Thread by @AfWrldNwPrj

A @AfWrldNwPrj thread: In 2016, this phenomena that has come to term itself ADOS was explored, without actual reference to the hashtag. The conditions that produced this very limited and detached frame of reference were already present for a while...

particularly in movements that were fomenting in and around the police violence. In an effort to use these forms of communication (twitter and other forms) in a way that moves the Africana world closer to a critical Pan African consciousness…

Here are the first 3 pages of that exploration (I will be revisiting and refining): Pan-Africanism in the United States: Identity and Belonging in Pan-Africanism in Modern Times Challenges, Concerns, and Constraints...

In order to truly understand the power of identity, one must first interrogate the strains of knowledge that inform the various inferences, interpretations, and/or beliefs that are used to construct ones’ sense of belonging. It must not be lost that these constructions are a...

direct product of the culture within which one lives, accepts, or that is forced upon them. The conditions that were produced from the processes of ancient/contemporary African migrations, imperialism/colonialism, and the international dimensions of human trafficking...

(aka slave trading through North African and Transatlantic routes) place the relationship between culture and resistance at the center of any exploration of the sociopolitical construction of identity and belonging. Being so, the role(s) that power often play in this...

relationship comes to fore. Once power is centered, we can begin to see that those who are able to control the means of production and distribution of culture are not only able to control their own identities but the identities of “Others.”

Taken together, one’s identity and sense of belonging, not only to the nation-state within which one lives, but to global society as a whole becomes a rich point of inquiry. As a consequence, the various interactions that are produced have a direct impact on ideas...

about citizenship, (human) rights, and individual/collective agency. In relation to the Africana world, the forms of resistance that challenge the dominant narratives which are produced and reproduced from the sociohistorical and cultural processes which attempt(ed) to strip...

the way African peoples live provide a nuanced frame of reference to understand the relationship between identity, belonging, resistance, and power. Moreover, the various perspectives that are produced have deep implications that are useful to understand oppression globally.

For our purposes, here, identity and resistance as it relates to the long arc of Pan African activity will be the point of inquiry. Focusing particularly on how African American critical consciousness formation challenges or impedes...

the development of an African collective consciousness, the central purpose of this exploration seeks to understand why Pan-African discourse is not a dominant expression in African American resistance today.

This is not to say a Pan-African discourse is not present at all, but when situated in the historical genealogy of African decedent experiences in the U.S., it is marginal at best. This becomes clear, particularly, when we examine dominant discourse(s) around African American...

resistance as it relates to constructing identities in order to belong. Before we move forward, it is important to clarify what is meant by discourse. As used here, discourse does not merely refer to a “way of describing external reality—a technique for labeling objects...

It acts to signify generalized, socially constructed categories of thought to which important social meanings and values are attributed.

In short, discourse(s) promote particular categories of thought and belief that guide our responses to the prevailing social environment. Accordingly, these discourses often lend structure to our experiences and to the meanings we give to our experiences.”

Therefore, discourse provides a set of values and beliefs—a framework—that inform our social responses and actions, although not always consciously.
In a speech delivered on October 12, 1968 at the Congress of Black Writers in Montreal, Canada...

titled African History in the Service of Black Liberation, #WalterRodney argued that “humanity is not a thing one proves. One asserts [it] perhaps, or one accepts [it]. One doesn't really set out to prove it.”

Efforts to assert ones’ humanity through the reclamation of an Africana identity through Pan-African activity is instructive for exploring 21st Pan Africanism. There are many books that have explored Pan Africanism.

This contribution will not attempt to cover this extensive catalogue. The primary concern, here, is with the lack of explicit Pan African discourse in the dominant narrative of African American resistance.

The specific argument posits that the relationship between African American identity and Pan Africanism, or the dominant perception of Pan Africanism itself is problematic because of the processes inherent in politics of belonging.

To that end, the hegemony of negative perceptions of Africa that move along race, class, and caste boundaries have created strict boundaries. These boundaries are inextricably linked to the social structures the produce various forms of consciousness.

Accordingly, the perception of belonging to a larger Africana world from an African American perspective becomes equally complex and problematic.

A problem that is ahistorical, as attempts to situate individual and group identity in a larger African historiography was an explicit project of Afro-descendant resistance in the U.S...

This fact has been meticulously documented in the works of scholars such as, but not limited to, #CedricRobinson, Ronald Walters, Joseph Harris, Wilson J. Moses, St. Clair Drake, and Elliot P. Skinner...

Taking this argument further, the tendency of African American negation of a Pan African discourse is built on the premise that as it is currently understood and practiced, Pan Africanism has been distorted by what I call “struggle exceptionalism”.

At its core, this notion is antithetical to the very essence of the idea and function of Pan Africanism. The idea of struggle exceptionalism is used here to suggest that the dominant tendency of African descendants in the U.S…

is to “place” their conditions of oppression in isolation to the conditions of African and African-descendant communities globally. In short, struggle exceptionalism suggest there is something “totally unique” about the conditions within which African Americans live.

While the practices of oppression produce “tailored” forms of marginalization and control, it must be not lost that the ability to find symmetry and continuities across these practices are important for developing a united front...

to resist the evolution and application of these conditions towards other vulnerable communities. As stated earlier, this “tactic” is a direct deviation from the political and historical genealogy of African American sociopolitical thought and cultural behavior.

Nevertheless, the dominant expression of African American struggle exceptionalist thought and behavior placed an already fragile sense of identity and belonging in flux. Specifically, it places African descendants in the U.S. on the fringes of “World Revolution." (See Malcolm)

The solidification of struggle exceptionalism can be historically identified within the explicit tactic to appeal to the “liberal” sensibilities of the white U.S. political elite class by the dominant black “leadership” in the 1950s and most of 60s.

As a result, struggle exceptionalism as a form of political thought & practice not only fractured the internationalist frame of reference necessary to the practice of Pan Africanism, but marginalized the efforts of what was considered the radical elements of the BlackFreedomMvnt.