Author: Bishop Dr Joe Aldred
Bishop Dr Joe Aldred, ecumenist, broadcaster, speaker and writer, outlines in detail Africa's history and its importance to our understanding of our world in a breadth of areas and also highlights the often forgotten and overlooked contribution of African theologians to our faith.
Bishop Dr Joe Aldred argues in this article that “the creation of Black History Month [February 1976 in the US and first celebrated in London October 1987], was a response to the racialised approach to history in the US and the rest of the western world, particularly since the 17th Century.”
He challenges and asks the questions: Surely the task now for educators, historians, the Church and the black diaspora etc is to right this wrong – to correct this gross imbalance, and not just for a month? Should this be ‘Black History’ since Africa and her recent enslaved descendants are so intertwined with the geopolitical, philosophical and economic history of the West? Time and again anthropology reveal that mankind’s origin are African. Should not therefore be an acknowledgement of our common ground as both victors and oppressors, rather than being crudely based on a stratification which constantly names and celebrates one side, and silences and defines the other as problems to be solved by the former.