Since I have no new updates today, I thought I'd post an interesting article from "Newsweek". It's not about Ethiopia, but it gives some insight into the lives of other blacks within the African diaspora, specifically Afro-Latinos. Take a look if you're interested.
Rise Of The Latin Africans
A new black-power movement in Central and South America.
Joe Contreras
NEWSWEEK
Updated: 11:09 AM ET May 31, 2008
Hugo Chávez is known as a revolutionary in many contexts, especially his
defiance of the United States. In recent years, however, he's also broken
ground on a far less well-exposed subject: the question of race in Latin
America. The saga began two years ago, when, during a tour of Gambia, Chávez
surprised observers by declaring that "I've always said that if Spain is our
mother, Africa, mother Africa, is much more so." Since then, the Venezuelan
leader has often revisited the theme at home, even drawing attention to his
own African roots. It may not sound shocking. But such language would have
been inconceivable from a major Latin American leader just a short time ago.
That's now changing, due to a black-consciousness movement stirring in
Central and South America. Emboldened by the success of their indigenous
countrymen in pressing for resolution of long-ignored grievances,
Afro-descendientes (people of African descent), as they are known, are now
lobbying for recognition of their own communities' land rights and for
increased spending to improve living conditions in urban slums and rural
villages. Local activists have begun urging Latin blacks to take pride in
their culture, and with the help of the Internet, leaders are reaching
across borders to share tactics and compare notes with their brethren in the
Caribbean, the United States and Africa. This "black-power movement has gone
way beyond anything that has happened in the past," says Ann
Farnsworth-Alvear, director of Latin American and Latino Studies at the
University of Pennsylvania. "People are making critiques of racism in their
own societies, and there's been a real shift in black consciousness and
involvement. "
Black power isn't entirely new to the region; for some time now the
descendants of African slaves have wielded political clout in a few corners
of the hemisphere. That's especially the case in the English-speaking
Caribbean, where black heads of state are the rule. And in Brazil, where
nearly half the country's 192 million people have African ancestry, Joaquim
Barbosa, arguably the most influential member of the Supreme Court, is
black; so is recording artist Gilberto Gil, who served as Culture minister
under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva for five years. Moreover, Lula's
predecessor, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, once announced that he himself had
"one foot in the kitchen"—a colorful way of admitting intermarriage among
his ancestors (albeit one that earned him criticism at the time).
In the rest of Latin America, blacks remain a small (they're thought to
number about 20 million, though activists claim the figure is much higher)
and marginalized minority. Demographics highlight their second-class status.
For example, Ecuador's blacks, who make up 5 percent of the population,
suffer a 14.5 percent unemployment rate, higher than that of the country's
nonblack majority and twice that of indigenous groups. In neighboring
Colombia, which is home to 10.5 million Afro-descendientes— giving it the
third largest black population in the hemisphere, after Brazil and the
United States—only one in five blacks has access to electricity and running
water (compared with 60 percent of the rest of the population), and the
black infant mortality rate is more than three times the white level.
Now, however, black communities are organizing and pressing for change. In
Honduras, for example, locals of African descent, who are known as
Garifunas, have staged protests in Tegucigalpa, the capital, against a
proposed constitutional amendment that would permit foreigners to purchase
property along the Atlantic coast, a region the Garifunas have called home
since 1797. And in Ecuador, more than a hundred black housewives and working
women joined forces in 2006 to seek more government assistance for housing
to combat racial discrimination in the rental market.
The epicenter of the new black activism, meanwhile, is Colombia. That's due
as much to circumstance as design: more than a third of the 3.2 million
Colombians uprooted by the country's long-running civil war are of African
ancestry, as are many of the ragged street vendors and beggars who approach
motorists at busy Bogotá intersections. Foreign and local NGOs are now
working hard to publicize their plight. Though a landmark 1993 law enshrined
the right of Afro-Colombians to obtain formal title to their ancestral
lands, including 5 million hectares along the Pacific coast—a unique
experiment in ethnic self-government— implementation has lagged, as
unscrupulous agribusinesses and paramilitary warlords have seized communal
property with near impunity. But recently, as part of its ongoing effort to
win U.S. approval for a free-trade agreement, the government of President
Alvaro Uribe has begun to expel these companies and restore 8,000 hectares
of stolen land to Afro-Colombian community councils.
Throughout the region, individual blacks have also begun blazing new trails.
Graciela Dixon became the first black woman to head Panama's Supreme Court
in 2005, and Luis Alberto Moore, a cop in Colombia, has reached the rank of
general—a first for an Afro-descendiente. "I hope I will serve as an example
for other black people in Colombia who will say, 'If General Moore did [it],
then so can I'," says the 48-year-old Bogotá native.
But many other Latin blacks remain reluctant to openly acknowledge their
background, which makes it hard for their communities to increase their
influence. In 2005, for example, when Colombians were asked for the first
time to identify their ethnic background in a census, less than half the
country's blacks described themselves as such. Doris de la Hoz, a senior
Afro-Colombian official in the Ministry of Culture, says that even this
percentage represented progress, since more than 4 million people did
acknowledge their heritage. But "there is still a strong separation of
people by groups," she says, "and many black families try to convince their
lighter-skinned children that they are white."
Yet such attitudes also seem to be shifting, albeit gradually. Evelyne
Laurent-Perrault, 48, is the daughter of Haitian immigrants and grew up in
middle-class Caracas, where she was usually the only black in her classroom
and, later on, her office. Over the years she's endured her fair share of
cruel jokes. Starting in her 20s, however, Laurent-Perrault, a biologist by
training, began to develop a passionate interest in her culture and its
links to Africa. She is now working on a Ph.D. at New York University
analyzing the topic in the context of Venezuela. "There is [now] more pride
in being black," she says. "People are mobilizing, and organizations have
arisen in almost all of Latin America to expose inequality and demand that
this must end."
Such organizations are drawing inspiration and financing from foreign,
largely U.S., sources. In February, African-American journalist Lori
Robinson launched a new Web site called vidaafrolatina. com that spotlights
news, cultural events and commentary by and about Afro-Latinos. Leading
members of the U.S. Congressional Black Caucus, like Rep. Gregory Meeks,
have taken a special interest in Afro-Colombians and dispatched staff to
advise black Colombian legislators. USAID has funded a variety of social and
economic development projects in predominantly black areas of western
Colombia, and has provided money and technical assistance to an association
of black mayors and groups working on behalf of internal refugees. The
groundbreaking presidential bid of a certain young U.S. senator hasn't gone
unnoticed in the region, either. "A triumph of Barack Obama would be
extraordinary, " gushes Ernesto Estupiñan, mayor of the predominantly black
Ecuadoran city of Esmeraldas. "It would be a huge encouragement for all of
us in terms of minority participation in politics." Indeed, if Obama does
reach the White House, one of his familiar slogans could soon take root in
the hearts and minds of his fellow Africano-Americanos south of the border:
"¡Si se puede!"("Yes we can!")
URL: http://www.newsweek .com/id/139401
A new black-power movement in Central and South America.
Joe Contreras
NEWSWEEK
Updated: 11:09 AM ET May 31, 2008
Hugo Chávez is known as a revolutionary in many contexts, especially his
defiance of the United States. In recent years, however, he's also broken
ground on a far less well-exposed subject: the question of race in Latin
America. The saga began two years ago, when, during a tour of Gambia, Chávez
surprised observers by declaring that "I've always said that if Spain is our
mother, Africa, mother Africa, is much more so." Since then, the Venezuelan
leader has often revisited the theme at home, even drawing attention to his
own African roots. It may not sound shocking. But such language would have
been inconceivable from a major Latin American leader just a short time ago.
That's now changing, due to a black-consciousness movement stirring in
Central and South America. Emboldened by the success of their indigenous
countrymen in pressing for resolution of long-ignored grievances,
Afro-descendientes (people of African descent), as they are known, are now
lobbying for recognition of their own communities' land rights and for
increased spending to improve living conditions in urban slums and rural
villages. Local activists have begun urging Latin blacks to take pride in
their culture, and with the help of the Internet, leaders are reaching
across borders to share tactics and compare notes with their brethren in the
Caribbean, the United States and Africa. This "black-power movement has gone
way beyond anything that has happened in the past," says Ann
Farnsworth-Alvear, director of Latin American and Latino Studies at the
University of Pennsylvania. "People are making critiques of racism in their
own societies, and there's been a real shift in black consciousness and
involvement. "
Black power isn't entirely new to the region; for some time now the
descendants of African slaves have wielded political clout in a few corners
of the hemisphere. That's especially the case in the English-speaking
Caribbean, where black heads of state are the rule. And in Brazil, where
nearly half the country's 192 million people have African ancestry, Joaquim
Barbosa, arguably the most influential member of the Supreme Court, is
black; so is recording artist Gilberto Gil, who served as Culture minister
under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva for five years. Moreover, Lula's
predecessor, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, once announced that he himself had
"one foot in the kitchen"—a colorful way of admitting intermarriage among
his ancestors (albeit one that earned him criticism at the time).
In the rest of Latin America, blacks remain a small (they're thought to
number about 20 million, though activists claim the figure is much higher)
and marginalized minority. Demographics highlight their second-class status.
For example, Ecuador's blacks, who make up 5 percent of the population,
suffer a 14.5 percent unemployment rate, higher than that of the country's
nonblack majority and twice that of indigenous groups. In neighboring
Colombia, which is home to 10.5 million Afro-descendientes— giving it the
third largest black population in the hemisphere, after Brazil and the
United States—only one in five blacks has access to electricity and running
water (compared with 60 percent of the rest of the population), and the
black infant mortality rate is more than three times the white level.
Now, however, black communities are organizing and pressing for change. In
Honduras, for example, locals of African descent, who are known as
Garifunas, have staged protests in Tegucigalpa, the capital, against a
proposed constitutional amendment that would permit foreigners to purchase
property along the Atlantic coast, a region the Garifunas have called home
since 1797. And in Ecuador, more than a hundred black housewives and working
women joined forces in 2006 to seek more government assistance for housing
to combat racial discrimination in the rental market.
The epicenter of the new black activism, meanwhile, is Colombia. That's due
as much to circumstance as design: more than a third of the 3.2 million
Colombians uprooted by the country's long-running civil war are of African
ancestry, as are many of the ragged street vendors and beggars who approach
motorists at busy Bogotá intersections. Foreign and local NGOs are now
working hard to publicize their plight. Though a landmark 1993 law enshrined
the right of Afro-Colombians to obtain formal title to their ancestral
lands, including 5 million hectares along the Pacific coast—a unique
experiment in ethnic self-government— implementation has lagged, as
unscrupulous agribusinesses and paramilitary warlords have seized communal
property with near impunity. But recently, as part of its ongoing effort to
win U.S. approval for a free-trade agreement, the government of President
Alvaro Uribe has begun to expel these companies and restore 8,000 hectares
of stolen land to Afro-Colombian community councils.
Throughout the region, individual blacks have also begun blazing new trails.
Graciela Dixon became the first black woman to head Panama's Supreme Court
in 2005, and Luis Alberto Moore, a cop in Colombia, has reached the rank of
general—a first for an Afro-descendiente. "I hope I will serve as an example
for other black people in Colombia who will say, 'If General Moore did [it],
then so can I'," says the 48-year-old Bogotá native.
But many other Latin blacks remain reluctant to openly acknowledge their
background, which makes it hard for their communities to increase their
influence. In 2005, for example, when Colombians were asked for the first
time to identify their ethnic background in a census, less than half the
country's blacks described themselves as such. Doris de la Hoz, a senior
Afro-Colombian official in the Ministry of Culture, says that even this
percentage represented progress, since more than 4 million people did
acknowledge their heritage. But "there is still a strong separation of
people by groups," she says, "and many black families try to convince their
lighter-skinned children that they are white."
Yet such attitudes also seem to be shifting, albeit gradually. Evelyne
Laurent-Perrault, 48, is the daughter of Haitian immigrants and grew up in
middle-class Caracas, where she was usually the only black in her classroom
and, later on, her office. Over the years she's endured her fair share of
cruel jokes. Starting in her 20s, however, Laurent-Perrault, a biologist by
training, began to develop a passionate interest in her culture and its
links to Africa. She is now working on a Ph.D. at New York University
analyzing the topic in the context of Venezuela. "There is [now] more pride
in being black," she says. "People are mobilizing, and organizations have
arisen in almost all of Latin America to expose inequality and demand that
this must end."
Such organizations are drawing inspiration and financing from foreign,
largely U.S., sources. In February, African-American journalist Lori
Robinson launched a new Web site called vidaafrolatina. com that spotlights
news, cultural events and commentary by and about Afro-Latinos. Leading
members of the U.S. Congressional Black Caucus, like Rep. Gregory Meeks,
have taken a special interest in Afro-Colombians and dispatched staff to
advise black Colombian legislators. USAID has funded a variety of social and
economic development projects in predominantly black areas of western
Colombia, and has provided money and technical assistance to an association
of black mayors and groups working on behalf of internal refugees. The
groundbreaking presidential bid of a certain young U.S. senator hasn't gone
unnoticed in the region, either. "A triumph of Barack Obama would be
extraordinary, " gushes Ernesto Estupiñan, mayor of the predominantly black
Ecuadoran city of Esmeraldas. "It would be a huge encouragement for all of
us in terms of minority participation in politics." Indeed, if Obama does
reach the White House, one of his familiar slogans could soon take root in
the hearts and minds of his fellow Africano-Americanos south of the border:
"¡Si se puede!"("Yes we can!")
URL: http://www.newsweek .com/id/139401
1 comment:
Thanks for the article! Years ago we attempted to start a similar group but everyone was too busy. We met a few times and had a lot of turn out but it didn't go anywhere. Afro-Latinos are everywhere and in every country but they are always marginalized just like in the US...interesting how that works.
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