American Africans in Ghana

American Africans in Ghana
Author: Kevin K. Gaines
Publisher: UNC Press Books
Total Pages: 359
Release: 2012-12-30
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0807867829

In 1957 Ghana became one of the first sub-Saharan African nations to gain independence from colonial rule. Over the next decade, hundreds of African Americans--including Martin Luther King Jr., George Padmore, Malcolm X, Maya Angelou, Richard Wright, Pauli Murray, and Muhammad Ali--visited or settled in Ghana. Kevin K. Gaines explains what attracted these Americans to Ghana and how their new community was shaped by the convergence of the Cold War, the rise of the U.S. civil rights movement, and the decolonization of Africa. Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana's president, posed a direct challenge to U.S. hegemony by promoting a vision of African liberation, continental unity, and West Indian federation. Although the number of African American expatriates in Ghana was small, in espousing a transnational American citizenship defined by solidarities with African peoples, these activists along with their allies in the United States waged a fundamental, if largely forgotten, struggle over the meaning and content of the cornerstone of American citizenship--the right to vote--conferred on African Americans by civil rights reform legislation.

American Africans in Ghana

American Africans in Ghana
Author: Kevin Kelly Gaines
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2006
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780807858936

American Africans in Ghana: Black Expatriates and the Civil Rights Era

Proudly We Can Be Africans

Proudly We Can Be Africans
Author: James H. Meriwether
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
Total Pages: 351
Release: 2009-01-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 0807860417

The mid-twentieth century witnessed nations across Africa fighting for their independence from colonial forces. By examining black Americans' attitudes toward and responses to these liberation struggles, James Meriwether probes the shifting meaning of Africa in the intellectual, political, and social lives of African Americans. Paying particular attention to such important figures and organizations as W. E. B. Du Bois, Martin Luther King Jr., and the NAACP, Meriwether incisively utilizes the black press, personal correspondence, and oral histories to render a remarkably nuanced and diverse portrait of African American opinion. Meriwether builds the book around seminal episodes in modern African history, including nonviolent protests against apartheid in South Africa, the Mau Mau war in Kenya, Ghana's drive for independence under Kwame Nkrumah, and Patrice Lumumba's murder in the Congo. Viewing these events within the context of their own changing lives, especially in regard to the U.S. civil rights struggle, African Americans have continually reconsidered their relationship to contemporary Africa and vigorously debated how best to translate their concerns into action in the international arena. Grounded in black Americans' encounters with Africa, this transnational history sits astride the leading issues of the twentieth century: race, civil rights, anticolonialism, and the intersections of domestic race relations and U.S. foreign relations.

The Predicament of Blackness

The Predicament of Blackness
Author: Jemima Pierre
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 285
Release: 2013
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0226923029

What is the meaning of blackness in Africa? This title tackles the question of race in West Africa through its post-colonial manifestations. Pierre examines key facets of contemporary Ghanaian society, from the pervasive significance of 'whiteness' to the practice of chemical skin-bleaching to the government's active promotion of Pan-African 'heritage tourism'.

Ghana on the Go

Ghana on the Go
Author: Jennifer Hart
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Total Pages: 267
Release: 2016-10-03
Genre: History
ISBN: 0253023254

As early as the 1910s, African drivers in colonial Ghana understood the possibilities that using imported motor transport could further the social and economic agendas of a diverse array of local agents, including chiefs, farmers, traders, fishermen, and urban workers. Jennifer Hart's powerful narrative of auto-mobility shows how drivers built on old trade routes to increase the speed and scale of motorized travel. Hart reveals that new forms of labor migration, economic enterprise, cultural production, and social practice were defined by autonomy and mobility and thus shaped the practices and values that formed the foundations of Ghanaian society today. Focusing on the everyday lives of individuals who participated in this century of social, cultural, and technological change, Hart comes to a more sensitive understanding of the ways in which these individuals made new technology meaningful to their local communities and associated it with their future aspirations.

Ghana's Foreign Policy, 1957-1966

Ghana's Foreign Policy, 1957-1966
Author: Willard Scott Thompson
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 489
Release: 2015-12-08
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1400876303

A systematic and thorough analysis of a small, determined and comparatively wealthy "new" state's attempts to enlarge its influence and augment its power. Originally published in 1969. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Returning Home Ain't Easy But It Sure Is a Blessing

Returning Home Ain't Easy But It Sure Is a Blessing
Author: Seestah Imahk S.
Publisher: Trafford Publishing
Total Pages: 312
Release: 2011-04
Genre: Self-Help
ISBN: 1425147631

"Returning Home Ain't Easy But it Sure Is A Blessing" is a very moving and penetrating work that every African whether he or she intends on repatriating to Africa or not, should read. It is an "invaluable guide" to all Africans who are desperately trying to make their way back home. To re-locate is not a simple matter. It requires a determination to succeed, a firm faith in God the Almighty and patience to learn and re-learn. The power of this book prepares a plan for those wanting to return home to re-acquaint themselves with the land of their Afrikan ancestors. This book shows wisdom, extreme sensibility, and sense of humor necessary to help one to re-settle and make their home in Ghana or anywhere in Africa for that matter. The discourse also includes Ghanaian law as it relates to the subject of Dual Citizenship and The Right of Abode for Afrikans born in the Diaspora. This book can help those who may choose to walk the path of "Return", but should also be read by those who do not intend to re-locate as it is a book, which imparts valuable information about a country in Africa, one of the countries that many African-Americans repatriate to...Ghana. Her straightforward choice of words makes for an admirable, enjoyable, serious and commendable read.

Brazilian-African Diaspora in Ghana

Brazilian-African Diaspora in Ghana
Author: Kwame Essien
Publisher: MSU Press
Total Pages: 392
Release: 2016-10-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1628952776

Brazilian-African Diaspora in Ghana is a fresh approach, challenging both pre-existing and established notions of the African Diaspora by engaging new regions, conceptualizations, and articulations that move the field forward. This book examines the untold story of freed slaves from Brazil who thrived socially, culturally, and economically despite the challenges they encountered after they settled in Ghana. Kwame Essien goes beyond the one-dimensional approach that only focuses on British abolitionists’ funding of freed slaves’ resettlements in Africa. The new interpretation of reverse migrations examines the paradox of freedom in discussing how emancipated Brazilian-Africans came under threat from British colonial officials who introduced stringent land ordinances that deprived the freed Brazilian- Africans from owning land, particularly “Brazilian land.” Essien considers anew contention between the returnees and other entities that were simultaneously vying for control over social, political, commercial, and religious spaces in Accra and tackles the fluidity of memory and how it continues to shape Ghana’s history. The ongoing search for lost connections with the support of the Brazilian government—inspiring multiple generations of Tabom (offspring of the returnees) to travel across the Atlantic and back, especially in the last decade—illustrates the unending nature of the transatlantic diaspora journey and its impacts.

The People of Ghana

The People of Ghana
Author: Godfrey Mwakikagile
Publisher: New Africa Press
Total Pages: 344
Release: 2017-07-01
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9987160506

This is a general survey of Ghana and its people. Subjects covered include the country's regions and their people; Ghana's identity as a nation and how it faced challenges to national unity during the struggle for independence; the nature of the post-colonial state; the asymmetrical relationship between the north and the south rooted in the colonial era, a structural imbalance which continues to have a negative impact on the wellbeing of northerners and which could perpetuate inequalities between the two parts of the country; Ghana's place in the Pan-African world because of the leadership provided by the country's first prime minister – later president – Kwame Nkrumah; and its success in forging unity on the anvil of diversity. Among the people the author has covered include an African American community whose members were given some land in the Volta Region in the eastern part of the country for permanent settlement of the descendants of African slaves who want to return to the motherland. He describes it as a distinct ethnic group with the same attributes indigenous groups have and which they use to identify themselves as ethnic entities. The community has acquired an identity of its own and qualifies as an ethnic group because its members have a common history, language and culture as diasporans who lost their African identity under white domination in the United States and were forced to adopt a Euro-American culture and the English language. The author was closely associated with the founders of the African American community in Ghana, known as Fihankra, when he was a student in the United States and has written about them in some of his works including his autobiography, “My Life as an African.” Members of the general public and students may find this work to be useful if they want to learn some facts about Ghana, the first country in sub-Saharan Africa to win independence.