boss'shistory: African Diaspora

The African Diaspora refers to a time period where Africans were transported in the world to work as slaves against their will. The main time period is from 1500-1800 where the Atlantic Slave occurred. The Atlantic Slave trade was African slaves who were traded across the Atlantic Ocean into Europe and The Americas. The African slaves usually came from west or central Africa. The African Diaspora was the largest forced slave trade in volume where an estimated 4-12 million slaves were traded and taken.

These slaves were often kidnapped or caught in wars in Africa and sold to Europeans and other nations in the ports. The Europeans never entered Africa to capture these slaves for themselves in fear of diseases. Kings and businessmen became very rich as they employed and funded these kidnappings and raids and earned a very large income selling these slaves to rich countries. Criminals were sold to make sure they no longer committed crime or caused any more trouble in the area. People were taken from their homes and sold. These slaves were purchased from tribal leaders who often sell the caught Africans from another ethnic group.

About 10% of these slaves die during transport. These slaves were overworked, tortured and not even paid. They were abused and mistreated. These slaves often died from overwork or diseases that spread to them or appeared due to the low sanitation and hygiene available to them. African slaves who were shipped away never returned. These slaves worked on coffee, tobacco, sugar plantations, mines, construction, and were servants. The plantation economies of several countries were built on slave labor as seventy percent of slaves were used to produce sugar. This slave trade made sure that the human resources of Africa were gone.

Since land was cheap in Western countries and slavery helped many business bloom, people often looked to invest in land and build a business using these slaves who lead to a constant shortage of workers or in other words, slaves. The countries buying these African slaves benefited and their economies agree with this statement. These African slaves were often the backbone of many countries. Due to this event, Africa suffered with a huge rich poor divides.

People who were rich or looked to further their education or for a better job opportunity would emigrate abroad which leads to a brain drain in the country, stopping it from moving forward and developing. Therefore, Africa had a huge shortage in human resources and the Africans continued to suffer.

These African slaves were seen as inferior due to their skin color which was dark. Since they could not speak English or a Western language, they were looked down upon. They did not have a united front which leads to them being taken advantaged off.

Although the African Diaspora is a very tragic event that everyone would like to change, it leads to the spread of culture, religion, and ideas. It created permanent ties between Africa and North America. Africans in the Americas speak pigeon English which is still spoken in some parts of the United States today which shows us part of the African culture that survived injustice slavery. The integration of native culture with traditional European culture was shown with the African American mixing old and new styles when they cook, sing, carve, and tell stories. These traditions are still there today.