The globalAfrican diaspora is the worldwide collection of communities descended from Native Africans or people from Africa, predominantly in the Americas. The term most commonly refers to the descendants of the native West and Central Africans who were enslaved and shipped to the Americas via the Atlantic slave trade between the 16th and 19th centuries, with their largest populations in the United States, Brazil, and Haiti. However, the term can also be used to refer to non native African descendants from North Africa who immigrated to other parts of the world. Some scholars identify "four circulatory phases" of this migration out of Africa. The phrase African diaspora gradually entered common usage at the turn of the 21st century. The term diaspora originates from the Greek διασπορά which gained popularity in English in reference to the Jewish diaspora before being more broadly applied to other populations.
Black studies or Africana studies, is an interdisciplinary academic field that primarily focuses on the study of the history, culture, and politics of the peoples of the African diaspora and Africa. The field includes scholars of African-American, Afro-Canadian, Afro-Caribbean, Afro-Latino, Afro-European, Afro-Asian, African Australian, and African literature, history, politics, and religion as well as those from disciplines, such as sociology, anthropology, cultural studies, psychology, education, and many other disciplines within the humanities and social sciences. The field also uses various types of research methods.
An African American is a citizen or resident of the United States who has origins in any of the black populations of Africa. African American-related topics include:
Black History Month is an annual observance originating in the United States, where it is also known as African-American History Month. It has received official recognition from governments in the United States and Canada, and more recently has been observed in Ireland and the United Kingdom. It began as a way of remembering important people and events in the history of the African diaspora. It is celebrated in February in the United States and Canada, while in Ireland and the United Kingdom it is observed in October.
The Providence Black Repertory Company (Black Rep) was a 501c3 non profit arts organization based in Providence, Rhode Island, USA. It offered programming inspired by the cultural traditions of the African Diaspora in Theater, Education, and Public Programs. It operated from 1996 till 2009.
African American Museum in Cleveland, Ohio was founded in 1953 by Icabod Flewellen. The Museum is housed in a 100-year-old Carnegie Library building. The Museum works to educate young people about the positive contributions of blacks to the cultures of the world, and to eliminate the distorted portrayals and images of black people.
The National Center of Afro-American Artists (NCAAA) is a center in Roxbury, Boston, Massachusetts founded in 1968 by Elma Lewis to "preserv[e] and foster the cultural arts heritage of black peoples worldwide through arts teaching, and the presentation of professional works in all fine arts disciplines." Although the organization's name specifies African American artists, the organizational mandate includes all African diasporic art. The NCAAA is the largest independent black cultural arts institution in New England, United States. Its alumni have distinguished themselves in the performing arts internationally.
The Salsa Soul Sisters, today known as the African Ancestral Lesbians United for Societal Change, is the oldest black lesbian organization in the United States.Operating from 1974 to 1993, the Salsa Soul Sisters identified as lesbians, womanists and women of color, based in New York City Arguments within the Salsa Soul Sisters resulted in the disbanding of the Salsa Soul Sisters into two groups, Las Buenas Amigas made for Latinas, and African Ancestral Lesbians United for Societal Change made for African-diaspora lesbians.
The African-American upper class is a social class that consists of African-American individuals who have high disposable incomes and high net worth. The group includes highly paid white-collar professionals such as academics, engineers, lawyers, accountants, doctors, politicians, business executives, venture capitalists, CEOs, celebrities, entertainers, entrepreneurs and heirs. This social class, sometimes referred to as the black upper class, the black upper middle class or black elite, represents 12 percent of the total black population in the United States.
The Kidflix Film Fest of Bed-Stuy is a free annual film festival for children and their families presented by the Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts (MoCADA). With the exception of the 2020 season, it has been held every Friday night in August since 2000.
Founded in June 1968 as the Archbishop's Leadership Project ("ALP"), Achieving Leadership’s Purpose, Inc. is a Harlem, United States, based 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that provides leadership development training to high school youth of the African Diaspora, preparing them for leadership. It fosters a commitment to service as well as prepares young men and women for leadership roles of mid-level management or higher in the fields of education, government, domestic and international community affairs, social justice, and philanthropy.
Friends of the African Union (FAU) is an economic, social, humanitarian, charitable, educational and civil society organization founded to work for the benefit of the African Union and the African diaspora in their host countries.
Beninese American are Americans of Beninese descent. According to the census of 2000, in the United States there are only 605 Americans of Beninese origin. However, because since the first half of the eighteenth century to nineteenth many slaves were exported from Benin to the present United States, the number of African Americans with one or more Beninese ancestors could be much higher. The number of slaves from Bight of Benin exported to present United States exceeded 6,000 people, although this might consist not only in Benin, but also washes the shores of Ghana, Togo and Nigeria. It is also important to note that they were slaves from modern Benin, who exchanged voodoo practices with Francophone African descendants in Louisiana. Currently, there are Beninese communities in cities such as Chicago or Washington, D.C., and in other states as New York. As of 2021, there were over 500 Beninese immigrants in the town of Austin, Minnesota.
The history of African Americans in Ghana goes back to individuals such as American civil rights activist and writer W. E. B. Du Bois (1868–1963), who settled in Ghana in the last years of his life and is buried in the capital, Accra. Since then, other African Americans who are descended from slaves imported from areas within the present-day jurisdiction of Ghana and neighboring states have applied for permanent resident status in Ghana. As of 2015, the number of African-American residents has been estimated at around 3,000 people, a large portion of whom live in Accra.
Marta Moreno Vega is the founder of the Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute (CCCADI). She led El Museo del Barrio, is one of the founders of the Association of Hispanic Arts, and founded the Network of Centers of Color and the Roundtable of Institutions of Colors. Vega is also a visual artist and an Afro-Latina activist.
Marta Victoria Salgado Henríquez is a Chilean activist who focuses on promoting cultural preservation and civil rights protections for the African diaspora. She has founded several non-governmental organizations to promote women's and minority rights and served as a government advisor in these areas. Trained as a teacher and public administrator, she has written books and articles on the legacy of Africans in Chile.
Vera Mae Green was an American anthropologist, educator, and scholar, who made major contributions in the fields of Caribbean studies, interethnic studies, black family studies and the study of poverty and the poor. She was one of the first African-American Caribbeanists and the first to focus on Dutch Caribbean culture. She developed a "methodology for the study of African American Anthropology" that acknowledged the diversity among and within black families, communities and cultures. Her other areas of research included mestizos in Mexico and communities in India and Israel. "[C]ommitted to the betterment of the human condition", Green also focused her efforts toward international human rights.
Adama Delphine Fawundu is a Sierra Leonean-American multi-disciplinary photographer and visual artist promoting African culture and heritage, a co-founder and author of MFON: Women Photographers of the African Diaspora – a journal and book representing female photographers of African descent. Her works have been presented in numerous exhibitions worldwide. She uses multiple mediums to create works with themes about identity, utopia, decolonization, and stories of the past, present and future. She is a Professor of Visual Arts at Columbia University.
