Decline of African Heritage in America
When Africans were uprooted from their homes and their land and forcibly brought to the Americas
at first they retained many of their cultural traits and values; however, as time passed and they were assimilated into the Euro-American culture, those cultural traditions and values were lost. In hindsight, the ugly scar on the history of the founding of the United States
can't ever be healed, but the dignity of the history of the Africans who were brought here should be part of history, and be honored.
The first premise of this research is that languages and culturally identifying traits brought to the American shores by Africans stayed in play during slavery years -- but a great deal of that aspect of African culture is gone today. Secondly, historians have "lost" African heritage and culture through incomplete recounting of African and slave history.
Literature Review
In author Betty M. Kuyk's book she asserts that Africans brought with them "…their whole experience of living in their own African culture," and for many Africans arriving in America, the fact of "Americanization" did not totally "erase that experience" (Kuyk, 2003). At least not right away. While the African slaves cooperated (they had no choice) with their masters in a physical context, their "beliefs, values, customs and rituals that lay at the heart of each person's culture remained" -- for the period in which the Africans were in bondage and some period after that as well.
The given names of the Africans brought by force to America remained. And, Kuyk continues, as people from the Congo (spelled "Kongo" in the book) were moved inland from their landing spot on the coasts of South Carolina and Georgia, they were "intermingled with people bearing values from many other African cultures." As this movement continued, cultural...
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