The Black Diaspora: Five Centuries of the Black Experience Outside Africa

by Ronald Segal

A history of black life outside of Africa provides a cross-cultural analysis that covers five centuries and encompasses religion and politics, language and literature, and music and art, and reveals that dispersed cultures have an organic, coherent identity.

Genres: History, Africa, Race, Politics, African American

496 pages, Hardcover

First published August 31, 1995

About the author

From the obituary in The Guardian (2008):

"At Cape Town University he majored in English and Latin and learned the raw facts of political life. Trinity College, Cambridge, followed, where he was more influenced by Enid Welsford, tutor in the English moralists, than by FR Leavis. An upper second was a disappointment. A dissertation on Paradise Lost won him a fellowship to the University of Virginia, but he found Charlottesville a 'museum world'. Within six months, in 1956, he was back in Cape Town to launch the magazine Africa South. Politics had won out."

From the book jacket for Islam's Black Slaves (2001):

"South African-born Ronald Segal, former editor and publisher of Africa South, left his country with the African National Congress leader Oliver Tambo in 1960 for political exile in England. Banned for more than thirty years, he returned briefly in 1992 and again in early 1994 to help the ANC run its campaign in the Western Cape for South Africa's first democratic election. Founding editor of the Penguin African Library, Segal is the author of thirteen books, including The Anguish of India, The Race War, The Americans, and, most recently, The Black Diaspora (FSG, 1996)."

From the book jacket for Into Exile (1963):

"From April 1960 to the end of 1961, Ronald Segal continued to publish Africa South in Exile from London, despite lack of funds (the South African Government had frozen all his assets) and the difficulties of smuggling copies back into the Union. In 1961 he published a book called Political Africa, a kind of Who's Who of the leading political personalities in Africa and of the aims and histories of their political parties. His personal knowledge of African affairs and his acquaintanceship with men like Nkrumah, Kaunda and Nyerere led him to expand some of the entries in Political Africa to form a book of African Profiles, published by Penguin a year later. In April 1961 he joined the Penguin staff as the editor of their new African Library. Recently he spent three months in India gathering material for a new book."

Reviews

[Harold Spencer, Jr. · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book. A real eye-opener. A great read for anyone who is interested in how the African slave trade, not only affected North America, but the rest of the world.

[Glenn Robinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

500 years of Blacks all over the world in one book is an extremely difficult task. This writer did a very good job. It is difficult to have anything of such a broad area in 440 pages and many of the subjects were gleamed over. This book is Western in view and does not look at the slave trade the headed East.

Slavery in the US is just a small chapter of this book. Slavery in each of the Western countries are covered, but none of the Middle East. North America, in terms of the slave trade and Blacks covers more the US and Canada as North America has had many other Nations that owned/governed the areas, including the Native American nations. This book covers these and all the Central, South and Caribbean nations in detail. Interestingly, North America has been deemed the most hospitable of the nations that imported slaves. Not something to be proud of, of course, but important to become aware of how difficult the lives of slaves in Brazil, the islands, and elsewhere were.

The 2nd half is life after slavery in each country. Haiti features big as Haiti was able to win independence from France. Sadly, the many leaders of Haiti were very poor leaders and while it was as wealthy as the US at the beginning, it is not now. When it comes to each country, the writer does a fairly good job at showing the good, the bad and the ugly. He seemed upset that East Indians now run Guyana instead of Blacks and upset that Trinidadians are so happy and not angry.

The last part seemed rushed. Musicians, artists, writers but nothing on science, diplomats and law.

Again, 440 pages to discuss 500 years of Black Diaspora is a tall order. Overall, well worth the time read.

[Vivian · Rating 4 out of 5]

While reading Homegoing I was curious how many people were sold during the transatlantic slave trade (12.5M embarked, 10.7M survived the voyage). To my surprise that only a small percentage were sold to nowadays US (388K), the vast majority were sold to Caribbean (4.5M+) and Brazil (4.8M+). However when we talk about slavery, it is always US-centric. What happened to all these other people and their descendants? That question led me to this book.

Ronald Segal was a Jewish South African anti-apartheid activist and writer; his passion for equality in South Africa led him to the black diaspora experience. After trying to commision several writers and nobody was willing to touch such an expansive topic, he decided to write it himself. This book is divided into 5 sections: From Africa to Slavery, The Insurgent Spirit, Chains of Emancipation, Travels in the Historic Present, and Selections From An Anatomy of Achievements.

It's not an easy read, nor very coherent. But writing 500 years of black diaspora experience is an extremely difficult task. This book definitely filled my knowledge gap in the slavery history beyond North America and how colonial legacies continued to impact and influence the cultures, economies and politics of these countries well into present days. I particularly enjoyed the sections on Haiti, Cuba and Brazil - countries I visited in the past but now I'm seeing in a new light.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good historical overview. I learned a lot as my US-centric history classes missed a lot of this! Enjoyed the thematic (versus purely chronological) organization, but this did sometimes make it difficult to follow with overlapping timelines.

[Jeremy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating and insightful historical discussion, but the later chapters tend to collapse political distinctions within and pertaining to the black diaspora in a way that was at times very silly. Thinking especially of the comments the author makes on the Black Belt thesis here.

[ػᶈᶏϾӗ]

Of course the specifics of this history is important and I will no doubt come back to it. But the fiction comes first.