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American settlers, fearful above all of the massive insurrections seen elsewhere in the Americas, spared no expense in securing the most docile slaves possible. This system of commodification contributed greatly to a deeper cultural and identity alienation among African-Americans, which, according to Orlando Patterson in Slavery and Social Death( 1982), made it more difficult to maintain ties with African traditions and develop a collective consciousness of resistance. This dynamic would explain in part why some African-Americans, out of shame or Americanism, may have sought to invent Asian, Greek, Jewish or Native American filiations, thus denying their African heritage.
The Role of Africans in Trafficking: A Responsibility That Must Be Qualified
Flashmag! Issue 164 September 2025
Another point of contention between the African and African-American communities lies in the discourse accusing Africans of having“ sold their brothers” into slavery. It is undeniable that some African chiefs and elites participated in the Atlantic slave trade, capturing and selling individuals, often in the context of inter-ethnic wars or for commercial reasons. However, it is imperative to place this participation in its historical context and to qualify the responsibility. One cannot blame the majority for the actions of an extreme bourgeois and elitist minority, when the same majority is the one that has suffered the most and continues to suffer. Blaming the victims for their own misfortunes is a method much used by the oppressor as a rule. A scourge we see to this day in the summary executions carried out by Western police against black communities, who are often blamed for their own misadventure. The hunter’ s narrative makes no mention of anti-slavery struggles across the African continent with movements such as the Doumbéman in Senegambia, who on the contrary fiercely fought the slave trade, attempting to protect their populations. Boubacar Barry’ s La Sénégambie du XVeau XIXe siècle( 1988) sheds light on these complex dynamics.
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