African American studies: history, culture, and society

¶ … cultures across time and geographical locations is the universality of symbols and rites, and the construction of social hierarchies. Furthermore, it was interesting to see how certain cultures, like the Luba, governed themselves and how religious, and sometimes supernatural, attributes are often associated with kings. For instance, Lubu kings worked to hide their human qualities, which appears to insinuate that these kings wanted their followers to revere them as gods, or to at least have power similar to a god or power derived from god. This is an interesting concept considering that in many monarchies around the world, kings have claimed that they are second-in-command, only to God. I am also highly impressed by the complex structure of the government and the role assigned to specific individuals. I think it would be interesting to analyze how different cultures (European vs. African) influenced each other or if the formation of a similar hierarchal construct was purely coincidental. I also found it interesting that among the Loango, cloth was used to determine an individual's social ranking.

On the other hand, it is also interesting to see how other cultures or clans, such as Gbaya functioned. I found it interesting to see how the clan focused on circles and how citizen loyalty to a kingdom depended on its ability to protect those people that inhabited it. It is interesting to see how flexible the Gbaya's loyalty was and how they migrated from one clan to another based on the protection that could be offered by another clan.

Another thing I found interesting is the relationship that certain clans, such as Mbuti, had with nature. It appears as though many of the beliefs held by certain clans are mirrored to an extent in other clans/tribes around the world with whom many of these Central African tribes never had any contact.

I also find it interesting how different Central African cultures adopted and used slavery for their own means and how the slave trade transformed once these slave-holding Central Africans began to conduct business with Europeans who were engaged in international slave trading activities.