History Commons^™

[Book Review] Female Monarchs And Merchant Queens In Africa By Nwando Achebe, Bright Alozie

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Book review excerpt:

Have you ever heard of small but mighty? Female Monarchs aptly fits that description. Traveling through time and across the African continent in a roughly chronological order, Nwando Achebe uses a slew of case studies to (re)frame and (re)tell the African-gendered narrative in solidly African-centered and gendered terms. Breaking from Western perspectives and relying on distinctly African-derived sources and methods, she weaves together the worlds and experiences of African females who occupied positions of power, authority, and influence. In Female Monarchs, the author not only restores voice and dignity to a people but also places elite …

Blacks In Oregon, Darrell Millner

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Periodically, newspaper or magazine articles appear proclaiming amazement at how white the population of Oregon and the City of Portland is compared to other parts of the country. It is not possible to argue with the figures—in 2017, there were an estimated 91,000 Blacks in Oregon, about 2 percent of the population—but it is a profound mistake to think that these stories and statistics tell the story of the state's racial past. In fact, issues of race and the status and circumstances of Black life in Oregon are central to understanding the history of the state, and perhaps its future …

Undressing For Redress: The Significance Of Nigerian Women’S Naked Protests, Bright Alozie

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Social media went abuzz on July 23, 2020, when hundreds of women – mostly naked – staged a protest in the northwestern state of Kaduna, Nigeria. Wailing and rolling on the ground, they protested at the killing of people in ongoing attacks on their community.

The protesters, mostly mothers, demanded justice and called on the government, security agencies and international community to intervene.

Such naked protests are not new in Nigeria. Traditionally, among the Igbo and Yoruba of Nigeria, stripping naked signifies a curse against those targeted. Sometimes, mothers strip naked to put a curse on their truant sons or …

How Igbo Women Used Petitions To Influence British Authorities During Colonial Rule, Bright Alozie

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Selected petitions and written correspondence between Igbo women and British officials between 1892 and 1960 shed fresh light on how women navigated male-dominated colonial institutions and structures of the time.

African women acted in varied and complex ways to the situations they found themselves in. This ranged from subtle to overt opposition, and sometimes violent resistance.

One response was through petition writing as women took to the pen to articulate their concerns. In my research, I examined several petitions written by Igbo women to British officials during the colonial period. I found that petition writing was part of the complex …

Space And Colonial Alterity: Interrogating British Residential Segregation In Nigeria, 1899-1919, Bright Alozie

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

The policy of segregation is undoubtedly a resented feature of colonial rule in Africa. However, discussions of the residential racial segregation policy of the British colonial administration in Africa invariably focus on “settler colonies” of South, Central, and East Africa. British colonial West Africa hardly features in such discussions since it is widely believed that these areas, which had no large-scale European settler populations, had no experience relevant to any meaningful discussion of multi-racial colonial relationships. Some studies even deny the existence of racially segregated areas in places other than the settler colonies. Despite evidence that residential racial segregation formed …

Public Morality And Ethno-Religious Chauvinism In Nigerian: Why History Matters, Bright Alozie, Ngozika Anthonia Obi-Ani

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Indubitably, history is a branch of knowledge which stretches way back to the beginning of time in human civilization and ipso facto, contributes to the shaping of a society’s past and future as well. As Marcus Mosiah Garvey (1887-1940) puts it, a people without the knowledge of the past History, origin and culture is like a tree without roots. Therefore, since development is a product of change, and the subject matter of history focuses on continuity and change, it follows that development can only be understood and appreciated within the context of history. This article examines the relevance of history …

Interpreting Women’S History Through Museum Relics: Lessons From The National Museum Of Unity Enugu, Bright Alozie, Chimee Nkemjika Ihediwa, Vitalis Nwashindu, John Uchne Ngonadi, John Kelechi Ugwuanyi

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Although women's history surrounds us, women's contributions to history are easily over looked and often unacknowledged. In fact, decades ago, there was what could be referred to as the invisibility of women in any serious study of history in spite of the fact that history itself has not and can never be solely a male preserve. It was not until recently towards the end of the 20th century that women's history began to be studied and documented. However, since the past fifty years, a number of roadblocks still prevent the historian from producing a coherent narrative on women's history as …

York Of The Corps Of Discovery, Darrell Millner

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Assesses the scholarship dealing with York, William Clark's slave, who was a member of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Two schools of writing developed regarding York. The "Sambo" school dominated his depiction for almost two centuries and publications at the turn of the 21st century still saw York in racist terms, as a slave grateful for his status. At the other extreme is the "superhero" school that describes York in heroic terms, rescuing Clark from peril, fluent in French, tall in height. Both schools are grounded in stereotypes and poor scholarship. The best source for establishing a historically accurate York …

Book Review Of, Obed Dickinson's War Against Sin In Salem, 1853-1867, Darrell Millner

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Reviews the book, "Obed Dickinson's War against Sin in Salem, 1853-1867" by Egbert S. Oliver

Cornerstones Of Community: Buildings Of Portland's African American History, Darrell Millner, Carl Abbott, Cathy Galbraith

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

The Bosco-Milligan Foundation is proud to present "Cornerstones of Community - The Buildings of Portland's African American History". This publication had its start in February, 1994 when we sponsored a seminar and walking tour at Mt. Olivet Baptist Church to celebrate Black History Month. In the preparation for that program, we knew we had barely scratched the surface in identifying and documenting the buildings associated with African American individuals, institutions, and events throughout Portland's history. The Bosco-Milligan Foundation made a commitment to continue that effort, based on community interest and a collective desire to attempt to fill in important "missing …

George Bush Of Tumwater: Founder Of The First American Colony On Puget Sound, Darrell Millner

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

A biography of pioneer George Washington Bush is presented. A free mulatto, information on Bush's childhood and birth date are uncertain. Believed to have been raised in Pennsylvania and educated under Quaker influence, Bush was literate and worked in the cattle business before moving to Oregon with his wife and children in 1844. Bush encountered various forms of racism, but was not deterred by pioneer life and by 1850 the family farm in the Tumwater, Washington area was thriving.

Book Review Of, The Invisible Empire In The West: Toward A New Historical Appraisal Of The Ku Klux Klan Of The 1920s, Darrell Millner

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Reviews the book "The Invisible Empire in the West: Toward a New Historical Appraisal of the Ku Klux Klan of the 1920s" by Shawn Lay

Book Review Of, As The Wind Rocks The Wagon, Darrell Millner

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Reviews the book, "As the Wind Rocks the Wagon" by Amy Warner

Restitution Of Cultural Material To Africa, E. Kofi Agorsah

Black Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

As African nations search for means to establish viable and authentic cultural identities, an increasing number of demands have been made on European Governments to return art objects, archives and antiquities taken during the colonial era. In a sense these demands come as attempts to turn back history, the history which denuded Africa of its culture in order to impress the fact of colonial subjugation.

For centuries, the movement of African art and antiquities has been an outward flow and as thousands of military and political conquerors, administrators, missionaries and adventurers took home souvenirs of their African experiences, and with …