Abandoment and Dismemberment

Abandoment and Dismemberment

Unfortunatly I did not enjoy this week’s Freshman Seminar class as I have previous weeks. This week’s lecture by Dr. Mario Beatty was not great to me at all, and to be honest I found myself drifting off here and there. I did not really understand the concept of the lecture or how they related to the previous lectures by the other speakers. Although I did not particularly like the lecture, or should I say the way Dr. Beatty approached teaching the lecture I did learn many key concepts.

In Thursday’s class we learned about dismemberment, an African term for the “middle passage” the beginning of the African Dispora. During dismemberment between 1492-1776 Africans were taken away from their homeland and forced into slavery. While brought to this New World, which Africans consisted of 83% of, Africans were forced to let go of some of their culture to adapt to their new surroundings. They desperately tried to hold on their culture but eventually lost some of what meant most to them. The European and African culture eventually combined with the European traditions holding more credit than that of the Africans.

Another key point that Dr. Beatty made was that Africans actually contributed a lot to the New World. Growing up in an African American Baptist church I have been very well educated on the advancements our ancestors but I felt this was very interesting. Too often Africans, or ancestors, are not credited towards the knowledge and science and technology they shared. Africans were able to use nature around them to cure the ill while carpenters and blacksmiths made fiddles and drums. While the Europeans were not educated in the field of agriculture the Africans were able to pass their knowledge of growing crops to the white people in order for them to produce and make profits. Africans have had a significant impact on our society today in more ways than one. Through our ancestors passing down their culture with younger generations they are the roots behind our medicine, music, agriculture, science, technology and much more.

The topic of Social Structure was also an interesting concept. Social Structure, as defined by the power point is the creation and modeling of family patterns, social and political culture, roles, traditions and rituals. There has always been the prominent role of a mother, minister or our ancestors from the very beginning. Although this role may vary in different religions and cultures every family or group in society for that matter has a social structure.

As stated before I believe that Dr. Mario Beatty could have been more engaging towards the audience but never the less I did learn a great deal. I hope next weeks lecture will be a little bit more interesting however just as informative, if not more as this one was.