way to use its powers and resources…? Because European civilizations may have measured it’s advancement in these terms does not mean every other civilization followed the European model, and if that culture did not follow the path of military might, then it’s as if it lacks the essence of civilization. I imagine that’s why I used to hear about the “child-like” innocence of the “natives” in old films/documentaries. These “carefree” primitives lacked the ambition and work ethic to implement social hierarchy, militarization and industrialization – no wonder they couldn’t “advance.”
This is is what is unique and better about white men. They have inherent greatness.
Notice the mantle of GREATNESS cast upon Europe’s founding fathers. For instance Charlemagne – rational, pure, dignified by God.
Not a genocidal bastard who wiped out the Saxons.
Compare this giant to Attila the Hun – who is known as “Evil on Horseback” (barbaric, destructive, terrorist) or Genghis Khan, another bloodthirsty SOB from the East. They had savagery by the bucket-load, but not greatness. Their “greatness” is not written about.
Similarly, the Celts of France and Britain used to nail the heads of their enemies onto walls or dangle them from the necks of their horses, and 100 years ago the “great” field marshal, Lord Kitchener, stole the skull of Sudan’s military leader for himself, much like the US settlers took the scalps and body parts of Native peoples for themselves because…they’d earned the trophy.
But like the Celts and settlers, Lord Kitchener was not characterized as a headhunter, because he was a GREAT military leader, statesman and hero who rallied armies on an unprecedented scale.
He is famous for this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:YourCountryNeedsYou.jpg
The great king Charlemagne:
@ sam
Disgusted is for real. For example, he said he married a Chinese girl from a farm. No one would make that up. Not even Doug. Also, most white trolls pretending to be black use Fake Ebonics or at least cringeworthy slang. He does not do that, not one bit. He is more like RR, if you remember him.
Abagond, I’m assuming his IP address is from Central China?
@ Bulanik
Right, if you are at all different from whites the only possible reason could be because there is something wrong with you. Whites are never screwed up and yet, by some amazing coincidence, everyone else is found wanting – even the Bible. That is because they make themselves the measure of everything. It is utterly subjective and question-begging from the very beginning. It would be ridiculous except they have the cultural power to make it stick, at least for now.
Like B.R. talks about the genius of African music. Music does not count because whites are bad at it. So they pick something they are good at. Or good at during this particular period in history: technology. And yet even that is compared in a white way: Western technology becomes the standard against which all is judged.
When Herodotus talks about what makes the Greeks great he does not bring up technology or race. Those are rationalizations to make white power in our age seem like the natural order – the Curse of Ham with a new paint job.
@ King
He is coming through an anonymous proxy, so based on that he could be absolutely anywhere: in the middle of the Sahara – or standing outside my window.
@Abagond
Of course, if it’s anything good, then it has to be white or “lighter than black”. That’s why ancient Egypt must be less than black, more “the Middle Eastern”. Erasing / burying or diminishing its African identity, archaeological connections with Saharan and southern Nilotic civilizations.
In practically every book on “world history” I’ve tried to read Saharan civilization, like Ile-Ife or Mwanamutapa, are not discussed at all. Only silence — until the era of European slaving and colonization, when it is portrayed as culturally and technologically backward. It’s helped along by the Arabs. But not as violence or colonization…people just BECAME Arabic-speakers, like they went to sleep and woke up speaking perfect Arabic the next morning…
********************************************************************
How is this view of Africa written about?
I have seen this word: “sub-Egyptian”.
Also noticed, is that African is endowed with certain characteristics peculiar to them – and sometimes with wildlife, such as:
- prognathism (jaws like some primates, I believe)
- “Negroid type cephalic indices” (brains)
- “platyrrhini” (nostril direction among some monkeys), and,
- “Steatopygia,” (large buttocks on a woman)
When I looked up Steatogypia, it was mentioned in the same place as the Khoi people of Southern Africa. The most famous Khoi historical individual seems to be Sarah Baartman also known as the Hottentot Venus.
I googled up “Hottentot”, and it refers to the language spoken by the Khoi, but imo, it sounded like a Dutch word; when I googled that, “Hottentot” in Dutch means: “stutterer”. Stuttering was what the Khoi language sounded like in the ears of the Dutch.
This made me wonder about other “historical language” and what they are code words really mean:
Conquest = unification,
Subjugation = pacification.
Colonized Regions = Protectorates.
Rebellion = Mutiny.
“The world’s great religions” = tribal superstitions, cults or idolatry.
A masterpiece of “religious art” = an “idol” or “fetish,”
Most visual art is not art, but ethnography, instead.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ife_Kings_Head.jpg
Whites are never screwed up and yet, by some amazing coincidence, everyone else is found wanting – even the Bible.
Moses’s first bride, an Ethiopian was made to disappear into the background of religious history.
It seems that no matter what, the constant theme of these trolls is that you can never, ever, ever, ever talk about white people in a negative and often times truthful way. “White people never did anything wrong ever to anyone. So, leave them (us) alone!” SMH.
Disgusted,
You said, “I grew up around black people and my parents are both black. I REALLY REALLY tried to give us a chance (before I fled the country), but I just kept seeing the same things over and over and over again. It is not history that has made me so disappointed/ disgusted/ avoidant of black people. It is ACTUAL EXPERIENCE. ”
So answer me this, how did those black people in your experiences get that way if history (the past up to the present) had nothing to do with it? If you were tricked into believing that they were somehow just born that way (a race realist argument) not caring about doing better for themselves, then you are one lost self-hating brotha, assuming that you are black.
[...] All the world is a white stage – Even though whites have never been more than a third of mankind, white history is what matters. Thousands of years of history in India, China, Africa and so on do not matter apart from their Colonial Period and Contributions to Mankind. But throw in a few token chapters so you can put “world” in your title. [...]
1. “Asian”: what’s wrong with this? The asians I know call themselves this all the time, and has replaced “oriental”, which means only “easterner”.
2. Elizabeth Taylor as Cleopatra: why does this make you made? Cleopatra was of Greek descent. Elizabeth Taylor was great for the role.
3. Map projections??? Every globe projection has distortions. The distortions are selected based on which components of the global surface are held to be accurate and which components have to vary to allow the projection at all. It all depends on what information is trying to be conveyed with the particular projection. To imply any more than that is silly beyond all belief.
4. Whites are bad a music? This is so absurd it’s laughable. The traditional musical forms of whites, blacks, asians, and others are different, with each great in different genres. That diversity is what makes music great and I select the music I listen to based on the mood I am in, not on the race of the musicians. Also, don’t forget whose instruments make most of the music you and I listen to.
5. Eurasia: every geographer knows that they are a single continent. The division is traditional and cultural, not geological, but who cares? I mean, really, what a thing to whine about.
6. Teaching of history: whether we like it or not, the US is an off-shoot of the European nations, and has been closely tied with those nations and wars etc. from the very beginning. Sure, other places have their own history, but until later on it was of peripheral impact on the United States. Every place I have ever been teaches history with themselves in a central role. Unless one is after a history degree, there is only so much that can be taught.
7. Whites screw up all the time. White nations have and do screw up all the time. So does everyone else. Right now the powers in Asia are squabbling over two groups of tiny islands not worth a dime.
@Brothawolf:
White people have this pathological need to be loved at all times and any criticism of whites in any way equals hatred. After all, you (we) wouldn’t criticise us (them) if you really loved us (them), would you?
In addition to being the punching bag, the punchline to white America’s jokes and the starving, helpless village that can only be raised up via the benevolency of whites, we’re expected to play the role of “best friend” and “yes man,” basically reinforcing their viewpoints of the world by telling them exactly what they want to hear.
Strange how an entire subset of people long to be told “YOU’RE AWESOME” over and over and over again. Surely the self-confidence of whites isn’t so fragile as to require constant reinforcement day after day, is it? Hence the laser focus on Greece, Rome, Western Europe and America as the end-all-be-all of history? It’s like those other places don’t exist, am I right?
@king: Hi there!
@ Joshua
1. Asian: The word “Asian” has its place, but it is such a HUGE generalization based on how many humans fit into that category. If you take all of the peoples who are called Asian in the world, you’d very nearly end up with 3/4 of the global population.
3. Map projections: Distortions can be easily concentrated around the far upper and lower latitudes. There will certainly always be much smaller distortions in the more habitable latitudes, but nothing dramatic. What becomes suspect is when the maps are ALWAYS distorted in a way that makes Europe look much larger than it is in proportion, and makes Asia look much smaller. There’s room for interpretation but why is it always the same interpretation?
6. Teaching of history: It’s not just the Eurocentric slant, its the failure to include things like where did Algebra, or Gunpowder actually come from. This is linear to European and therefore American history, yet it took forever to get it into the history books.
Asia are squabbling over two groups of tiny islands not worth a dime.
Au contraire… I suggest you check the potential petroleum and mineral rights for the territorial waters surrounding both the Takeshima and Senkaku chains. I think that you will find that they are less foolish than you have imagined.
HEY there, Sam!
@joshua
Not much to offer, have you?
@mary burrell
That particular Cleopatra (VII) was the daughter of Ptolemy XII, a Greek, but it is inconclusive who her mother was. It’s possible then, that Cleopatra VII might have been only 50% or 25% Greek Macedonian, as it’s not clear who her paternal grandmother was, either.
The people who cast Elizabeth Taylor in their film were not eyewitnesses to Cleopatra’s features.
And when the film was made in the early 1960s, do you think the makers would have chosen a black woman to play this historical figure in the investment? I suppose we are also to accept that Richard Burton looks like Mark Anthony.
He played Sakini, an Okinawan interpreter in “Teahouse of the August Moon” (1956). But he never actually used any Okinawan dialect in the film.
“whites are bad at music” I am going to speak on behalf of Abagond,and , I dont want to misrepresent him, but,this is what I think he meant, and it certainly is what I mean, and, Abagond was reffering to me:
In American pop culture, it is built firmly on the foundation of black Americans innovations. And, whites, since apropriating the bango, have always copied these black Ameican innovations, said they invented them and made the most money comercialy from it. It happened with the first jazz band ever recorded, who were white, and said that blacks couldnt play jazz and that they the whites invented it….which is a total lie…it went into the swing era where the swing bands that made the bigger money were the white ones and Duke Ellington and Count Basie and Chick Webb were the heaviar swingers ( there is an account of when Benny Goodman’s big band that was the most popular, battled Chick Webbs band , and, Gene Krupa admitted that Chick’s band burned them), keep goint into Rock and Roll, and , you know the story, Elvis gets the glory, all the way up to Emenem getting voted artist of the decade somewhere (vomit), tell me what that is about?
So, of course there are great white individual musicans in the USA, but they didnt innovate the music and the orignal black sound is the definitive sound that most of the great players get lost in obsurity…until 100 years later, scholars all start saying the truth, as we see wih Loius Armstrong and discover his value and how he influenced every popular singer that came after him as well as any trumpeter…
Now, no one is denying the value that European classical music has brought to the world and the gift of harmony…but, the notion that it is something greater or more important than the ancient African concepts that dominate the world now, is something that shold be questioned
And by the way, this drama plays out in other places where they brought black slaves from Africa…the culture of the slaves totaly dominated the popular music styles of the perspective countries the slaves were brought to, meaning, the foundation of rhythm and groove, coupled with specific black African styles of dance to go with these beats, became the table that all the songs and melodies was set on top of…creating a music you never heard before in the other cultures involved, the Native Ameicans or Europeans never had dances and beats that aproximated the call responce, pollyrythmic , syncopated, shuffle step , PELVIC THRUSTS, that the black slaves from mostly West Africa brought to the tabble, and , the song writers of all colors and countries with this dynamic, raced to write their songs over these beats and dances.
This plays out all over in Samba, Rumba, Calypso, Cha Cha Cha, Bossa Nova, Jazz, Rock and Roll, Mambo, Reggae, Lindy Hop, Tap Dance, Charleston, Break Dance, Lambada etc etc ( is there anyone on here who never heard of any of these dances or style of music?)
At the same time, you get the phenomenon of something like in Salvador Bahia, a city that is one of the most black cities in Brazil with one of the strongest connections to its Afro diasporic past, having three white women the most popular and comercialy succesful at the “axe music” movement, and the big trio electricos on the TV coverage are mostly phenotype white as a bone….I was just there and let me tell you, there is so much that never gets shown, and it is really black…sound familiar to any of us Americans ?
…this is one of the things that is exactly what this thread is reffering to
In the music business, it is quite blatent and enormous in its perspective
Actually we know every well who Cleopatra was, and what she and Marc Antony looked like. Contemporary busts and coins still exist. Egyptian royalty practiced brother-sister marriages and the Ptolemies adopted this.
In map projections you have choices: distort the shape, the size, or both. The Mercator as I understand it was a map for marine use, and became familiar to many others. It starts with zero size error at the equator and it becomes infinite at the poles. Given that at that time polar sailing was non-existent it was logical to do so. Like other cylindrical projections it also gives a rectangular map. Many other projections do get used, but people are used to looking at this one. Also interesting is the north up, south down image used for virtually all of them.
I know there are resources projected to exist in the sea surrounding the islands, but rather than coming up with a rational method for compromise or using the existing international organizations for resolving such disputes, they all are posturing and brushing their militaries up against one and other. In the one case, three of the contenders are US allies posturing against each other.
I agree that the teaching of history is slanted, though I think the example of gunpowder is incorrect as even back in the 1960s I learned who invented it. I just don’t know how the teaching gets corrected without losing coherence altogether.
They are doing exactly the same thing that the United States would do if China began laying claim to Wake Island, the Midway Islands, or Johnson Atoll. How long do you think it would take for the Pacific Fleet to muster a Destroyer Battle Group to the general area? Nobody is interested in “the existing international organizations for resolving such disputes” when it is their own territory that is in dispute.
In the end the final arbiter of what is or isn’t a “rational” methodology is the sword.
Then “we” must all be in possession of exceptional knowledge, as the specialist historians do not agree who Cleopatra’s high-born Egyptian mother was. It is not conclusive who her father married after he repudiated Cleopatra V.
And, “we” know what Cleopatra looked like because there are coins and busts that remain from the era that show her accurately. Really?
Of course this explains why the British Museum’s scholars (who study these things) conclude, from one set of coins that remain of Cleopatra, she and Mark Antony look somewhat similar. Here are the twins on the coins:
http://0.tqn.com/d/ancienthistory/1/5/U/L/CleopatraandAntonyCoin.jpg
In another set of coins, commentators say Cleopatra VII was endowed with “an enormous neck and the features of a bird of prey.”
What one of the essayists (Guy Weill Goudchaux) concludes, is that there are no complete, accurate, and positively identified pictures of the face of Cleopatra. Therefore as no scholar has positively identified who her mother or paternal grandmother were – and the images that remain of her are inconsistent – then we CANNOT know “very well” who Cleopatra was, or in fact, what she looked like.
(The British Museum’s book that review images of Cleopatra is called “Cleopatra of Egypt: From History to Myth” by Walker and Higgs.)
Here is this bust of Cleopatra VII exhibited in Berlin:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kleopatra-VII.-Altes-Museum-Berlin1.jpg
But some might say that that bust in Berlin looks like this actress:
http://static.tvguide.com/MediaBin/Galleries/Shows/S_Z/Ui_Uz/Up_All_Night/season1/up-all-night-56.jpg
@jefe: Right! As great actori as he was, that is not one of his shining moments. Not to say that the movie is, in my mind, anybodys shining moment.
Joshua said, about map-making:
There are a few interesting ideas there. For instance, choices, information conveyed, marine use and – people are used to it.
It’s all seems so harmless and natural.
Mercator explained his map thus: Nova et Aucta Orbis Terrae Descriptio ad Usum Navigantium Emendata or the “new and augmented description of Earth corrected for the use of sailors.”
Yes, sailors. The Mercator projection was used for Marine navigation .
That is why the map employs conformality and straight rhumb lines!
Because it was created for sailors! And, why would the Europeans of this era go SAILING? To find fish, perhaps?
Hardly. Even though Europe is the world’s second-smallest continent in area, it has has a very long coastline, and has, arguably, exerted more influenced — and has impacted the world most profoundly — by its maritime history than any other continent. It is not a harmless accident that longitude is measured in south-east London and not Harare or Uttar Pradesh. Seafaring was a method of conquest and map-making was one of its most powerful weapons.
The Age of Discovery saw European ships travel around the world searching for new trading routes and partners to feed capitalism in Europe. This would not have been possible without maps. Could trade routes or colonies have been established or, national imperialism and economic competitiveness developed without maps? Did the mapmakers take interest in actual boundary practices and the language of peace treaties? What purpose would sensitivities like that serve?
But what Joshua is really saying is: let us oppose historical realities and non-white ways of knowledge because otherwise the matrix of violence, woven from lies — is sustained by “neutral”, common-sense sounding denials and cultivated ignorance….and exposing of that must be made to sound “silly”.
In the Middle Ages, East was often placed at top.
During the Age of Exploration, European cartographers decided to put north-upwards and make Europe bigger than it is…perhaps because the North Star was their fixed reference point for navigation, or because they wanted (subconsciously or otherwise) to ensure Europe’s claim at the top of the world.
As we often correlate importance to relative height (the way the flag of the gold medalist will fly higher than silver or bronze, for example), the north-up/Europe too big convention reinforces the idea that northern bodies are more important than their southern neighbors. Suddenly, traveling “down” to the south “countries” like Africa and India might have an inference much deeper than geographic location. So, no: maps convey power and subjugation.
Territories colonized by the European powers and the United States since 1492:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Colonisation2.gif
@Sam
@WM
Computer? A computer literally means a “device that computes,” (i.e. calculates) and the oldest one is the Ishango bone from 25,000 BC (Central Africa).
Lamp? The walls of the Temple of Dendera prove that ancient Nilotics had electric light bulbs at least since c 350 BC, but perhaps earlier. Oil lamps that date to as early as 20,000 BC have been found all around the ancient world.
Drywall? as we know it, was invented in 1894. But who cares? it’s cheap and doesn’t last long anyway.
Paint? The oldest evidence of painting comes from the Blombos cave in South Africa and dates to roughly 100,000 BC.
Calculator? Central Africa had the first calculating instrument as mentioned above. As to Calendars, see the Dendera calendar, Nabta Playa, and an older, unnamed one in South Africa etc.
Shirts? Unsure. Good luck finding the oldest animal skin and determining that it was used as clothing.
Glasses? Actually, the oldest known optical lenses are housed in the Louvre and are over 4,000 years old.
Ink pens? Reed pens used at Saqqara, Egypt (c 2600 BC) are the world’s oldest known pens.
Tattoos? “They have found a frozen female from Siberian tundra who was some 10 – 15 000 years old and she had tattoos on her chest.”..agree, perhaps the oldest known evidence b/c of the preserving qualities of frigidity, but I surmise without any evidence that tattooing is much older than that.
Bulanik, of course you are able to believe whatever you would would like to believe about map projections and their hidden European racist agenda, power, and subjugation. It really makes no difference to me what you want to believe about them. I think it detracts from areas that are truly of concern, but YMMV. I would be interested in seeing a map that has east at the top as I’ve never seen one and love maps of all kinds. The Mercator projection is annoying exactly because northern and southern bodies end up inflated. Northern countries like Greenland, Russia, and Canada, and the southern continent of Antarctica all end up over-sized. If I want accuracy I use a globe or an interactive projection. If I want a quick look at relative locations, I look at whatever is handy. Nobody I know mixes politics with map projections but whatever. Everyone is free to make their own.
As far as Cleopatra is concerned, of course the art varied to a degree. However it all points to her being of primarily Greek descent, likely with the typical black hair but rounder and not as beautiful as Elizabeth Taylor when she played the role. Without a photograph there is no way of ever knowing conclusively. Without a gene analysis her parentage likewise can’t be proven. Everyone in the field has opinions on detail, so what?
@ King – I agree completely. They are acting no different than the evil white European would have – that’s the point. The Argentine/UK dispute over the Falklands is an example of this, except in that case the kelpers themselves have made their desires clear.
I agree with Paul Mooney with regards to Cleopatra. What did she do that was so special? Nothing. If White folks want her, they can have her.
@ B.R.
Thanks.
@SomeGuy
Apparently she caused a civil war and the Roman Republic became the Roman Empire as a result.
@ joshua
Bullsh*t.
@SomeGuy
Nope. A stretch, but not BS. Julius Caesar was her lover, and killed. Marc Antony and Octavius engaged in civil war, Marc Antony was her lover and lost and suicided. Octavius became the first emperor, Caesar Augustus as a result.
@ Joshua
I probably wouldn’t go that far. I’d say that the truest transition point from Republic to Empire was at the end of the Gallic campaign when in defiance of the Senate, he refused to lay down arms and return to the capital without his victorious legion. Once Caesar crossed the Rubicon with his army and won the civil war that ensued against Pompey and the Senate, the Republic was effectively dead. He was eventually proclaimed “dictator in perpetuity” which is effectively the same thing as “Emperor.”
Although Cleopatra had relations with Julius Caesar it was well after his Gallic wars and after he had broken the power of the Senate (The Republic). I’d say that her biggest contribution was in single-handedly getting Caesar to abandon his plans to annex Egypt, and instead to back her claims to the throne as the Egyptian Queen (of the Ptolemaic Dynasty)
Certainly she was an extraordinary woman of her time. I don’t think that we would recognize her today as either Black or White, racially speaking.
@ joshua –
“Actually we know every well who Cleopatra was, and what she and Marc Antony looked like.”
No, we didn’t. LOL
“Without a photograph…”
What, like in 30BC?
“The Mercator as I understand it was a map for marine use….”
You really had no idea about any of that history, did you? LOL.
.
The racial authoritarian view of history will say:
“….of course you are able to believe whatever you would would like to believe about map projections and their hidden European racist agenda, power, and subjugation. It really makes no difference to me what you want to believe …
And so it is. As Abagond said:
“White Americans and Englishmen – position them as the good guys of history or at least as well-meaning. Take their words at face value. Do not question or frame their actions in any way that would make them appear backward, strange, savage or evil. Power corrupts – except for them.”
Factual history does this.
Fictional historical literature does this.
Both do this because: the curtain of decorous denial is drawn across the historical reality of colonization and subjugation. And all for our education and entertainment.
Sailors and slavers used those maps to navigate their way across the seas.
Mastery of the seas was a necessary part of mastery and management of the colonized peoples to cultivate sugar and other commodities for the English, the French, the Spanish, etc.
Fictional literature for literate Europeans placed the characters in these fictional worlds as beneficiaries of this subjugation. But we are not supposed to know that, right?
After Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” was published, it was followed by ”Mansfield Park”. This time, the glory of the British empire and the comfortable life of the novel’s landed gentry as products of colonial exploitation was not hidden. In one adaptation of this book, the main character, Fanny Price, finds a sketchbook belonging to her cousin during his time tending to “the family business” in Antigua, in the West Indies, with his father, Sir Thomas – the master. This sketchbook reveals what was then hidden from history:
Abagond:
As african people, we have to remember that “whiteness” is constructed from “blackness.” Whites may put themselves front and center, but, others laid the foundation for so-called “White Culture.” As is noted, Greeks and Romans co-opted much of their alleged culture via Egypt and other african dynasties such as Ghana and Mali. Africans ruled the world for centuries, white folk are newbies in terms of age and status. Stealing from africans and asians has been the norm since day one. Most learned folk know this to be true, white folk know it as well.
Tyrone
@Bulanik
From what I can see, I understand it better than you do through the prism of your politics. I will freely admit that what the Europeans did was at least as much wrong as right, but to put cartography in the wrong category as a rational position I won’t accept. You are free to believe what you want, and to quote Abagond’s homilies in support.
@Tyrone
It’s one thing to educate away from a Eurocentric view of the world, quite another to set up an Afrocentric view in its place. Both are fallacies.
Here what the French think about black women in particular Michelle Obama, slaves. For some reason White people in Europe thinks putting Black back in slave images is artsy or revolutionary.
http://now.msn.com/michelle-obama-is-depicted-as-a-slave-on-magazine-cover
.
Michelle Obama the nude slave?
12 hrs ago Michelle Obama has been portrayed in a variety of ways, but this Spanish magazine is probably the first to picture her as a 19th-century French slave. Magazine Fuera de Serie has superimposed the face of the first lady over an 1800 painting, “Portrait d’une négresse,” by French artist Marie-Guillemine Benoist. The artwork depicts a female French slave in a white gown and head scarf, with one bared breast. The magazine Fuera de Serie praises Michelle Obama as the “gran mujer” (great woman) behind President Obama, but the image has sparked controversy — some experts see the image as an homage to slaves’ emancipation and the start of a feminist movement in France, but some feel the cover portrait reeks of racism. [Source]
Check out the msnNOW.com homepage to read more trending stories.
Read more:Obama could be descended from African slave First lady should get paid (says pretty ballsy husband) Michelle Obama wishes Gabby Douglas hadn’t gone to McDonald’s
@joshua
joshua says:
No, you do not. You merely assume a great deal, and because you do that, you underestimate your ignorance.
Maps have always been made – or commissioned – for some particular purpose or set of purposes.
About maps: in medieval times Jerusalem had to be in the center of any world map in the “west”. Reason: it was the holiest place on earth according to the church which at the time wielded enormous political power. Maps have always been political too. Only very recently there has been attempts to create “realistic” projections of the earth and its landmasses via maps.
@sam
The direction of the Qiblah (direction of prayer for Muslims) was Jerusalem for a short time, but that changed to the Kaaba in Mecca, because The Prophet Muhammad said so after a revelation.
What did this lead to? A field of scientific and mathematical inquiry based on determining this precise point …. a constant generator of a scientific environment during Islamic civilization, one that required both mathematics and observation….
@joshua
Explain this:
At least as much wrong as right, you say.
What did they do that was right? And what was so “right” as to cancel out the “wrong”?
Give examples, if you don’t mind.
Another trend I have noticed when reading about European history in particular; this history is heavily populated with miscreants, psychopaths and other assorted and sundry maniacs to varying degrees of course. However, their behaviour is always ‘explained’ or ‘excused’ by old standby arguments like ‘it was the times!’, ‘every culture’ has had these lunatics at one time or another!’, ‘they had to, because the circumstances called for it’ etc. etc. ad-nausea. Unless the personage is an extreme example such as Hitler or Stalin, they attribute dysfunctional behaviour to syphilis, inbreeding, other similar dysfunction. Most write in varying degrees to explain away or ‘justify’ evil behaviour in the context of the times. Hence they(European-descent) do not have to be introspective when it comes to examining their history or it’s effect on racialized people. That was in the past to them, they do-not see the long standing deleterious effect on these people. The miniscule ones who do are seen as off kilter or eccentric and derided and given short shrift. Woe betide the white historian who goes against the grain!
@sam
About maps and the white racist writing of history.
Anyone who could say that cartography has been put into the “wrong category” because the role a map can play in subjugating other races has been identified — does so because they are loyal to the authority of those that sponsored European imperialism and colonization.
I don’t think any other image has enjoyed such prestige of neutrality and objectivity as The Map. And, I would go further and say the most oppressive and dangerous of all cultural artifacts may be the ones so naturalized and presumably commonsensical as to avoid critique.
This is the kind of thinking/writing that accepts history as dynamic, a thing to be contested – but considers space as dead, fixed, like the immobile and universal….like the way the Americas were only “real” after the arrival of Europeans. When history began, and a body of land had a name…
I don’t believe that in the past, the military considered maps “sensitive”, for example, because maps are like an upward ascent toward an apex of an ever more perfect and dispassionate rendering of space.
Maps were “sensitive” because they provide info about location, spatial patterns, population density, and so on. Why have governments in the distant past had a deliberate policy of destroying maps due to their “sensitivity” in matters of national security and military control?
Back in the 16th century King Charles IX of France was always fighting wars of religion. I recall once reading that he explained the reason he maintained tight controls on cartographic materials, was because maps are useful in war. If he didn’t maintain tight control, then he’d enable a foreign enemy to lead an army without the aid of a guide who knows the country across the terrain shown on said maps, utilizing “only a quadrant and compass”…
Maps are power.
Was the Age of Exploration and conquest of “new” countries so different from the enterprise of war?
Anyone who believes that a map is an impartial reference point – rather than an expression of a point of view – has a poor understanding of what a map is and why it was made. A map-maker of the past had a point of view. Every map-maker did/does. The centre of the world, for starters, is not determined by geography, but by ideology.
Map-making was a business, not an over-view of the world handed down by God in pictorial form. Cartography was a business of authorship and authority-making. The intention of making a map was to create a product that would convince anyone who saw it that the ethnic centre (politics) is the same thing as the geometric centre (neutral and scientific). Acceptance of this is no more than “subliminal geometry”: to make us believe this is accurate and true – and not a socially constructed argument, which is what it is….. And its purpose? to legitimate and codify imperial European power.
The Mercator Projection was not created like one of Moses commandments.
Instead, Gerardus Mercator, professional map-maker, got the job because the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, offered him the commission.
What Charles V wanted was a map that would help him to oversee the Spanish colonization of the Americas, including the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire and the Inca Empire. He wanted a map that drew a distinction between East and West because his “diplomatic and commercial interests” concerned the division of the earth on an East-West axis. The distortion of the northern and southern region were a relatively minor concern. He wanted territories in the East and beat off his Portuguese and Dutch rivals in the process.
And how have maps been used to silence and suppress conquered peoples?
One example I can think of, is when Mexico came under Spanish control, the Spanish King, Phillip II, commissioned a cartographic survey to learn about his territories in the New World – the Relaciones Geograficas.
What this undertaking exposed, more than anything else, was the gulf between colonial and indigenous conceptions of Mexico.
The Amerindians had existing maps.
And the Spaniards had theirs.
Yet the indigenous perspective became more and more marginalized during colonization as that perspective was re-shaped and ignored.
The Mesoamerican ways of representing space were transformed, repressed, and replaced during the consolidation of Spanish rule. The European territorial representations (maps, descriptions), helped by the printing press, silenced Amerindian ones, which were never printed during the colonial period, producing the effect that the former were more ‘appropriate’ or ‘truthful’ descriptions of space than the latter.
The result of this was 2 fold:
1. Alternative spatial concepts were erased, implying that history begins with the colonizer, in a linear fashion, and,
2. the gradual erasure of one crucial event: dispossession.
Cartography was one way the new-born history of the “New World” was created, because Europeans applied specific technologies of representation and created a “New Spain.”
It’s effect? To silence, all over again, the presence of indigenous groups and their territorial representations that preceded, complemented, coexisted with, and competed with those of the Spanish. That was simply rubbed out.
What the Spanish King imagined as empty, virgin SPACE was, in actuality a PLACE, a landscape with histories and meanings.
Indigenous maps portrayed a far different lay of the land.
It had place-names and histories codified in symbols.
But López de Velasco, the King’s chief cartographer, considered these maps unintelligible and irrelevant, so the maps were relegated to a forgotten corner.
Scholars say mapping became as an instrument of national policy in the European nations during the 17th and 18th centuries. Governments of early modern Europe increasingly relied on cartography as a means for territorial expansion, assisting rule and administrative control. The maps produced would presumably improve understanding and prove possession but also provide an illusion of control from a distance — control of the “empire” by a central authority.
There’s a book about this subject by Barbara Mundy:
The Mapping of New Spain: Indigenous Cartography and the Maps of the Relaciones Geograficas
@bulanik:
A map is a statemant of how the world is
seen in that particular culture or state or by the rulers. No accident
that in roman maps Rome was in the middle and all the roads litterally
went in and from there. As for military maps, they had only one
function in the past: they were weapons. The more you knew and more
accurate your knowledge of your enemies was, the better the weapon.
Today of course satellites and un manned planes spy the ground and maps
as such do not have the same military weight but in the old days it
certainly did.
That is why for couple of centuries and more the sea maps were state
secrets and many times when the english sea dogs over took a spanish
galleon it was the maps and notes of it which was the main target, not
that huge load of gold. And, naturally, vice versa. Pirates were sought
after partly because they were among the first to sail across the oceans and
around the world and thus had more informative maps and notes which the
officials did not posses.
Also pirates did trade with anyone, and looted anyone, including the chinese, arabs and indians /of India that is) and knew these trade routes etc. They had bases in Scheychelles and across the Indian ocean, they knew which rivers were deep enough for big sail ships to hide, where to moor your ship for inspections and repairs etc.
This is the origin of the tales of pirate treasure maps, maps so valuable that men litterally killed each other to posses one. And yes, they also had treasure maps too.
@sam
From what I recall of Barbara Mundy’s book about Spanish cartography’s deliberate erasure of Mesoamerican cartographic traditions – the maps made by Ameriindians of this region were not intended for conquest or military use.
Whilst only fragments remain from these once-discarded maps, it seems that Amerindian cartographic traditions were far removed of those from the Spanish, Dutch, etc.
They seemed to have 4 categories of map:
1. Terrestrial maps that include accounts of history – “cartographic histories.”
2. Terrestrial maps without a historical narratives, such as city plans.
3. Cosmographical maps that showing either the horizontal cosmos, or the vertical cosmos to visual the world tree and,
4. Celestial maps of stars and constellations in the night sky.
Their maps were of the mundane environment, and the greater cosmos.
Thus, what was practical and what was sacred.
It seems spatial models of the cosmos abounded in sculpture and architecture, going back before 1200 B.C, and the Olmecs. Lots of connections!
I found this link written by Barbara Mundy, there are also examples of ancient Mesoamerican cartography included:
http://www.fordham.edu/images/test_suite/art_history_music/history%20of%20cartography%20chapter%205.pdf
@ sam, maritime history is also cast as essentially European in character.
For instance, the east African Aksumite/Axumite city was a major player in the commerce between the Roman Empire and Ancient India. Trade was facilitated by minting their own currency, for example, the Axumite state even meddled in the politics of the kingdoms on the Arabian peninsula, crossing the Red Sea on a regular basis, to gradually extend its rule over that region.
Yet, historians could not believe that the east African Axumite peoples of that region could have founded that civilization. Instead that was attributed to the Semitic-speaking Sabaeans who crossed the Red Sea from South Arabia (modern Yemen)… Later, it was discovered that the culture was an independent development of the indigenous people on the African continent — the true authors of that civilization. It seems the Sabaeans were late immigrants into the region.
Also, it had been assumed that the writing system, Ge’ez, was also an import and invention from Arabia. It is not. There is evidence of a Semitic-speaking presence in Eritrea and Ethiopia is at least as early as 2000 BC.
Aksum is mentioned in the 1st century AD in the Periplus of the Red Sea as a bustling metropolis and market place for ivory. Of course it was also exported from the ports there. The ruler of that time, Zoskales, controlled 2 harbours on the Red Sea: Adulis (near Massawa) and Avalites (Assab) located in Eritrea. It is not clear what the Axumsite sailing vessels must have looked like, but could they have resembled the ones used in Egypt, further along the coastline?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:C%2BB-Ship-Fig1-HatshepsuSailingBoat.PNG
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Map_of_the_Periplus_of_the_Erythraean_Sea.jpg
My ancestry is Middle Eastern, and I consider myself pretty much white genetically (Indo Iranian to be exact). Most people in the Middle East are white with the exception of a few ethnic groups in Yemen and Oman, like the Akhdam and the El Khwal-fairly recent immigrants to the area..only few hundred years or so.
As for Egypt…from Wikipedia
“In general, various DNA studies have found that the gene frequencies of modern North African populations are intermediate between those of the Horn of Africa and Eurasia,[26] though possessing a greater genetic affinity with the populations of Eurasia than they do with Africa.”
So pretty much what it appears by looking at it, mix of African and Eurasian peoples since antiquity.
Otherwise I agree with all, though schools have gotten a lot better in this regard than since my time. My child has a much more thorough education than I did.
@ Pentagon, the point I made is not about the DNA of the people.
It was about the way the history has been told, as if the civilization in question was assumed to come from outside only.
For some reason, I had always associated Indo-Iranian with a linguistic group, and the Middle East with a place, and they overlap, but they are 2 different things.
I am not sure, when you say “white”, whether you’re referring, indirectly, to a strict interpretation of what is “Caucasian”? If this is what you mean by “white”, don’t you think this definition and its origins are very suspect?
In my experience, most individuals I have met and know from the Middle East and the sub-Continent, who speak languages in this category, have usually described themselves as “brown”.
I encountered this self-designation, even though they individuals themselves range somewhat in skin tone – as you know – from deep-dark Sri-Lankans to lily-white Kurds. This is a huge category of humanity you are referring to.
But, of those specific individuals I knew that were of Persian/Iranian origin, it seemed that it was the older generation were much keener to self-describe as “white”. This was especially true if they were in the USA. The etymology of Iran is “Aryan” — a reflection of their clearly “white” heritage — was pointed out regularly and with much pride.
I found that this was in contrast to some of the younger generation — in my experience only, I stress — who seemed to question this possibly delusional attachment to “whiteness” in America.
For them, the “white” self description seemed somewhat ironic!
I suppose this is because definitions have changed.
After all, just look how various immigrant communities who emigrated to the US from unquestionably white Europe, and faced obstacle after obstacle before they could join the “White” elite and be considered as white European-American people.
They were Irish, Jews, German and Italian waves of immigrants, just to name a few. The Irish (usually whiter than the vast majority of Middle Easterners I have laid eyes on, incidentally) in particular, were disdained, not only because of their “different race” but their different religion, as Catholics. It took each community decades and concerted effort to overcome discrimination, to “become” White in America. It is an “achievement” that might be reflected on more and more, I believe. Many Middle Easterners may call themselves white (there is no issue about this — not for me) but they may not be perceived, or treated, as white by whiter Europeans, whether they liked it, or not.
I take your point about the black el-Akdam servant-class, but is it really as cut and dried as you say — the Middle East is full of white people and anything black is pretty much new and the exception? Is that really so?
For instance, I was under the impression that mtDNA lineages throughout South Arabia are African L haplotypes. AFAIK, their origin has usually been attributed to migration and assimilation of African females into the Arabian population over approximately the last 2,500 years, constituting roughly a third of the population, which makes this significant number of Middle Easterners not that recent, not that rare, and not that white.
@ Pentagon.
Regarding the Akhdam (Al Akhdam). Are you sure they are so new to Yemen? Their origins are unclear, and they may have been in this southern corner of the Arabian Peninsula for as long as anyone.
Also, it seems they do not call themselves “servant”, either, which is what “Akhdam” means, right?
Instead, it appears they call themselves Al-Muhamasheen, which seems to mean “marginalized person”, if I am not mistaken.
Pentagon quoted Wiki, regarding the origins of Egyptians:
“In general, various DNA studies have found that the gene frequencies of modern North African populations are intermediate between those of the Horn of Africa and Eurasia,[26] though possessing a greater genetic affinity with the populations of Eurasia than they do with Africa.”
I have my reservations about this. Why? Because I believe we must proceed with care, and not assume too much by using this data of this kind to determine the “significance” to any cultural producers…because Wiki also says DNA studies shows this:
R1b (the common marker among white men), proves relatively little, as the “y” chromosome only accounts for a tiny portion of genetic makeup, and there is no evidence that DNA or genetic affinities effect the culture of the character. It neither does it make one white. I’d even go as far to say that the likelihood of Middle Easterners being of ‘pure’ race is as likely as any any east African civilization being the exclusive creation of white West Asians.
How much can DNA surveys tell us about Egypt? Studies of pre-dynastic Egypt (between 4800 to 4300BC) point out that these Eyptians are closest to the Nubians, and their ways of life duplicated the traditional African cattle-culture typical of Southern Sudanese and East African pastoralists of today. Scholars say that cultural similarities and social complexity is more reflective of Egypt’s Old Kingdom (such as Schilder & Wendorf in “Holocene settlement of the Egyptian Sahara”).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Anglo-Egyptian_Sudan_Nubian_woman.jpg
Other approaches, such as Anthropometrics, a field of study that can be purposed to identify the crania and faces of ancient Egyptians — has uncovered proof that show ancient Egyptians more closely resemblance modern Egyptians as well as Nubian and “Ethiopic” populations more than Middle Easterners or Europeans (whites). (Archaeologist’s Barry Kemp’s 2005 study of Egyptians for Cambridge University. )
A physical anthropologist in the field, Nancy Lovell says that:
“There is now a sufficient body of evidence from modern studies of skeletal remains to indicate that the ancient Egyptians, especially southern Egyptians, exhibited physical characteristics that are within the range of variation for ancient and modern indigenous peoples of the Sub Sahara and tropical Africa.. In general, the inhabitants of Upper Egypt and Nubia had the greatest biological affinity to people of the Sahara and more southerly areas.”
(An extract from her chapter published in the Encyclopaedia of the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt, 2007)
Other Eygptology specialists, such as Yurco, Keita and Kakrzewski, corroborate Nancy Lovell’s findings. Scientists in the fields of osteology, for example, cite that ancient Egyptians’ body plot closest to tropical Africans and not Mediterranean Europeans, and that the bodies of ancient Egyptians – though not identical – are closer in form and type to American blacks than American whites.
typos! third paragraph should read:
“R1b (the common marker among white men), proves relatively little, as the “y” chromosome only accounts for a tiny portion of genetic makeup, and there is no evidence that DNA or genetic affinities effect the culture of the CARRIER. Neither does this marker alone make one white. I’d even go as far to say that the likelihood of Middle Easterners being of ‘pure’ race is as likely as any east African civilization being the exclusive creation of white West Asians.”
I find it extremely hilarious that some people spent so much time and effort to prove that egyptians of old were not black etc. I mean, EGYPT IS IN AFRICA. Period. And I don’t care if some one proofs they were green or bright blue, they were still africans. Period.
@ sam
I find it extremely hilarious that some people spent so much time and effort to prove that egyptians of old were not black etc. I mean, EGYPT IS IN AFRICA….
Hilarious but sad.
Sorry to see so many Arabs, Indo-Iranians and other Middle Easterners who imagine they are so white…. SMH. Sad and foolish.
They are not quite white in the eyes of more people than they want to accept.. Do they realize that behind their backs, many white people simply see them – among other racial epithets – as no more than “Paki” ?
When I hear something like:
Africa had civilizations,and kings and queens when white people were still cavemen..
I feel that this is not a rational point of view.
I understand it as a point of view, but what it implies is questionable.
When were white people cavemen? We simply don’t know they were “white”, at least, not as we know it these days.
Neither do I think we should compare the cultures of geographically distinct regions with one another.
Egypt did have “kings” and queens, but that was only possible because ancient Egypt had the good fortune of a stable society – due to the fertile cycles of the Nile. In parts of pre-historic Europe, people lived more haphazardly, in clusters of hunter-forager groups.
When we make these crude comparisons, we impose a framework of imperialistic superiority on pre-history. It’s no surprise then, that this notion of Egyptian ‘civilization’ being an organized pre-mediated system, where a strata of people wield power above and over others, is perceived as non-African and non-black. I feel this is ONE reason why Egypt has been admired, coveted and claimed as “whiter” than it is: it fits the western imperialistic world-view of advanced society much more neatly than other types of civilization.
I find it more hilarious that people spend so much time and effort to prove that egyptians WERE black or that other cultures were black.I get the distinct impression that blacks are desperately grasping at straws in order to quell the nagging certainty that they were not and are not the equals of the white european,nor are they genetically linked to them or their accomplishments.I`ve seen evidence of this wishful thinking on the part of blacks in many politically-correct teaching materials in public and private schools.In these materials,we find blacks laughably taking credit for modern and ancient technologies when there is little or no evidence for this.Rather than accept the natural inequities of accomplishment that have always existed because of the genetic differences between races,they are always looking to blame “eurocentrism”,”racism”,oppression,or theft of ideas by whites.
Then you didnt read very well , Ben, some of the various opinions of black people on this blog that clarify all the time that, black people dont need to look at Egypt with so much evidance of ancient black African civilisation and innovation and contribution to the world and genius (genius you dont have the capability to recognise)…You havnt read or seen the links to Dr Marimba Ani and how she recognises the problem with associating with a Euro point of view, and the value of what the African inner connection can bring..I dont think you get it
@ Ben W. Stop sniveling. You just cannot handle it.
How pathetic that some people are beyond brainwashed by white supremacy.
It clearly shrinks the brain.
It impairs literacy skills.
Additionally, it retards comprehension of words AND meaning, damaging all capacity of conceptual thought.
Then, combine it with sheer, willful ignorance — like not knowing where Egypt is, lack of exposure to the outside world, and — and the shrunken, white supremacist brain only has “political correctness” to rely on and blame for a world that doesn’t make sense any more… and, then out comes the snot.
Sniff, sniff.
Ben W. Black people have many, many advanced and ancient cultures, and some of the earliest cities, too-they don’t need to look at Egypt, which as most people know is a historically multiethnic and multiracial country smack in the middle of major trade routes! They probably got the advantage of contact from Africa, South Europe, and Asia. I’ve never gotten the is Egypt is Black or White fight. It’s obvious they are both-and more!
Bulanic, you may be right, the Al Muhamasheen ( I didn’t know there was new name here) may have been there longer than historians recognise, but I can only go by what knowledge is out there, not what I imagine to have happened.
As for us being white, I go by DNA and historical migration patterns, not color. My brother is darker than some Black people, yet he is almost all White genetically (I’m sure we have some black in us but not much.) I’m not saying I’m White to try and prove myself to any mythical Whiteness Judgement Panel. I really don’t care what anyone else thinks. I just attempt to say it like I believe it is.
@ Pentagon
Ancient Egypt was not originally a mixed-race civilization. It was wholly African both culturally and ethnically. However, it was much, much later invaded by Hyksos, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Ottomans, etc….well after the start of the decline of Egyptian civilization.
I can’t understand this widespread misperception that people from Asia had something to do with the foundations of ancient Egypt when there’s just no evidence to prove it.
@ Pentagon
Re: the Al Muhamasheen. The truth about these people is easy to find.
Don’t you find that when someone is looking to confirm their biases — they only see what they want to see?
The Al Muhamasheen have been Yemenis for at least 1,400 years.
I am sure you were not alone in believing that they were new-comers.
No doubt you are aware how are terribly these people are treated?
I believe many look down on other people they know nothing about because they have racist ideas about who is “better” than who based on something as silly as skin-colour.
I also heard some of them prefer not to be called “servant” of marginalized, because they themselves say and believe they are human beings like other Yemenis. Imo, in saying and believing that, they sound like true Muslims.
Pentagon
I think you mean that because you are not a “negroid” or a “mongoloid”, but a an west or central Asian “caucasoid” instead, this is the same as being “White”.
Fair enough. A person can be as white and caucasian as they like.
It’s a personal thing and no skin off my nose, as I said to you before.
I thought DNA could not tell a person what race they are, only where your ancestors came from? I am sure if your DNA was tested enough, you would easily find the black ancestors you want to distance yourself from so much! LOL.
Joking aside, DNA or migration patterns do not in themselves, make a person “white” — as you’re aware. Sure, I have met a few Indo-Iranians (or light-skinned Arabs) who consider themselves white, hoping that’d impress white Europeans, especially. And these individuals care, not one jot, that other people actually see them as “brown” or even just as a “Paki”.
It’s as though some had forgotten their proud Asian heritage in favour of conforming to something more inferior, but they were too ashamed to say it.
If I had my DNA tested I realize that I’d be mostly “caucasian” too, technically speaking, and by the standards set down by racist pseudo-science who class part-Asian Indian-types like myself as “Caucasian”. But my Indo-Sephardi DNA would not begin to make me white by any stretch of the imagination.
Excellent contribution, chief ! Very exotic tribute from a representative of your tribe. Perhaps when your daughter is ripe of age, you will be given the right by a white priest, to take her as your legal wife, then molest her at will.
Beats eating her, like all your uncivilized relatives do, eh? Then again they are the “un allied” savages who do not abide by our White Laws, like you do. You are so well assimilated into White Culture, you even speak our language ! Brilliant attempt at english, by the way, if naturally inferior to mine. Which is to be expected.
One cannot forget the words of the famous slave, …. some general whose name is unimportant, who tried to kill some whites in Haiti, and win independence from the French crown, before Napoleon sent a few french imperial “armees” to put them in their place of chains.
“I have only, ever served the French Crown! Oh please spare my worthless life as a coloured, oh Noble White French Masters !!!! Oh pweeeaaaase, I Beeeg of Yoouuu !!!! I’ve even put the other negroes to work as slaves on the sugar cane fields, like before, see? Forgive my arrogance in thinking I could ever come close to the heel of my white masters !”
Then he died. Apparently Napoleon didn’t believe the Black General was humble enough to serve the French Empire. And that’s the story of how Haiti went back under Europe’s mighty while heel, once again.
Islam was an empire of peace, and slave trade with mostly coloured peoples. Who were sold to the arab slave drivers by your own kind. So they could become fat bellied, gold buried tribe “kings” in some useless village in the Afrikass. Because let’s face it. All the coloured tribes, Amerika, Afrika or Asia, were in the business of selling their children or relatives or race “families” to foreign RICH slave dealers, on the flesh markets of wherever, because that’s how they could afford new goats and dowries to marry some even richer chief’s daughter.
Politics is wildly transparent in the Conquered Peoples (read “Coloures”) history, they practically begged the Whites to accept them as slaves, to have a better life at the heel of White Masters. Who were the most humane and merciful of the Overlords, treating their lowly servants almost as good as some animals!
After all, they did hunt elephants, lions, tigers, rhinos, hyppos, crocodiles, elks and moose, but not your kind. They spared your kind, instead of hunting you, like Egyptian Mammelukes or Bedouins did, and still do in the Middle Earth.
So, charmed by the decent and mighty reputation of the “Good Generous White”, many coloures flocked to the Heels of White Masters, centuries past. Whether as beggars or thieves or slaves, you just loved White Leadership.
Well, who are we kidding here? You still do ! Isn’t this why you wrote this here blog, medicine man?
I’m not too fond of the Englishers myself, or the Yankees, but I strongly doubt what those even are / were. You must be confusing them with the British, who are nothing more than a multiethnic, multinational confederacy of royalists, from the bodies of Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales as well as other countries. England is something different, a historical region in half of Britain, which was more Templar or christian in origins, thus more Islam friendly than any other known christian or european folk. Which explains their generous allowance of the Saracens and Muslims to come and prey at the Holy City in Palestine and neighbouring Crusader States. See, all they ever wanted was trade. The Ottomans had extensive spices and opium and who knows what other riches and wares from the Orient, and you know … merchants from Europe wanted all they could have of that precious trade, to sell them to pretentious rich europeans, in love with their “teas”, and “peppers” and “coffees”.
If the ottomans or muslims had not traded at all, they would have been crused by Teutons and colonized within the decade. But that would have been disastrous for trade in the Orient, and caused many wealthies to lose their best trade, and lose status back in the Europes.
As for the “chinese wall”, built in the 1950′s. There is evidence of this.
China and Japan, simply copied their “ancient histories” from medieval Spanish history. Even the errors of that famous spanish book remain now in the chinese “script” which is supposedly millenia older. As for the 300 galleons which belonged to Spain? They did ravage the South East coasts of Asia, they just simply .. never had any asians on board. Just your usual White Conquerors.
You are grateful for this lesson, in extension of your knowledge. Come again.
^^^ allegorical crap-ola.
Stopped reading after:
“…some general who… tried to kill some whites in Haiti…”
Tried to kill? You mean the 4,000 white dead during Haiti’s revolution weren’t really corpses?
@allegory:
You must be jonesing for more punishment since being banned from Brotha Wolf’s! Take your meds you rambling loon!
Abagond,
Allegory has been trolling his nonsense on my blog spotting the same exact fecal matter. Be careful. Please, be careful.
@ Brothawolf
Thanks for the warning.
“As for the “chinese wall”, built in the 1950′s. There is evidence of this.”
This must be comedy, you know.
“If the ottomans or muslims had not traded at all, they would have been crused by Teutons and colonized within the decade.”
must be.
“China and Japan, simply copied their “ancient histories” from medieval Spanish history.”
Now that is comedy.
@ brothawolf
Oh no… you mean the same Polish guy and his nonsense?
Mexico.
New archaeological research has found that Mayan women played key roles in leadership of their societies. So far it has been believed that Mayan women were restricted and only allowed to stay at home. It seems this view was one imposed by Spanish historians and a situation implemented by Spanish conquest.
Shankari Patel, an anthropology graduate student from the University of California-Riverside has found that: “The previous research I looked at left out women completely.”
Patel says:
Women lost their status and authority with the advent of colonialism…..”
http://archaeologydailynews.com/more-girl-power-in-ancient-maya-than-what-was-thought-before/
@Allegory
I see you’re an expert at revisionism! I guess since ancient and medieval Europeans got nearly all their knowledge from outside Europe, you feel compelled to revise world history to make it seem like Europeans contributed something. Good try, but your statements are fraught with inaccuracies.
“some general whose name is unimportant, who tried to kill some whites in Haiti, and win independence from the French crown, before Napoleon sent a few french imperial “armees” to put them in their place of chains”
Jean-Jacques Dessalines defeated the French very badly. In 1802, he and only 1,300 men defeated 18,000 French. Then in 1803 beat the French so badly that Napoleon not only withdrew from Haiti, but the Louisiana Territory as well. You French were never very good in battle.
“Islam was an empire of peace, and slave trade with mostly coloured peoples. ”
Wrong. Muslims captured and enslaved millions of white European Christians from England, Ireland, France, etc….Capt. John Smith, Rev. Devereux Spratt, etc. are just some examples.
“….White Masters. Who were the most humane and merciful of the Overlords, treating their lowly servants almost as good as some animals”
Good one. In reality, white slave owners didn’t even treat their own mixed children humanely! They beat and sold their own seed downriver too. And don’t forget that many of them also owned white slaves, I mean “servants.” In April 1775, George Washington offered a reward for his 2 runaway white slaves.
“As for the ‘chinese wall’, built in the 1950′s. There is evidence for this”
Wrong again. Much of the existing structure was mainly built by the Ming Dynasty in the 1400s (the original was built as early as the 600s BC). The wall underwent destruction in the 1950s.
As I stated earlier, this was a great attempt at rewriting history, but next time try to be a little more subtle with your fabrications if you want to be effective.
Holy Cow! Allegory is here? Aba, you’d better get ready.
*sigh*
[...] contribution - something invented by a person of colour that white people learn how to do. Call it an “achievement” for added condescension. Or just leave it out: after all, white people could have invented it if… read more [...]
There’s a description for parts of the world which is:
“underdeveloped”.
They are the poor places. The “3rd World” places. They are this way, generally, because of colonialism, and what the colonializing nations did was suck out the wealth and resources from the places they colonized so that their nations could become the developed world.
Instead of “underdeveloped”, perhaps “over-exploited” is more descriptive. And truer.
I’m generally cool with White people, but I feel bad for them. Many of them are so attention starved that they have to run around shouting at people or ranting on blog sites in order to gain recognition. “We created EVERYTHING! We are the BEST! The most IMPORTANT! We are everything good and nothing bad! I’m IMPORTANT! Don’t you see?! ME! Please pay attention to ME!!!! I can’t share the spotlight with anyone else and I constantly fear that my racial group is in decline!!! President Obama! Noooooo!” In about 150 years, revisionist history will kick in once again and I’m sure President Obama will be a lily white man with an oddly African name and American slavery will have faded from public record. Yay for White people!