Some days ago, there was a lively discussion thread on Afrocentrism at the BBC.
A BBC Online article is supposedly about teaching history of the Empire in schools:
‘School history lessons should focus more on the British Empire to explain modern UK life, a think tank says.
MPs and historians were among those who contributed to the Fabian Society’s review on “Britishness”.’
Bear with me here – what photo would you think might be posted? Queen Victoria? A grand durbar? How about an entirely neutral picture of shackled black slaves being whipped (admittedly by another black man).
The picture caption: “Schools are being urged to study the history of the British Empire”
That’s the British Empire for you folks (and the “key to UK life”) – slavery.
The “See also’ sidebar has:
I note the jpg alpha name is “slaves” – and presume that this is the keyword in the BBC image library used to search. The same photo appears in the “black history” article.* Talk about patronising – every time black history is discussed at BBC Online, it would seem the editor types “slaves” into the image library search box.
*The caption there is “Lessons on Afro-Caribbean history often focus on slavery” – which unintentionally states the PC worldview – black = slavery.
Oh to see a BBC programme on Arab involvement in African slavery. As far as I have been able to establish more slaves were taken from East Africa by Arabs than from West Africa by Europeans, and a higher percentage died en-route to their destinations. And of course too, as Denis Healey notoriously discovered, slavery in Saudia Arabia persisted well into the nineteen sixties. I am not aware that Arabs have ever apologised for their slaving actions. Would make a good item for Today, yes?
There’s certainly slavery in the Islamic world right now – Sudan for one. Of course, the BBC will never touch this – if nothing else, they’d have to explain why the evil US has plenty of citizens descended from slaves while the Islamic world has very few. Hard to put a positive face on that.
Incidentally, my personal count is one program about the Barbary Pirates in the last twenty years. I guess some history is more important than others.
Bernard,
Absolutely.
http://www.allaboutzanzibar.com/indepth/history/id-01-01-34-slaves.htm
They could also give us some EU history – the Belgians in the Congo.
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=leopold+force+publique&meta=
Now, that is what I call Imperialist!
OT/
“The UK rebate will remain and we will not negotiate it away. Period” Tony Blair, House of Commons, June 8th 2005
“In every crisis there is an opportunity. There is one here for Europe now. If we have the courage to take it” Tony Blair, European Parliament, June 23rd 2005
The Arab Slave Trade is the longest yet least discussed of the two major trades. It begins in the 7th century AD as Arabs and other Asians poured into Northern and Eastern Africa under the banner of Islam, either converting or subjugating the African societies they came upon.
The Arab slavers raided at nightfall, during the dinner time. Africans who resisted or tried to run were shot and killed.
One of the great achievements of the British in relation to slavery was to start the road to END IT.
Unfortunately for the BBC, not only is this an achievement of the British, but it is one of the great achievements of that other great evil, British CHRISTIANITY (ie Wilberforce etc). Shock horror. Christianity only does bad things like, er, Crusades and the Inquisition, pedophile priests and stuff, so we can’t run that line on the BBC!
Slavery (of Blacks by Arabs) persists not just in Sudan, but across much of the Sahel, certainly in Mauritania and Niger too. For one reason or another (colonial history, essentially), this is much more widely known about, and a source of protest/concern, in France than it is in the UK. “SOS Esclaves”, for example.
Like I said before.
Former Colonies which embraced “Anglo-Saxon” values have prospered (anglosphere).
Former colonies which went coerced-collectivist have failed miserably(lot’s of Africa).
Former colonies which are rediscovering capitalism are prospering again (India).
Former colonies which are going more collectivist are failing (Zimbabwe + SA).
One last point: Socialism is slavery. Together we can abolish state slavery like we did with individual slavery.
Benjamin Zephaniah – “I have been fighting against the legacy of empire all my life… Anybody who has thought of giving me this OBE can’t have read my work.”
I know this very pedantic but two obvious Imperial legacies pertaining to directly to Mr Zephaniah are 1)Writing (and speaking) English and 2)Living in Britain. If he wants strike back against the Empire, perhaps he should consider correcting those inconsistencies forthwith.
There were actually three Arab slave trades in Africa: One from East Africa to North/West Africa, one from East Africa to Arabia, and one from East Africa to India. The Arab slave trade was only put to rest under Western “imperialist” pressure, and some of the Arab states (like Saudi Arabia) did not officially abolish it until the mid-1960s. Unofficially the slave trade still continues in some of the Arab world.
It should be noted that Arabs and Ottoman Turks did not discriminate in color for the taking of their slaves: they also took a huge number of Slavic and Hindu slaves (and a considerable amount of Western Europeans during the Barbary raids).
I was going to post about this article, but you got there first. Given that the heyday of the British empire is considered to run from the mid-1800s to 1914, and the fact that slavery was abolished in Great Britain in 1807, why would an image of slavery be appropriate for an article about the history of the British Empire? Surely the BBC could have found approx 1,000 more appropriate ones? Of course, the key here is the word ‘appropriate’. For the BBC, misrepresenting the Empire in this way is entirely appropriate, indeed necessary.
If you want an incident to illustrate the Weltanschauung of the BBC, this could serve as it. Contrast this with their coyness in discussing the slave trade which flourishes NOW in Africa.
Slavery existed in Ethiopia, the only African country not to be colonised in the 19th century, until 1936, when it was ended by the Italians. Now Mussolini’s fascists weren’t very pleasant, but there have been much greater evils which the metropolitan elites choose to ignore.
i once read somewhere that arab slave traders took about one tenth the number of africans into slavery that europeans did. can anyone direct me to a place where i can be enlightened on this point?
They took about the same number. The Arab slave trade was just spread out over a longer amount of time. The Arabs also didn’t keep precise records so no one really knows.
Read “The Arab Slave trade” by Murray Gordon or “Islam’s Black Slaves” By Ronald Segal.
Its a mistake to separate arab slavery from european. In many cases it was arabs selling slaves to european traders.
It’s a bigger mistake to ignore/deprecate the Arab involvement in the slave trade.