Negritude..

“my Negritude is not a stone..
nor a deafness flung against the clamor of the day..
my Negritude is not a white speck of dead water..
on the dead eye of the earth..
my Negritude is neither tower nor cathedral..
it plunges into the red flesh of the soil..
it plunges into the blaxing flesh of the sky..
my Negritude riddles with holes..
the dense affliction of its worthy patience..”

With these words, Amie Cesaire expressed the views that evolved within the Black university student at Paris in 1930th.. A movement that welcomed the French colonist rule, but requested equality and dignity within.. Many people rejected the call for its apparent paradoxical structure, while few supported, turning it into the greatest intellectual, philosophical and literature movement in the Africa. Négritude movement included the future Senegalese President Léopold Sédar Senghor, Martinican poet Aimé Césaire, and the Guianan Léon Damas. The Négritude writers found solidarity in a common black identity as a rejection of French colonial racism. They believed that the shared black heritage of members of the African diaspora was the best tool in fighting against French political and intellectual hegemony and domination.

The term Négritude (which most closely means "blackness" in English) was first used in 1935 by Aimé Césaire in the 3rd issue of L'Étudiant noir, a magazine which he had started in Paris with fellow students Léopold Senghor and Léon Damas, as well as Gilbert Gratiant, Leonard Sainville, and Paulette Nardal. L'Étudiant noir also contains Césaire's first published work, "Negreries," which is notable not only for its disavowal of assimilation as a valid strategy for resistance but also for its reclamation of the word "nègre" as a positive term. "Nègre" previously had been almost exclusively used in a pejorative sense, much like the English word "nigger."

Neither Césaire, who upon returning to Martinique after his studies in Paris was elected both Mayor of Fort de France, the capital, and a representative of Martinique in France's Parliament, nor Senghor in Senegal envisaged political independence from France. Négritude would, according to Senghor, enable Blacks under French rule to take a "seat at the give and take table as equals." However, France had other ideas, and it would eventually present Senegal and its other African colonies with independence.

Négritude had inspired the idea of Pan Africa, as political movement; which stormed west African states in the 1960th. The Pan-African flag was designed by Marcus Garvey and is known as "The Red, Black, and Green". This flag symbolizes the struggle for the unification and liberation of African people. The "red" stands for the blood that unites all people of African ancestry, "black" represents the color of the skin of the people of Africa, and "green" stands for the rich land of Africa.

Recently, Pan African Movement had received a great support and gear up force, by the South Africa legendary leader Nelson Mandela, and the Libyan leader Colonel Ghadafi; in addition to many new breed of politician and political leaders in Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya and Zimbabwe. A formal Pan Africa Organization was announced as governing body, many groups, particularly in culture and arts had gain powers and enthusiasm, and many distinctive expressions in media and business came to surface.

The associated term of “Black Power” was very well received among the African American in USA; who went the extra mile and painted the USA map with Pan African flag colors. It is also relevant to acknowledge the negative implications of such political uprising, which created a wide spread waves of violence, armed conflicts and further unrest in many corners of the continent. However, the hard delivery came with some extra bright symptoms on fighting the chronic political corruption, namely; the 2009 presidential elections of Ghana, which was a unique event historically and globally.

For more; panafricanempowerment.blogspot.com/