…”What is Black History?”…

I love the way in which we are ignorant. Everyone is ignorant, including historians. As humans we have this tendency of ignoring things, either because we do not want to hear about it, because it implicates effort or just because we never showed interest. Sometimes we are ignorant by accident, but most of the time we are ignorant because we chose to. You will think why am I discussing this when we are in the middle of what is called Black History month, and that we only “celebrate” in october in the UK (apparently the rest of the world that is concerned about it does it in february, but never mind). Well, the answer is rather simple, we ARE total ignorant in the subject of Black History.

Me, myself, I was thinking on my topic for this week and found myself wondering…what IS black history? The only thought I could get in my mind were words like slavery and Martin Luther King, maybe some bits and pieces of the Boer War… And that was about it…Me…A “potential” historian…And I thought that was just wrong. It is wrong in the first place having such a thing like black history month, or women history month…It seems rather discriminating. Just like J. Wayne explains in his article, it seems like an excuse to ignore this type of histories for the rest of the year. Nonetheless, and before I put far too much criticism on the subject, one could say that at least for one month these people are remembered.

Going back to the subject of what is black history, I am still trying to make sense of it. I have ben told, and read in several places that it primarily applies to the movement of african people around the world and its implications…Which, to an extent I guess it is reduced to Slavery (the fact that we are using movement rather than migration gives me the clue…). I think this is a sad fact. We chose to remember that African people were trade as any other sort of goods…Why do not we try to remember what existed before that? What made them a people and there for electable to have their own history month? What about their culture? Their unknown kingdoms? Their religion? What about all those Africans that were not slaves or that not ended in wars with the Europeans? Why do not we pay a bit of attention to them?

This is the reason why my topic for today is going to be a very brief comment on a couple of cultural aspects of African societies NOT RELATED to the usual thing. These are things I have just learnt for myself and that I would like to share with you so we all get an image of these ‘black’ people and their history.

In case that anyone forgot, Africa could be argued to be the cradle of civilization. The extraordinary archaeological work in this continent remind us that most likely our human origins belong there. Half of the bananas we eat, we owe them to the inhabitants of East Africa. As it happens they  decided to trade and spread their new-found crop to the rest of the continent (back in the 3rd century CE) and so, new varieties of bananas were produced. These bananas helped to the agricultural development of these people; it provided them with food supplies and trade (reference: C.Ehret, The Civilizations of Africa: A History to 1800). Half of the music you listen is based on African music. They took it with them to America in the age of Slavery and they expressed their lament in a very poetical way: music. Thanks to this we have soul, blues and even jazz, rock and roll and heavy metal, and most likely, other sorts of pop music. It seems that music was a very important part of African life, as other sort of artistic representations (and it is still within many tribes in the continent, p. 337-344). In the words of B. Davidson:

” Carvers were famous because they were excellent. Dancers were celebrated not because they knew the steps…but because they dances them supremely well. Drummers were admired for the rhythms they could hear and play, rhythms so complex that an unskilled listener like myself cannot even recognise them.” ( The Africans: and entry to cultural history, p.161)

…And so I could carry on.

I am not trying to say that it is bad that we have such a thing like Black History month. I am not trying to say that we are bad people because we do not know their history. What I am trying to say is that maybe the reasons why we do not know such things, or why we need something like black history month are not the best ever. So maybe, we should do a bit of historical reflection and reconsider what sort of things we pay attention to and why.

“Nothing determines who we will become so much as those things we choose to ignore. ~ Sandor McNab”

…And I hope this might encourage you to learn something new today, or this month. Perhaps…Something related to Africa and Black history.

Thanks to the “Groovy Greeks”

September is here, and we all come back to our routines. Some of us will be back to work, some to University, or school…No more holidays folks, just our normal repetitive life. Nonetheless, here in W.U Hstry we have been thinking that if everything comes back, does history do it as well? There is this eternal debate in the historiographical area about history working in cycles, always working in the same place…History that happens and later on returns again. I am not talking here about an isolated thing that happened once and then it reappeared with no much glory. I am actually talking about a trend that has been carried out through time. Because of this reason, my topic for this post is the eternal revival of the classical art.

 

Let’s see. The Greeks were the first to create this magnificent artistic style. Even though there were some changes and improvements made through the different periods of Greek classical history, the basic characteristics remain pretty much the same, and could be summarised in the following. Both in architecture as in the pictorial arts geometry and proportion was a key factor. The Greeks developed their own ‘canon’ by which they judged the perfection of their master pieces. They worked with tough, long-lasting materials, such as stone or marble, so their structures would remain through the ages. They had integrated in their philosophy that idea of eternity, of history, and it was clearly reflected on their art work. Also, despite the perfection they tried to achieve, all their work seem to have certain degree of idealism: the figures seem apathetic, or if not in a state of eternal nirvana. In general, all is pure, magnificent and, very importantly, human-focussed. (this is just a brief sumary…of course they are other key points but these are the one I would like you to focus on)

 

So, when the Romans absorbed they Greek culture, so did they absorbed their art and culture. In fact, anyone with little knowledge of art could be easily fooled and mistake a Roman sculpture or building with a Greek one. However, and despite the mightyness of Roman art, once the empire collapsed all sort of Roman tradition seem to get lost in time (apart from in Byzantium, of course, it prevailed there, but still there were some changes in it with the arrival of orthodox christianity). The Gothic barbarians took over Europe and mix their own culture with the Roman based of the rest. The classical art appeared to be lost or mutated into something else, combined with slavic/germanic/celtic. The Western civilizations needed centuries to see the new revival of classical art. It took place in several places at different times, but I would say that the most significant would probably be the Carolingian Renaissance.

Even though Charlemagne and his heirs did not achieve a total renewal of the Roman culture and their artistic skills, they definitely try hard to approach to it. With the great influence of the Byzantines we can see the re-appearance of Roman-like basilicas, geometrical decoration and, most importantly, the treatment of human figures. The effort made by the Franks kept on expanding around Europe to finally reach its peak moment with the Romanesque of the High Middle Ages.

With the Romanesque, sculpture and fine painting came back to live, maybe for some in not such an impressive form than the classical style, but still good enough to be something succesful again. The treatment of the human body reappears with yes, the influence of Christianity,  and in fact if would be a key element on their art work: Jesus in his whole grace would be the most depicted figure ever. Architectural wise, the buildings start to expand into new dimensions; they became bigger, built mainly from stone, again with the idea of eternity in their minds. These were mainly ecclesiastical buildings that obviously wanted to be preserved through out time…and so they did, and if you look around in your city you most certainly will find a Romanesque church, or at least the ancient settlement underneath whatever is there now.

As you may know, from the Romanesque we pass onto the Gothic style of the Late Middle Ages that most likely suited better the needs of that age. However, The Renaissance was just around the corner, and again together with the whole humanistic movement we have a new artistic revolution.

The people from the Renaissance interested in their history saw an extreme appeal in this classical style that had been building their nations since almost the beginning of history, and so they paid their own tribute to it. I am sure it is no difficult to see the themes already commented such as the proportion and harmony in master pieces such as Michelangelo’s David. It is Greek and Roman art all over the place again.

Then again the tendency died out and moved into more eccentric forms, but not for long. Some centuries later, and thank to the new scientific-intellectual-humanist movement know as the Enlightenment came along the Neoclassicism. As its own name explains the “New-classical” tendency took over the western nations. A great example of this would be the early years of Louis XIV court, and without doubt Versailles itself: all with the grandeur typical of a Roman emperor, symmetric and eternal. it is well-known that the Sun King was after “la gloire” and the recognition of his achievements through history, so this style suited him very much.

 

I know this is a lot of information in a brief and small explanation, but I am sure that if you have been reading and paying a bit of attention you have seen already what is my point. Humans tend to take back things from the past…Things that were succesful in the past…Things that are the clear remain of the days of glory and power, things that make oneself be proud of his heritage.Art is one of those things that keep on changing through time, but art works on an inspirational basis, as well as in the taste of the artist, and artists need to find their influences from somewhere… And it seems that classical art is one of their very favourites. So for this, I think classicism within the artistic world should be on the top ten (or something like that) of Things That Came Back, and that might possibly come back again.

I mean, who knows? Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not next week. But perhaps in a couple of decades, with all these crises, catastrophes and changes our world is suffering or seems to be suffering, there may be a possibility of taking that splendour that once was ours and use it to keep people’s faith alive, or just to remind them who they are…

 

 

 

 

 

 

History: A Fraction of the Past in the Present

History surrounds us in everything we do, even if we do not think so, it does. Most of the history we do not think about is what we can call History use, by this we mean using the past in the present. This we can find in everything from street names to public feasts, or even political speeches. The later have in some cases been known not only for using history, but also to miss use it. The difference between using and miss-using history is that by miss-using history you use a part of the history that suits you best, and twist it to your advantage, or you may use something that has no historical credibility at all.

So my question to you is; are you using the past in your life? and do you know why one may use history?

It has been said that history is a societies memory and conscience. However history through all these memories can be used for so much more than you can think off… we are talking about five different types of history use, each en every one of them have a distinct character and purpose.

1. the academically and scientifically use, which is characterised by its strict rules and concept of a “historical truth”.

2. the existential use, by which he means the use that gives us roots and covers our needs to feels we, both on a personal level, a regional, and a national level, are coming from somewhere, as well as being part of something that have lasted over time.

3. the moral use of history, where you use the history to create an idol, or remember something that is ethically or morally important to the History user, like remembering the Holocaust so that we may prevent it from happening again

4. the Ideological use of History,which is when one use a historical event, or fact to legitimise something, as for example a war or an unpopular diction.

the 5th is maybe the most serious of the all; to not use history. In other word keeping the history quiet, and not speaking about it, that is also using history though maybe in the same way as the other 4 moments.

All of these five we have seen can be used for more than one purpose. History is something we encounter, as before mentioned, every day. We find it in commercials by trying to connect a certain product to a certain event or historical fact, or by the street we live in, most cities name their streets up after people or pleases that they think have some importance. A very famous example for this can be Trafalgar square in London, where the place is named up after the battle at Trafalgar. However there are thousands if not hundred thousands of places that have been given names after people or places, do you know who some of the streets in your town or city are named after?

I have in the title mentioned abuse of history, and you may not agree with me on this, but abuse of history can be all from silencing a history and thereby depriving a person or a society their right to a memory and a place in the common history. Groups that often over the years have experienced this is those subject to discrimination based on different reasons, such as ethnical or religious minorities within all countries of the world. An extreme miss-use of History and historical data may also over time become abuse of history, through the twisting to history to suit once own intentions.

History, is as we have seen not only history, it may just as well be a fraction of the past in the present.

Sources:

Bøe, J.B., Å lese fortiden, 2006.

(in english; to read the past)