Welcome to Gaia! ::

I know some people are always asking, hey, do you want to be called African American or Black?

Personally, I don't care.

My friend, Val` ( who is mulatto ) jokingly calls me "negro". Though, I do call him half-negro, so it's cool.

What about you?

Black it sounds better 3nodding

I prefer Afro American
African American is someone born in africa, then came to be a citizen.
Black is just a no. talk2hand

i like black just fine

it's what i am, i'm not going to deny it

Before I go and answer the question I would like to start out with a quote from Dead Prez:



AFRICAN! Like the lyrics say, "Even tho I wasn't born in Ghana, Africa's my momma...No it aint 'bout where you stay, it's bout the motherland". First of all my I am not black. There is no Black land that I can call home, there is no such place, black is the color of my words, not my skin. You don't see Asian people going around describing themsleves as yellow while in conversation, or hispanics saying I'm a Tan American and using that as their identity. It's ludicrous. Also, I am not African-American. Firstly, I am not American because I never had the choice of coming to America, so even though I have citizenship here this land is not my land and it is not of my origin. Secondly, how can one claim two nations? You are either one or the other. When I say nation I mean, "a politically organized body of people under a single government", since African peoples in this country are not politically organized as a part of the running government (because we are systematically disinfranchised and cannot actually have power while playing by their rules) we cannot claim to be part of the American nation. I mean think about it, the term African-American is he-lar-i-ous, because as soon as you say "oh so your African" to an Emancipated slave they get all "I aint no dirty African" or some such nocense. How you gunna hate half of the name that you use to describe yourself? Besides, my blood came from Africa, thats where it originated from so how all of a sudden did my blood become "American"?

So, do you plan to find out?

You can still read a book about your heritage...at least just to start

gonk crying evil AMERICAN HISTORY??????? You can't trust that as a reliable source. They are the ones who brought African people here for monitary gain....why would you trust their books, why lord why???

....ok I'm done now....
Learning about being an African on the continent or not, you really can't rely on Europeans to tell you something you know they have a bias opinion on. I didn't learn "Africaness" until I came to college. Just hanging around any ol' "black" person wont really get you what you need to know (mostly because they don't know them self). From the sound of it, are you telling me that unless an African person knows exaclty where they came from in Africa, that their efforts are futile? In that case 99% of us are screwed, because not many of us know. If thats what you think, then I wont waste my time trying to get to know and help you look for an answer. (In all seriousness, and I'm not saying this to be mean, so please don't take it that way)

Everything starts from reading. So if you want answers I'm willing to help you.

To begin with I would reccomend exploring the following sites:

http://www.homestead.com/wysinger/ancientafrica.html
http://web.cocc.edu/cagatucci/classes/hum211/timelines/htimeline.htm
http://web.cocc.edu/cagatucci/classes/hum211/timelines/htimeline2.htm
http://web.cocc.edu/cagatucci/classes/hum211/timelines/htimeline3.htm

Anyway, think about it. heart