West Africans looked to the Americas as a source of trade, commerce, a place to settle and a place to build new civilizations. The History of African civilization and Africans in Latin America is an important beginning to African American’s because; in world history these two regions were the first areas of the Americas to be populated by African immigrants and we’re also the first people to become African Americans. Africa has been portrayed in popular culture and academic discourse as a continent without history. Africa has history that was once overlooked but, as historians went back to reanalyze African history, they have represented the fact that Africa has changed over time, and that it has been a place of diverse groups of people throughout a long and rich history. Africa, in all of its regions, has a rich, diverse, and dynamic history.
The continent of Africa is very diverse in its culture. Not only are there culture variations from one country to another, but within an individual country as well. Much of Africa’s cultural activity centers on family and ethnic groups. Art, music and oral literature serve to reinforce existing religious and social patterns. Many of Africa’s inhabitants are of indigenous origin, which contributes to the scientific notation that Africa was the birthplace of all human species.
Studies have proven that over 90% of today’s history has been discovered through the study of archaeology. Archaeologist pride themselves on doing extensive research to satisfy the mission of conquering the mystery of prehistoric cultures as many significant developments in human history occurred during prehistory, including the evolution of humanity during the Palaeolithic period also known as the old stone age. There are a substantial amount of theories one has to determine before practicing the act of Archaeology; for one, cultural-history archaeology, which presents the idea of explaining why cultures changed and adapted to particular circumstances rather than just drawing attention to the fact that they did change. While the other theory has a lot to do with the study of past societies with direct continuing links to the existing ones.
Each myth has its own purpose whether it’s a moral, tradition, or a story of creation. But, of all these different themes and archetypes in African myths the most common stories contain Personification, Heroes, and Creation. To start, one of the most commonly used themes in African Myths is personification. Firstly, in the Myth “Why the Sun and the Moon Live in the Sky”, personification is used when the narrator says, “Many years ago the sun and the water were great friends, and both lived on earth together.” Personification is the when you give none human objects human characteristic or abilities, so in this Myth the author gave the water and the sun the ability to be friends. Secondly, in the myth “Why there are Cracks in Tortoise’s Shell”, personification is used when Mr. Tortoise answered, “No, I shan’t sprout any wings because I was not born that way.” This quote shows the use of personification because the narrator gave Mr. Tortoise the ability to talk.
Many transformations were experienced through many periods as early humans began using stones, discovered fire, and gathered wild plants and hunted wild animals. Modern humans appeared first in Africa over150, 000 years ago before spreading throughout the world by the end of the Old Stone Age. This lead to the New Stone Age Revolution about 10,000 B.C., with producing food through the domestication of plants and animals in permanent villages where goods were accumulated and traded. The people of the Western world share with people the world these intricate and complex changes that led to the development of a common drive toward what is called civilization. Civilization is known as urban and includes some formal institutions such as the use of writing, religion, art, monumental architecture, law and the production of metal.
Most countries today consist of different ethnic groups. Ideally, countries strive for pluralism, where people of all ethnicities and races remain distinct but have social equality. As an example, Algeria is very diverse; with people representing groups from different ethnic back ground history. (1) Algeria is a country of approximately thirty-seven million people located on the northern coast of Africa With a total area of 2,381,741 square kilometers (919,595 sq. mi), Algeria is the tenth-largest country in the world and the largest in Africa, and in the Mediterranean.
[12] Ghana is a constitutional democracy divided into ten administrative regions, and the world's 56th−most inhabited nation with a population of approximately 27 million as of 2014. [5] Ghana's varied geography includes savannas, woodlands, forests, a coastal line, springs, cave systems, mountains, estuaries, wildlife parks, and nature reserves. [13][14][15] The coast of Ghana stretches 560 kilometres (350 miles) and includes a rich assortment of culturally significant castles, forts, ports and harbors. [15] Prior to colonization by the British empire in the early-20th century, Ghana was the site of numerous kingdoms and empires; the most powerful being the Akan Kingdom of Ashanti. [16] In 1957, it became the first African nation to declare independence from European colonization.
African art, begin spread out on a large plane, has continuously changed and the variations can be seen through the ages from land area to land area. In many traditional African art cultures, a word for “art” does not exist. Instead they make the object and and use a word that fits best when making the object, often using political or religious words to describe the object. However, when an ancient object is discovered, it is uncommon for a name to be labeled and instead the object is named after what its use is. Masks and statues are most common in 1 African art, although many different types of objects with many different purposes exist.
Africa is a continent of great size, almost 12 million square miles about three times the size of the United States. Most of it lies in the tropics and, although we often think of Africa in terms of its rain forests, less than ten percent of the continent is covered by tropical forests, and those are mostly in West Africa .Much of the African surface is covered by savannas ,or open grasslands, and by arid plains and deserts. In geological terms, the continent is really formed by a series of high plateaus broken in the east by the Great Rift valley and the mountains that surround it. Large rivers - the Congo, the Nile, the Zambezi, and the Niger - begin in the interior of thecontinentandflowtotheseaovergreatfallsandcataractsthamarkthepassage from the plateau to the coast. These falls have historically made movement from the coast to the interior difficult, but the great river systems have also provided the interior of Africa with routes of communication.
Historically, modern Ghanaian territory was the core of the Empire of Ashanti, which was one of the most advanced states in sub-Sahara Africa in the 18–19th centuries, before colonial rule. It is said that at its peak, the King of Ashanti could field 500,000 troops. For most of central sub-Saharan Africa, agricultural expansion marked the period before 500. Farming began earliest on the southern tips of the Sahara, eventually giving rise to village settlements. Toward the end of the classical era, larger regional kingdoms had formed in West Africa, one of which was the Kingdom of Ghana, north of what is today the nation of Ghana.