What you need to Know about Racism and the African American Culture

A young boy named Tabmja

This definition comes from Wikipedia:

Racism consists of ideologies and practices that seek to justify, or cause, the unequal distribution of privileges, rights, or goods amongst, or otherwise exhibit hatred or prejudice towards, different racial groups. It is often based on a desire to dominate or a belief in the inferiority of another race. Modern variants are often based in social perceptions of biological differences between people. These can take the form of social actions, practices or beliefs, or political systems that consider different races to be ranked as inherently superior or inferior to each other, based on presumed shared inheritable traits, abilities, or qualities. It may also hold that members of different races should be treated differently.

African American Culture

African American, also referred to as Black American or Afro-American, is an ethnic group of citizens or residents of the United States with total or partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa. The term may also be used to include only those individuals who are descended from enslaved Africans. The problem here is most African Americans cannot tell you anything about their ancestry in Africa.  The truth is, there is no African American Culture, they have no identity.  I don’t know where in Africa my family came from.  I do know most of them now live in Kansas, or Colorado.  I have no relatives in Africa that I am aware of.  Yes, we have at one time or another tried to incorporated some African traditions such as Kwanzaa, into our lives.  Some have even worn Kente cloth or Dashiki outfits.

What happened?  It is difficult to relate to something you know nothing about.  What happened was the black population rejected the African association.  Now we see this.

This is a race trying to find an identity and their place in America.  They have adapted to the American culture by infusing their own brand of music, their own style of clothing, their own economic system, and sometimes their own style of justice.

                                                   

                                                     

  Exactly How “Black” Are African Americans? 

* According to Ancestry.com, the average African American is 65 percent sub-Saharan African, 29 percent European and 2 percent Native American.

* According to 23andme.com, the average African American is 75 percent sub-Saharan African, 22 percent European and only 0.6 percent Native American.

* According to Family Tree DNA.com, the average African American is 72.95 percent sub-Saharan African, 22.83 percent European and 1.7 percent Native American.

* According to National Geographic’s Genographic Project, the average African American is 80 percent sub-Saharan African, 19 percent European and 1 percent Native American.

* According to AfricanDNA, the average African American is 79 percent sub-Saharan African, 19 percent European and 2 percent Native American.

This is probably the most important thing for All Americans to know.

“this finding is important because it deconstructs the very American notion of biologically “fixed races” that our society inherited from the racist pseudoscience of the 18th century and drew upon to justify slavery and the property rights of masters who fathered children with their slaves (Henry Louis Gates Jr).

Fact is African Americans genomes are dramatically comprised of European ancestry. They also have very little Indian ancestry ( 0.5 to 2%)  despite the claim of their great grandmother’s long straight hair, and fair skin color.  Truth is there was very little interaction between Native Americans and African American’s.  I am African American, but was often confused as Latino, or Puerto Rican during my stay in Florida, due to my hair texture and skin color. Very few African Americans are pure 100% sub-Saharan African.

Lets re-visit racism.  Racism is ignorance, due to a lack of education, exposure in diverse environments, cultures and history.  We are all mixed, whether you like it or not.  If one person dies in this country, we all bleed, we all have the same genetic makeup, and are all from the same race…human.  So let it be written….

~ by E. Tomlin on September 7, 2015.