Christopher Columbus is revered throughout North America and Europe. There are streets named after him and Americans have even gone as far as to give him a national holiday. In school, children learn that he “discovered” America. It’s not only a bold faced lie, it is also inaccurate. How do you “discover” a land that was already inhabited.
In John Henrik Clark’s book Christopher Columbus and the Afrikan Holocaust: Slavery and the Rise of European Capitalism, a thorough analysis is conducted about the negative effects that came about from Christopher Columbus.This book simply puts how Africans/Black people have our own holocaust and it isn’t something we hear too much about.
In this book, Clark will teach and inform the reader on secrets about Christopher Columbus and his voyage(s), how Africa was before and after the slave trade and the slave trade in North America. He spends time going over the three Golden Ages of Africa’s “grandeur” or prestige, which he does so to “simplify an overall approach to African History.” The reader will learn about Mansa Musa’s stop in Timbuktu, the brilliant commoner Imhotep, and that Africans had been in the New World long before Christopher Comlumbus. Near the end of the book, Clark brings forth a question that needs to be answered: “Why haven’t we memorialized our dead?”
This book offers the reader a much needed look into Christopher Columbus and slavery. The quotes used from other authors are great points of reference to works on similar topics if the reader would like to do more research.
