The Struggle For Mozambique By Nidoo Mondlane

Firstly, strong government support sponsored by leaders, such as Prince Henry, allowed Portugal to establish a navigation school to improve sailing skills. Then, Portugal began sending out voyages and establishing trading ports on the African coast, which expanded their trade routes and set the base for a trade route to Asia. The last step to discovering a direct trade route was sending our voyages to find or go past the tip of Africa, which would then lead them easily to Asia. Explorers, such as Dias and da Gama, discovered a route to the tip and beyond and then established a trade route and port to trade with Asia. The Portuguese discovered a direct trade route to Asia through many

Focusing on micro examples in order to explain a macro concept is the basis of what Donald Wright wanted to do with his book “The World and a Very Small Place in Africa”. In this text, Wright explores the concept of globalization in the small country of Niumi, a country in West Africa with the Gambia river flowing through it’s land. With it’s position in Northern West Africa, Niumi was a major part in the expansion of Europeans for a great part of world history. This expansion impacted the civilization of Niumi during the European Colonial era, and after the colonial era. Globalization, a major theme in our lectures, was a controlling theme and major concept Mr. Wright discusses throughout this book. His micro connection with Niumi & globalization can apply to other

“African Perspectives on Colonialism” is a book written by A. Adu Boahen. This book classifies the African responses to European colonialism in the 19th century. Boahen begins with the status of Africa in the last quarter of the 19th century and follows through the first years of African independence. This book deals with a twenty year time period between 1880 and 1900. Boahen talks about when Africa was seized and occupied by the Imperial Powers of Europe. Eurocentric points of view dominated the study of this era but Boahen gives us the African perspective. There are always two sides of the story and Boehen tells us the side less talked about informing us of what he knows.

Portugal was one of the, if not the only, technological and economic geniuses of the fifteenth century. As a result of their genius, Portugal was able to build one of the first caravels and sail around the coast of Africa in an attempt to find a sea route to India. As a result of this attempt,

European powers shamelessly exploited the people and resources of Africa in the 19th century. They often tried to justify their actions by using ideology, religion and moralism. After the end of the African slave trade, the development of steam power, and medical discovery, European nations started exploring not only the coast but also the unmapped interior of the continent. In this essay, I will explain the main driving forces behind African Imperialism. The Western europeans countries all competed for land and resources because of their self interest. They sought natural resources, and technology gave them the ability to exploit them. The philosophy of national pride however, was the primary reason. (Main document) (Doc C, D & B)

- Because Spain and Portugal were rivals, they were always trying to out beat each other. Since the Portuguese set up trading posts in Africa first, other European countries started and later on Spain set up posts too. Because the Portuguese didn’t like taking water routes, it took them longer to get to India through land to get spices and jewels. While this was happening, the Spanish people became unified and seeing that they were now stronger, planned to outstrip their rivals of the Indian

In July of 1956, Lumumba was sentenced to two years imprisonment for embezzling $2,520 from the post office for the Association des Evolués. After the Association returned the money, Lumumba’s sentence was reduced to 12 months, which began his career as a prisoner, leaving and re-entering the prison system for the next five years. During his 1956-1957 imprisonment, Lumumba wrote Congo, My Congo, 200 pages to “make a contribution towards the search for a solution for the present and future problems of the Congo” (Lumumba 7). Because this book was not published until after Lumumba’s death, it did not have an impact on the independence movement, but the views Lumumba wrote about certainly did.

From 1880 to 1900, Africa was split in many colonies by several different European countries. This was called the “Scramble for Africa. Because Africa didn’t have all of the technology that the Europeans possessed, the Europeans deemed them “uncivilized.” They took it upon themselves to colonize their land, disregarding their set tribes and customs. Although attempting to seem helpful, Europeans had their own selfish reasons for renovating Africa and its traditions.

European Imperialism in Africa had one real driving force behind it, racism. After 300 years of Europeans cashing in on Africa’s coasts, the explorers finally ventured inward, wreaking havoc on the continent’s environment and inhabitants, not giving a second thought to the people whose lives they ruined. This is made clear though the British’s new industry they built their and the economy formed atop it poorly affected the people they took advantage of and the moral obligations they had but did not follow.

The Europeans deeply encouraged the African peasants to grow cash crops, giving them the option to be employed by a European corporation. In an effort to enforce such cash crop principles, the European administrators possessed land ordinances that could introduce major fines or punishment into the peasant’s life. The colonial establishments were soon maintained all over the continent of Africa. Taxation was used to make a profit off the cash crop and it was also used as a method of sustaining the colonial administration. A council of European law-making elitists harnessed the ability to make laws and to supervise the colonies. Labor within the colonial economy was present at all levels with prescribed minimum wage, no matter the physical ability. The image maintained by the European administrators was an extremely censored image of what truly occurred in the African colonies. The realities of the harsh working conditions were maintained within the realms allowed by the law-making elitists.

There was a very small group of European administrators that governed all over Africa. Due the this fact, European ruler did not want African people to gain anymore knowledge that would allow them to rise up against foreign settlers. Sir Frederick Gordon Guggisberg, a colonial governor, was among a few who supported the development of education for African people, pointed out a few reasons why European settlers were against this idea. He restated critics’ thought on why African people should not be getting a better education, “The African is not capable of exercise those qualities that will be conferred on him by higher education.” This show that European settlers did not want African people to gain any knowledge, by refusing to believe that these African people are capable of applying all the knowledge if they were given a chance to learn. Furthermore, the denial of Education for African people was away to control them from rising up in social status with their newly acquired knowledge. European settlers hoped that the African people would remain as second class citizens which make them easy targets for exploitation as well as avoided the risk of educated African tried to invoke revolutions against the White rulers. European settlers were well aware that Africa is a vast land that was the origin of many great civilizations in human history. It is necessary for

This European interference in African historical storytelling destroyed parts of the uniquely constructed explanations that were no more wrong than the scientific explanations. In general, education destroys the truth of imaginative stories because it teaches which explanation is “correct” when both are equally legitimate. Part of the reason to imperialize, according to J. A. Hobson, author of Imperialism: A Study, is the ability to control the education of the colonized. To the ignorant public, education is a reason to imperialize for it is seen as generous of the mother country to enlighten primitive Africans. Once able to control the education of children, it is easier to impose ideas of racial inferiority, corrupted measures of value, and European morals. (Hobson 229) This education, however beneficial or otherwise, plausibly diminished inventive African explanations of nature, but also destroyed the need for griots. Once Europeans and eventually Africans could begin writing down their stories, the oral storytellers of the past were not needed. The essential and important part of Mali’s history and cultural became much less

The scramble for Africa represents the most thorough and systematic process of colonialism in world history. The European colonial powers managed to conquer and control almost the entire continent of Africa in a short, twenty-five year period from about 1875 to 1900. Some of the European states involved were already well-established global powers; the others were up and coming nations that desired to emulate and compete with the dominant imperial states. Various factors allowed for and contributed to the conquering of the whole of Africa by European states. The slow, but ever-growing European presence on the perimeter and the completion for dominance between the major European states acted as the platform for the inevitable quest for

This is a tale of horror and tragedy in the Congo, beginning with the brutal and exploitative regime of King Leopold II of Belgium, and culminating with the downfall of one of Africa’s most influential figures, Patrice Lumumba. The Congo is but one example of the greater phenomenon of European occupation of Africa. The legacy of this period gives rise to persistent problems in the Congo and throughout Africa. Understanding the roots and causes of this event, as focused through the lense of the Congo, is the subject of this paper.

Angola is one of the many African countries which suffered from the Portuguese colonisation in earlier years. The colonisation these African countries suffered from (specifically Angola), began in the mid eighteenth century (Santos, 2010), where European countries identified the many resources that these countries were rich in, and found an opportunity to possess them through migrating to these countries and taking over the governance in these countries, changing the system in a way that was best suitable for them.