Explain Why Africa Is Not A Homogeneous Continent

There are many misconceptions that have been universally accepted mentioned in Curtis Keim’s book Mistaking Africa, many of which are based on biased and incorrect accounts and are extremely offensive. Three important myths are that Africa is a land of cannibals, it is backward and very uncivilized, and that it is one country where everyone and the climate are the same all over. These will be explained, refuted, and the detriment to the people of Africa will be discussed.

Like many other continents in the world Africa has a lot of differences in itself for example there are differences in geography ,language, politics, religion and other things in life due to Africa’s lack of political government over an extended period of time.

Africa's people are divided not only by country, but also by religion, race, and class. The Sahara also serves as a vast barrier between the people of northern Africa and those of sub-Saharan Africa. South of the Sahara, Negroid peoples, which constitute about seventy percent of the population, predominate. Primarily concentrated in southern Africa, are some five million people of European descent. Europeans began to appear in Africa in the last half of the nineteenth century. Even though they were small in number they had a lasting impact on the African way of life. Their purpose in Africa was for raw materials for their industries, naval bases, new markets, investments and their ever present quest for new

Africa is the second largest continent in the world that was shaped 550 million years ago. Houses 800 million people that speak more than one-thousand languages and regional dialects. I was amazed that the native people of this region could speak many different languages. Africa is known for its vegetation, rainfall, mineral resources, and topography. The vast majority of its geography is grassland and woodlands that support the migration of animals and livestock. There must be warm weather and rainfall, which is heavily relied upon for vegetation. The largest river that flows upward, but has a span that runs from the top of Africa to the bottom is called the Nile River. Africa is mostly recognized for its enormous enriched deposits of mineral resources. Learning about the importance of Africa is truly exceptional. Whenever someone thinks about Africa the first thought is, this is where blacks come from. People don’t talk about how wealthy Africa is nor do they shed positive light on this region. This continent is thought to be poor and a developing country, but this the ideal place for humankind to emerge. Although, I was unaware of the mitochondrial DNA tree study I was mind-blown. This study shows

After the Europeans abruptly left Africa after they had imperialized them for years, Africa was left to develop a government and economy for themselves. The Europeans made no haste to establish borders that would agree with the Africans and their tribes. The borders for the countries were random, the European nations paid little to no attention to the cultural affairs of the African tribes. The terribly placed borders per newly formed African country along with the fact that they had to establish their own government once the Europeans left caused intense turmoil that still carries over to today.

Africa’s persistent poverty interrogates the continent’s past through institutions, government, demography, economics, colonialism, and the impact of the trading. The colonial era affected the variety of Africa’s historical development for it was quite the game changer since it put a halt to the continuous drain of scarce labor and paved the way for the expansion of land concentrated forms of agriculture, and engaging smallholders, estates, and communal farms. The establishment of the colonial rule over the African interior reinforced African commodity growth in export. The colonial control facilitated the construction induced significant inflows of European

Africa’s rich history and unique geographic features make this continent vastly different from the six others on this planet. Being the only continent with a majority of its landmass lying in the tropics, it’s inhabitants adapted to their situation accordingly. Unlike Europe, who adopted industry, Africans developed in small, isolated tribes due to the rugged geography, which led to problems with government and poverty when Europeans tried to implement their ways on native people. The extremely diverse geographic features of Africa, including its deserts, mountains, valleys and rainforests obstructed movement from place to place, making it much easier for people to live in smaller groups. These tribes all had their own unique languages and

Although some may think of Africa as being of a single climate and terrain description, in reality a wide variety of land types can be found throughout Africa. How does this wide variety of climates and physical terrains affect human life and settlement patterns on the African continent? Different terrains and climates allowed for different lifestyles for Africans in different regions. Those close to the sea were susceptible to invasion, but had the advantage of maritime trade. Those living more in land were isolated but protected by the diseases visitors would contract that did not affect the locals. Due to the fact that Africa is so massive, it has many

When learning about the history of the world, we can not ignore the fact that Africa plays a significant role. Many believe that Africa is the birth place of all races, and although that is true, the history and cultures of Africa and its natives are misunderstood among Americans. People do not take the time to expand their knowledge about Africa, yet they create their own perceptions of the continent based upon the image that America created. America creates this stereotype that Africa is inferior to the other continents by picturing them as savage like individuals who live an insufficient life. To truly understand Africa, you must understand these two important elements: the demographics of Africa and the true history of Africa

The county of South Africa is an economically flourishing country and probably the most advanced country on the continent of Africa. However the entire continent of Africa is probably the most undeveloped part of the world. Why is South Africa so different from the rest of its continent? Karen Politis Virk explains that it is because of South Africa’s developed economy and diverse population (Virk 40). South Africa has three main ethnic groups: African, Afrikaners, and the mixed race. The Afrikaners and mixed races have many roots to Europe and Asia giving the nation even more diversity and a culture melting pot. This set the nation apart from the rest of the African nation in which the majority of the residents are of native African

During pre-colonial Africa, Europeans were trying to colonize Africa and during the colonization, the Scramble for Africa, the Berlin Conference, and African resistance took place. During the decolonization of Africa, they split up and joined together to make the United Nations. (go back to D) African culture is one of a kind. “People across the continent are remarkably diverse by just about any measure: They speak a vast number of different languages, practice hundreds of distinct religions, live in a variety of types of

Hieroglyphs can be considered one of the oldest forms of literature; Egyptians developed this technology at around 4,000 BC. Reasons for creating hieroglyphs are art, and communication (Mattessich). Parallel to that, farming was another type of technology that was being developed along the north of Africa and the river Nile, by the upcoming kingdom of Africa. Nubia (modern day Sudan) also gave rise to another kind of technology in term of agriculture, the cattle herding, their location made it easy to feed animals because it was tropical and had lots of vegetation. Hunter gathers were living since the beginnings of times, so this is not a new developed technology but it is significant to say that the rest of Africa was occupied by them (Britton).

The filmmakers intend that the viewers see the tremendous diversity existing within the confined geographical areas that we classify as continents. Singularities and similitudes coexist in the same space. In the African continent the click language has a long history of survival and migration. On other parts of Africa, Arabic is a language that is spoken in countries/areas that may not have a border in common. Oceania, has three main family languages. Asia has a vast number of people who speaks Chinese, and similar languages like Mandarin, but there are other languages spoken in the area that do not have much in common with Chinese. Europe and the American Continent (the whole three parts) have as the other continents many languages/dialects

Africa has a massive population of 1.2 billion people growing very quickly and will grow 3 billion in 80 years this will have an impact on Africa's resources and the migration stream from Africa to Europe will impact European countries in good and bad ways. Africa has a large population but Europe has a small population so there are many push and pull factors that will push the population away from Africa into Europe. As well as the resources and jobs in Africa are becoming deficient, Africa will not have enough resources to survive. Europe has a high standard of living and is more developed but Africa is undeveloped and has a low standard of living.

It can be refferd to as a period whereby European powers colonised, invaded, occupied and annexed African territories in a very rapid and unprecedented manner, even though there was little interest in Africa up to the 1870's. In fact, up to 1880 Europeans ruled merely 10% of the African continent. Yet within 30 years, by 1914, European nations will have claimed all of Africa except Liberia (a small territory of freed slaves from the United States) and Abyssinia (Ethiopia), which had successfully held off Italian invaders at the battle of Adowa in 1896. The partitioning of Africa was seen as a means of easing tensions between European states which was high in the late 19th century and avoid a full blown out war in Europe