This quote from Hegel stuck out to me as the "common sense" of the understanding of history since although I do not agree that Africa has no "movement or development" it is interesting that we do not learn about Africa in our history books. Which makes it appear that Africa is an underdeveloped country that has not changed while all other countries have progressed. So I found it interesting to have Hegel come out and state that "it is no historical part of the World"
Growing up all of my history classes I had never studied the history of Africa. I sadly do not have a link for this but I will describe what moments I mean. The most we looked at African history was when the Europeans/ Americans took Africans for the use of slavery or how their land was conquered. Them main point is that the history I have read was told in the point of view of the white man. The man that took the land rather than the slave or the person to had their land conquered. Hegel is arguing that the only history that is worth learning about is the history that progressed the European/ Americans. He considers them the developing culture while Africa just sits there?
Hegel helped me understand why all my history books were so biased. I really had never thought about why I only learned where Africa was on the map rather than any of its history growing up. The men that wrote the history books were white men. They chose to focus on the growth of white countries rather than Africa's history. This was highly supported when Hegel says that the historical movements from the northern parts (that were colonies of white males).
One reason to why we should read Hegel is because he gives an insight to the history we know since many of the books we have learned from are written by men with the same mind set of Hegel. Men that were also possibly racist privileged dead white straight European christians that are educated. We can use Hegel as data to interpret what really happened and what our history books leave out.
I also found this quote quite interesting. The only time I remember learning about Africa was when white Europeans conquered it or as you said explaining slavery. If we did have the view point of the other side (the Africans) I think that the stories would change and the changing of those stories might even change the history we know. So I think that while more and more people are becoming interested in Africa no one has really done something about it as far as getting their view of their history out there. II also found this quote quite interesting. The only time I remember learning about Africa was when white Europeans conquered it or as you said explaining slavery. If we did have the view point of the other side (the Africans) I think that the stories would change and the changing of those stories might even change the history we know. So I think that while more and more people are becoming interested in Africa no one has really done something about it as far as getting their view of their history out there. I would be curious to see what would be found... would be curious to see what would be found...
ReplyDeleteThanks to your post, I was able to realize what exactly I wanted to say in mine-the truth is that Africa DOES have history, and the white Europeans DID NOT conquer it. In fact, the slaves in the trans-Atlantic slave trade were completely provided by the African people. The Europeans were kept only on the coastal areas of West Africa, because the Ashante, Dahomey, Oyo, etc. kingdoms wouldn't allow them to go farther inland. This was the agreement they all made. You can refer to my post for more information about all that, but I'm convinced the Hegel is asserting that there is no such thing as "positive history." Africa has extensive history, and yet everyone thinks that it has no history. Why? Well, because Africans were always very peaceful people, and learned to coincide with one another in such a way that, in Hegel's eyes, no history was made.
ReplyDeleteWhen I first came across this comment I felt almost offended by it. I mean who is he to say that there is no history in Africa. But then, after reading your post it became clear to me that you are absolutely correct. I can recall nothing in any of my, oh so amazing, "history classes" that referenced Africa. Sure there were small things, but nothing compared to the history we studied about the rest of the world. The only time I have learned about the history within Africa is when I took specific classes on it. So thank you for the insight into this quote. I knew there was a reason I found it so irksome.
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