African History and Consciousness

Good evening and welcome to for the people. Within the last 20 years there's been an explosion of data on the history of African people. An example of this is the recently announced dating of Harpoon Heds found in Zaiya Africa. These Harpoon Heds which represent the first human invention were made some 90,000 years ago. No one has done more to harness and organize this explosion in African history than our guest, Dr. Ivan Van Sardama. Dr. Van Sardama is the editor of the highly respected Journal of African Civilizations. Professor of African Studies at Rutgers University, Dr. Van Sardama is probably best known for his book. They came before Columbus, the African Presence in Ancient America. For this series with Dr. Van Sardama we invited Kenan High School's Girls Basketball Team and Coach, Ms. Van McLeod, and CA Johnson High School's Basketball Team and Coach, Mr. Ten Gates. Both schools are located in Columbia, South Carolina. But we begin with this question to Dr. Ivan Van Sardama. In 1984 at the Nile Valley Conference, you made a very important statement. One that has really stuck with me over the years. And you talked about history, time and consciousness. Would you share with us, would you go back over that again, please? Mr. Vallet would be very difficult to remember something I said more than 10 years ago. But what I meant, what I meant to say was that we are made by the past. We are made by how we conceive of the past, how we think of the past. Many of us have been crippled by a certain false history of the past. We've been crippled by cause we think of ourselves as people who achieved nothing. We did nothing great in the world who were merely slaves, et cetera, second class, citizens. That conception of the past has destroyed so many of us. So that it has become absolutely critical to remake a piece of the transform of people. It has necessary to transform their conception of the past. To make them look again at the past and understand what really happened. Because the black has done extraordinary remarkable things in the past. And it is only within recent times within this century in fact, that the black has had a chance to look at his own history, with his own eyes. And to rewrite it. That is why it is so important. People seem to think, oh, the past is there. The past is alive in us. We are millions of years old. The first man appeared on this planet at least four million years ago. The first modern man appeared about the hundred and fifty thousand years ago. So that we are not ten years or fifty years or fifty years. We are millions of years old. And it is important to understand, therefore when you are born, you may be only one day old. But your millions of years, the baby doesn't have to be told the baby is ignorant, but his body has wisdom. The baby can when the baby sucks its mother's milk, the baby can transform that milk into million things. Also, it is a nutrients that is because behind it lies millions of years that is taught the body, how to transform these things, how to keep a trillion cells alive. So that we are not one year or ten years or fifteen or fifty years. We are all that we remember. We are all that we remember. The tragedy is that we have been made to remember only the dark things, days of slavery. The tragedy is that we have been made to remember false things. Not just slavery, but the assumptions that we have been given that we have no history of consequence that we have done nothing major in the world. That is why these books, this is an encyclopedia as it were. And it is not just by me. I have been ahead of a movement which embraces people from all over the world, from Africa, from Europe, from America, from the Caribbean, etc. Trying to restructure that is trying to rewrite it. Trying to bring it closer to the truth so that we can see ourselves again. Because unless we see ourselves again, we cannot be new people. I want you to touch on this because I am getting back to that statement you made at the Mal Valley about what happened five thousand years ago. Oh yes. What happened five thousand years ago and what happened five minutes ago occupies the same room in consciousness? This is the life of our world and within this great room, life thousands of years so that the assumption that because something is dead or something happened years ago that it doesn't really matter. The streets we walk through are made by the dead. Most of the houses and buildings in our city are made by the dead. Most of the books that you read were written by the dead. So the dead are still alive in us. Our consciousness is where our real life is. It's the life that draws heavily upon what is passed, what is dead. So that we, we become small when we occupy only one small room in consciousness. We become huge. We become greater people when we occupy all these the whole mansion. Yes, the whole mansion. What can you tell us about the beginnings of mankind and woman kind? Well, we now know and we have extraordinary capacities now to find out what really happened in the world. We are rediscovering the universe, for example. We find, for example, we thought just a few years ago we thought that the universe was about 15 billion years old and therefore it's in its evening. We only discover the few weeks ago because of our new machines. We've discovered the universe is young. The universe is only 8 billion years old and that we are in the morning. We are not in the evening of time. We've discovered extraordinary things about the beginnings of man. We have the capacity to go back into the past. We've discovered, for example, that there were no people on the earth except Africans. After about 55,000 years ago, there are no other people. The African moves across various parts of the world. Sure, again, sure, here. There are no people on earth. There are no humans and aren't except Africans until about 55,000 years ago. All people are Africans. The African begins the cross-Africa. He crosses also, he moves to the east and he crosses into Asia. He moves up and into the north and he crosses the streets of the Baltic. In the streets did not exist or it was very narrow at that time. So that Africa was only about 20 miles from Europe. And the Africans cross-stofing in the Europe. There are no Europeans at that point in time or everyone is black. The reason why that is so is because man was born in hot human climate. That is where the human race first appeared. And the black skin was very important because it the melanin protected you from the vertical rays of the sun. The African moved up into Europe. At a certain stage, the ice in the Arctic moved forward. There was an ice stage, but the first ice stage did not affect the African because he was in Africa. The second ice stage is known as the woman's the Stadial II. Bit effect to Africa. Africaans were trapped near Russia, near Spain. Those Africans who were out bynoes because you have pink Africans, like in my country, in Africa too, in various parts of the world, sometimes a pink person is born to an African. That's an albino. Albino does not easily survive because in my country you can only live about 30 years if you're an albino. My country is hot to the most of Africa. I come from Guayana. I come from the creator. So it's about 100 degrees in the shade every day except for few days. So that it's important to have brown or black skin. Albino, which does not have the protective melanin would die. However, in the ice, this became an advantage. Those Africans who produced albinoes, which would be a problem in Africa. That pink African is the beginning of the European. Now the pink African also started on the block certain changes like ice produces a narrow nose. The parts of Africa you have Africans with narrow noses too because dry heat produces the narrow nose. So that man is one. There are no races really.