Africa-Asia Relations: Historical, Cultural, and Linguistic Connections

1
Africa-Asia RelationsHistorical, Cultural, and
Linguistic Connections

• Adams B. Bodomo
• University of Hong Kong
• abbodomo_at_hku.hk
• Visiting Professor
• Ansted University, Penang, Malaysia
• August 7, 2001

2
Outline of the Talk

• Introduction and Themes of the Talk
• Historical/ Archeological/ Genetic Links
• Cultural Links/ Similarity
• Linguistic Links
• East-West Dualism and the African Absence in Asia
• The Way Forward How to improve Asian-African
  Links
• Summary and Conclusions
• Ansted as a Universal University
• References and Bibliographical/ Web-based sources

3
Themes of the Talk

• African presence in Asia Hong Kong and China
• Despite the not-so-tenuous historical, cultural,
  and linguistic connections between Africa and
  Asia, Africa is not so much present in the minds
  of Asians as compared to other parts of the world
• Africa has not much conceptual space in the minds
  of Asians.
• Most Asians know next to nothing about Africa as
  compared to Europe and the Americas.
• There is a certain kind of conceptual and
  philosophical dualism in the minds of Asians.
• this dualism is the East-West dichotomy that is
  so pervasive and rampant in Asian parlance!

4
Historical/ Archeological/ Genetic links
5
History of Mankind and Humanity

• began in Africa
• East Africa and the Nile Valley
• Homo Erectus migrated out of Africa into Asia
• Varieties of the early Africans
• Peking man (first humankind found in China)
• Java Man

6
Recent Genetic Studies

• Migration - first Africans to Asia
• Early Asians - the closest cousins of the early
  Africans!
• Human race emerged from Africa
• Scientists have uncovered the strongest evidence
  yet that humans share a single African
  ancestorThe idea that the entire world is
  African is supported by powerful genetic analysis
  of the Y chromosome.
• Victoria Griffith, the London Financial Times,
  May 10, 2001
• Chinese Roots Lie in Africa
• Most of the population of modern China--one
  fifth of all people living today--owes its
  genetic origins to Africa.
• Robert Lee Holz, Los Angeles Times, Sep 29, 1988

7
African Asian Communities today

• Within South Asia, A Little Touch of Africa
• Kenneth J. Cooper, Washington Post Foreign
  Service, April 12, 1999
• the existence of African Asian communities such
  as the Siddis of India who speak Gujarati, the
  Sheedi community near Karachi in Pakistan most of
  whom speak Baluchi, and the Kaffirs of Sri Lanka.
  
• these communities may not exhibit as much African
  consciousness as we see among many African
  Americans
• but their music, their dance and many of their
  indigenous speech forms and other linguistic
  characteristics point to strong African
  connections.
• these groups aredescended from slaves, servants
  and soldiers brought from East Africa over the
  centuries, first by Arab traders and later by
  Portuguese and British colonizers.
• Indigenous communities in other parts of Asia
• The Philippines, Malaysia (Orang Asli, Original
  Man), In donesia, Iran, Saudi Arabia

8
Vibrant Communities

• Vibrant African communities in Asia
• in megacities like Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai,
  Singapore, Tokyo, Delhi, Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta
  and Manila
• Vibrant Asian communities in Africa
• In African cities like Accra, Johannesburg, Cape
  Town, Durban, Nairobi, Dar es Salaam, Cairo and
  Lagos.

9
Cultural Links/ Similarity
10
Ancestor Worship

• In BOTH African traditional religions and Chinese
  traditional beliefs
• Ancestors are worshipped like GODS
• Strong belief and practice
• Families in Africa set up regular periods in the
  year for ancestor worship
• Chinese Ching Ming Festival (grave-sweeping)
• Chinese families show their respect by visiting
  the graves of their ancestors to clear away
  weeds, touch up gravestone inscriptions and make
  offerings of wine and fruit.

11
Ghosts

• Africans and Asians are superstitious in their
  beliefs.
• Belief in ghosts
• Dead peoples souls will not depart this world
  and linger about among the living as ghosts to
  hound people if they are not given a fitting
  burial
• Theme of the novel Beloved, by Toni Morrison
  (African-American Nobel laureate)

12
Anthropomorphism

• Duality of existence between man and animals
• Humans are given animal characteristics and some
  animals are given human characteristics
• In some ethnicities in Africa, e.g. the
  Dagaare-speaking people of the central parts of
  West Africa
• Every person born has a totem, an animal that
  lives somewhere in the wild
• The fate and destiny of a human and their totem
  are linked
• If the totem dies the human dies
• My totem the PYTHON
• Cool, calm, collected, humour, grace, compassion,
  compunction
• Dont step on its tail!

13
Chinese Horoscope - the twelve-year cycle
(twelve animal signs)

• TOTEM
• Rat
• Ox
• Tiger
• Rabbit
• Dragon
• Snake
• Horse
• Sheep
• Monkey
• Rooster
• Dog
• Pig

http//www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/interactive/ho
roscope/index.jhtml
14
Mentorship as Educational Model

• Belief in authority, deference to the elders as
  custodians of knowledge, rigorous mentorship
  relationship between pupil and master
• University of Hong Kongs mentorship program
• African traditional education systems
• No formal classes and lectures
• Children of farmers and fishermen understudy
  their parents

15
Linguistic Links
16
Genetic Linguistic Relationships

• Languages do not move until people have moved
• The Afro-Asiatic group
• African languages - Hausa, Oromo, Tigrinya, and
  Berber
• Asian languages Hebrew, Assyrian, and Arabic
• The Dravidian group
• South Asian languages - Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada
• Have variants in Southeast Asia, South Africa,
  and Mauritius
• A web of communities in Africa and Asia speaking
  either the same languages or similar ones
  belonging to the same language families

17
Typological Linguistic Relationships(1) TONE

• Tone languages in Africa and Asia
• Akan , Dagaare, Ewe, Ga, Igbo, Yoruba
• Chinese, Thai, Zhuang
• Two tones in Dagaare
• High Nyu? (to drink)
• Low Nyu ? (to smell)

18
Tones in Cantonese

• 6 tonemes
• 1 High
• 2 High rising
• 3 mid level
• 4 - Low Falling
• 5 Low rising
• 6 Low level

19
Typological Linguistic Relationships(2) Serial
verb construction (SVC)

• More than one lexical verb may be found in the
  same clause
• Example - I bought some water and drank it
• Cantonese
• Ngo5 maai5 seoi2 jam2
• 1.SG buy.PERF water
  drink
• Dagaare
• N? da? la?
  ko?O? nyu?
• 1.SG buy.PERF FOC water
  drink

• Tones and serial verb constructions have received
  the attention of many linguists
• contributed very useful data for this linguistic
  inquiry (Luke and Bodomo 1998)
• Association for Languages of Far East, Southeast
  Asia and West Africa (LESEWA)
• Typological similarities as important aspect
  Comparative African and Asian Studies

20
East-West Dualism and the African Absence in Asia
21
My experiences as an African living and working
in Hong Kong

• Africa is not much present in the minds of
  Chinese and other Asians as other parts of the
  world are in their minds
• Asians I have interacted with know next to
  nothing about Africa
• In Asian academic setups, compared to the
  institutions of Europe and America, Asian
  universities and colleges have very little
  content about Africa.

22
Why is Africa so much absent in the minds of
Asians?

• The way Asians, especially people of Hong Kong
  (the group of Asians I know best), categorize the
  world
• Conceptual and philosophical dualism in the minds
  of Asians
• This dualism deprives Africa of any conceptual
  space in the Asian mind
• This dualism is called
• EAST means Chinese or Asian in general
• WEST refers to European, American or any white
  person

EAST - WEST DICHOTOMY
23
Examples of East-West Dichotomy in Hong Kong

• In search for restaurants
• often involves choice between a Chinese or a
  Western restaurant
• Politicians and many people in Hong Kong
• Like to see their city as a meeting point between
  East and West
• The REALITY Hong Kong is indeed a global
  business hub
• A positive move
• Government of Hong Kong has moved away from the
  maxim, Hong Kong where East Meets West to HONG
  KONG ASIAS WORLD CITY

24
Consequences of the East-West Mindset

• Non-Western and non-Asian countries are relegated
  to the background in their minds and daily
  practices
• When Africa is glanced at with a wink, it is
  often with borrowed lenses
• In Hong Kong,
• Africa is hardly mentioned on the main
  English-speaking TV channels
• No African city is mentioned in weather reports
  of the worlds major cities
• When African news is reported
• It is negative news
• It is to be curled from Western sources such as
  Agence Press, Associated Press and other news
  media which portray Africa as some backward,
  uncivilized part of the world

25
Consequences of the East-West Mindset

• The potentials of Africa as an economic force and
  as a business and cultural partner of Asia are
  lost
• Africa has no economic significance to Asians
• The reality
• growing presence of Chinese communities and
  businesses in Africa
• rich resources of gold, diamond, manganese and
  oil
• Asians must revise their world-view, moving away
  from a conceptualization of world affairs in
  terms of East and West

26
The Way ForwardHow to Improve Asian-African
Links
27
Improving the linksSTEP (1) A Global Approach

• Asians must accord Africa new conceptual spaces
  in their mindsets
• They must dispel and desist from constructing a
  bi-polar view of the world
• They must not see relations between them and the
  rest of the world as one of East and West

28
Improving the linksSTEP (2) Establishing
Economic and Cultural Links

• Tourism
• Africa is a potential tourist destination of the
  highest magnitude, with its wild life and
  uninhabited and unspoilt nature
• Trade, cultural, and educational exchanges
• Benefit a lot from a rediscovery of Africa in a
  new Asian mindset

29
Improving the linksSTEP (3) Africans in Asia
and elsewhere serve as catalysts

• There is an emerging trend of African communities
  in parts of Asia, especially in megacities like
  Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Kuala Lumpur
• These must play a pioneering role in drawing the
  attention of Asia to the potentials of Africa,
  i.e. to sell Africa to Asia and other parts of
  the world

30
Summary and Conclusions

• SUMMARY of the talk
• Africa-Asia relations
• Historical links (Archeological and Genetic
  studies)
• Cultural links (ancestor worship, totems)
• Linguistic links (Genetic and Typological
  relationships)
• Africans and Asians have not taken advantage of
  these links because of the way many Asians see
  the world
• To move forward, people in all parts of the world
  ought to discard a bi-polar view of the world and
  embrace a more universalist view in which Africa
  can gain new conceptual spaces
• Trade, tourism, and other economic, educational
  and cultural links can only flourish if Africans
  and Asians work towards greater cooperation

31
Ansted as a Universal University

• Africans and Asians can take advantage of new
  paradigms of education in our age of information
  technology
• Consolidating open and distance education
• Training their populations for manpower needs
• Ansted a Universal / Global university
• It transcends the West, the East, the North and
  the South
• Campuses in many parts of the world
• It represents the new paradigm of higher
  education that must be emulated by many other
  educational institutions in the world for a
  better understanding of our vast universe
• A better understanding of the world is a
  precondition for fostering peaceful relations
  among the different regions and peoples of the
  world

32
Further issues

• to know how Africans on the continent think of
  Asia and the nature of Asian communities in
  Africa
• to investigate the consequences of the inability
  of Africans and Asians to relate more to each
  other on the nature of comparative studies in
  either continent
• to investigate the impact of an increased
  African-Asian corporation on world bodies and
  global politics

33
References and Bibliographical/ Web-based sources

• The African-Asian Society. 2000. An NGO website
  managed from South Africa http//www.africanasians
  ociety.com/
• Bodomo, A. B. 1998. Publish or Perish Notes from
  Africa. In CERCular Newsletter of the
  Comparative Education Research Centre, University
  of Hong Kong, no 2, pp 6-7.
• Bodomo, A. B. 2000. AfricansInHongKong website
• http//communities.msn.com/AfricansInHongKong/hom
  e.htm
• Bodomo, A. B. 2001. Historical, Cultural, and
  Linguistic Links between Africa and Asia, ms,
  University of Hong Kong
• Brunson, James E. 1985. Black Jade The African
  Presence in the Ancient East and Other Essays.
  Introduction by Runoko Rashidi. DeKalb Kara.
• Brunson, James E. 1989. The Image of the Black in
  Eastern Art. Pt. 1, Black Roots in Most Ancient
  China (1766 B.C. - 950 B.C.) DeKalb Kara.
• Brunson, James E. 1989. Kamite Brotherhood
  African Origins in Early Asia. DeKalb Kara.
• Chai, Chen Kang. 1967. Taiwan Aborigines A
  Genetic Study of Tribal Variations. Cambridge
  Harvard University Press.
• Chang, Kwang-chih. 1968. The Archaeology of
  Ancient China. Rev. ed. New Haven Yale
  University Press.
• Chi, Li. 1967. The Formation of the Chinese
  People An Anthropological Inquiry. 1928 rpt.
  New York Russell Russell.
• Cooper, Kenneth J. 1999. "Within South Asia, A
  Little Touch of Africa." Washington Post Foreign
  Service, April 12,1999.
• Duyvendak, J.J.L. 1949. China's Discovery of
  Africa. London Probsthain.
• Filesi, Teobaldo. 1972. China and Africa in the
  Middle Ages. Translated by David L. Morison.
  London Frank Cass.

34
References and Bibliographical/ Web-based sources

• Griffith, Victoria. 2001. "Human Race Emerged
  from Africa." The London Financial Times, May
  10, 2001.
• Horton, Mark. 1987. "The Swahili Corridor."
  Scientific American (Sep 1987) 86-93.
• Hotz, Robert Lee. 1998. "Chinese Roots Lie in
  Africa, Research Says." Los Angeles Times, Sep
  29, 1998.
• Kochiyama, Yuri. 1998. A History of Linkage
  African and Asian, African American and Asian
  American. In Shades of Power Newsletter of the
  Institute for Multi-Racial Justice, Spring
  1998.http//www.hardboiled.org/2-3/linkage.html
• Luke, K. K. and Adams Bodomo. 1998. A semantic
  typology of serial verb constructions in Dagaare
  and Cantonese. ms, University of Hong Kong.
• Rashidi, Runoko and Ivan Van Sertima. (eds).
  1995. The African Presence in Early Asia. Rev.
  ed. New Brunswick Transaction Press.
• Rashidi, Ronoko. 1998. The Global African
  Community website http//www.cwo.com/lucumi/runo
  ko.html
• Rashidi, Runoko, 2001. The African Presence in
  Early China a Bibliography. Website
  http//www.cwo.com/lucumi/east.html
• The 1990 Trust. 2001. A website for the promotion
  of the interests of people of Asian, Caribbean
  and African origin living in Britain
  http//www.blink.org.uk/organ/1990t.htm
• Winters, Clyde-Ahmad. 1978. "Trade Between East
  Africa and Ancient China." Afrikan Mwalimu 4, No.
  3 (1978).
• Winters, Clyde-Ahmad. 1979. "The Relationship of
  Afrikans and Chinese in the Past." Afrikan
  Mwalimu (Jan 1979) 25-31.
• Winters, Clyde-Ahmad. 1984. "Blacks in Ancient
  China, Pt. 1 The Founders of Xia and Shang."
  Journal of Black Studies (1984) 8-13.