AFRICA3100 B.C.-Present

Kwa mwendwo gutiri irima (On the way to one’s beloved there are no hills)

-Kikuyu proverb

OverviewOverview There are as many as a thousand languages spoken by

different African ethnic groups, each of which has a distinct history, culture, and set of religious beliefs.

Africa’s earliest civilizations, Egypt and Kush, developed in the Nile Valley.

Between the eighth and the nineteenth centuries A.D. the trading states of Ghana, Mali, and Benin flourished in West Africa. Ancient Egypt produced rich written literature, from myths and hymns to love poetry.

Griots, oral storytellers, preserved the literary traditions of heroes and kings.

Historical, Social and Historical, Social and Cultural ForcesCultural Forces

The Nile River stretches 4,000 miles through Africa, flowing from south of the equator and emptying into the Mediterranean Sea.

The Nile is the LONGEST RIVER IN THE WORLD!

Aur (Black)- The ancient Egyptians called the Nile this because of the rich soil left behind by the annual flooding of the river.

The Nile was crucial to the formation of ancient Egyptian civilization (transportation and crops)

Menes – united southern and northern Egypt. His reign began the first Egyptian dynasty.

Major periods of stable rule (Old kingdom, Middle Kingdom, New Kingdom)

HieroglyphicsHieroglyphics

HieroglyphicsHieroglyphics

“Priest carvings” or “sacred writing”

Used for formal inscriptions

Later used for business transactions, record keeping, and daily life

Papyrus- reed paper (stayed stable during Egypt’s dry desert weather)

Transportation, Change, and Transportation, Change, and

SlaverySlavery

Camels= transportation

Trade= West African empires (Ghana and Mali)

Ghana’s wealth came from gold

Sundiata (Malian hero-king)- conquered Ghana, solidifying Mali Empire

1518- a Spanish ship carried the FIRST boatload of African slaves to the Americas

Over 6 million endured the Middle Passage- brutal sea voyage (malnourishment, epidemics, mutinies)

What do you think about the fact that people were sold for a profit? What if we did that now to help our economy?

The ArtsThe Arts The West African

“talking drum” was designed to change pitch to imitate speech patterns.

Traditional African music is polyrhythmic (beating drums, striking bells, clapping hands, and stamping feet)

http://www.ehow.com/video_4395486_polyrhythms-sixteenth-notes-djembe.html

Visual arts were created for religious, ceremonial, everyday uses

Art work reflected where the people lived (example: people near forests become accomplished wood-carvers)

After about 700 A.D. African people who lived north of the Sahara were influence by Arab traditions of music and dance.

The drum was the most important instrument

Masked DanceMasked Dance Call-and-Response: African music had conversational

elements (one instrument would “talk” and another would answer)

Masked dance was utilized during several occasions: Agricultural celebrations (first rain and harvesting), right of passages (marking birth, adult-hood, marriage, and death), rituals of secret societies, and healing rituals. These dances were public, but only members of the societies were allowed to see the masks outside of performances and to observe dancers putting on their costumes.

http://video.id.msn.com/watch/video/behind-the-mask-of-a-west-african-tradition/yr5cg3fx?src=v5:share:email:&from=email

ArchitectureArchitecture

ArchitectureArchitecture

Muslim mosques were often built of sun- baked bricks

In Ethiopia, the Coptic Christians produced churches carved into mountainsides.

Civilizations develop in the Nile Valley

Osiris and Isis Human events believed to be affected by a variety of

supernatural forces

Akhenaten- tried to change religion (one deity)- did not last after his death

Osiris: king of the dead: the myth about his death was the foundation of the Egyptians’ elaborate beliefs about the afterlife

Isis: his sister and wife and savior

Scribes: masters of hieroglyphics and its teachers: prominent status in society

Death: mummy and possessions that might be needed in the afterlife

Literature and Beliefs Family/clan important!

African oral literature (histories of ethnic and kinship, heroic legends, praise songs for chiefs and kings, trickster stories, animal fables, riddles, proverbs)

TRICKSTER: represents the unpredictable, chaotic elements of life. Cunning and foolish, playful and cruel, funny and brutal. Trickster can take animal form (Anansi the Spider- famous African trickster). The trickster archetype is one of the most universal figures in world mythology and folklore- also in popular culture: Bugs Bunny and Bart Simpson

Impacts Simplified hieroglyphics= Phoenician

alphabet= basis for all modern alphabets

Egyptian sculpture= classical Greek sculpture

Slave trade= spread of African cultures in the Americas

Traditional African sculpture influenced Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse

The word religion was non-existent because it was a staple in life

Osiris and Isis Myth: Osiris was killed by Seth, his brother, and Isis

revived him twice. Now people hope for new life in the afterworld because of him.

Belief: the ba (soul) must make a dangerous journey through an underworld filled with monsters to reach the Hall of Two Truths, where Osiris awaits to judge it. Souls had to recite the most important parts of the Book of the Dead during judgment: the “Negative Confession” or “Declaration of Innocence”

Feather (truth) versus the heart of the deceased= eaten by Ammet (monster) or welcomed by Osiris

Spiritual body= ka