• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

The Black Culture Thread

L

Lebron

Member
The fuck is this shit? Damn American system sucks. We just had endless US History, shitty Texas History, and World History which should have been called Western Civilization. The only time we covered Africa was when we had to map it out for Geography, just name the countries and environments. No wonder we aren't even in the Top 50 in education. The Canadian School system sounds pretty nice.

Himuro said:
We couldn't have done that shit without the glorious French.
Click to expand...
Yeah, that, and the fact that we never faced their full force since they were occupied with more important skirmishes in Europe. I felt so lied to when I found out the truth.

Also, Himuro, since you are from Houston too, how many times did you visit the San Jacinto monument during grade school? I lost count myself :lol

The Alamo is fucking boring too
 
L

Lebron

Member
Himuro said:
China in particular is my love in terms of history. That, Greece, Rome, and Egypt. The history of that place is so fucking fascinating.
Click to expand...
It..it..It's like we were separated at birth. The fact that you are from Houston too is making me wonder :eek:
 
V

Vic

Please help me with my bad english
Lebron said:
Give me the Gold
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZfyrIPw3wY


I couldn't help myself
Click to expand...
smh

Himuro said:
I know about the Moors, that's something they didn't teach in school until University level.

But I know jack shit about Africa.
Click to expand...
I recommend to every people of the African diaspora to research about the continent. The only subjects discussed in the west about Africa are the slave trade, colonialism, wars, poverty and HIV. This is a very negatively distorted view of the continent and it's people. When we hear all those bad things, how the hell would anybody want to associate with Africa? This reaction is unsurprisingly a very dangerous and harmful behaviour. If you deny your ancestry, you're denying yourself. Researching about Africa did me much, much good. Solved many questions I've been asking myself for years and totally changed my perspective about the world.
 
C

crazy monkey

Banned
Lebron said:
Yeah, there's still deaths related to Dowry's, simple spousal abuse, women not giving birth to boys, etc. It really is sad. Let me try and track some down.

Back in 2008 for instance, India reported they had 8,000 dowry deaths. http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Dowry+death+toll+rises+as+women+shy+away+from+invoking+law-a0213755634

The National Crimes Bureau of India reports Dowry and bride-burning kill or maim about 25,000 innocent brides every year in India alone
http://india-facts.com/news/women-abuse/2008122150/bride-burning-dowry/

You can do a Google news search and see a lot of stories in regards to husbands maiming or killing their wives over stupid shit like that. Getting a "divorce" is a unheard of concept over there it seems, since women don't really have much rights. Seems as womens rights are upheld and increased, so does the divorce rate. Funny, huh? :p
Click to expand...

dowry problem is even reached some of the western countries.
 
L

lightless_shado

Banned
Himuro and Lebron, did you guys ever discuss the political aspect of the Mexican-American war? I just finished a paper about Henry David Thoreau, and one of his complaints about the government had to do with the Mexican-American war and how the president pretty much started the war without Congress' go ahead.

In the course of my research I learned that one of the main reasons for the war was to get land and spread slavery. I also learned that some of the original document keepers of the white house as well as a good deal of its builders were slaves. The irony nearly knocked me off my seat.
 
L

Lebron

Member
Being from Texas, they mostly focused on the Texas Revolution then the Civil War. They just skimmed over the Mexican-American war. I knew slavery and land were some of the root of the causes, but that's about it.


edit: I knew that slaves built the White House, no idea about document keepers though.
 
L

lightless_shado

Banned
Himuro said:
They glossed over American-Mexican War in my history books but to my memory it was some ol' bullshit like the Texas Revolution.



Wait, what? I thought they weren't allowed to read? Or was this decreed at a later time period?
Click to expand...

http://www.whitehousehistory.org/whha_classroom/classroom_4-8-history-afam.html

I was actually wrong, they weren't trusted with the documents at all times, but they did preserve them during a fire in 1814. So they didn't necessarily know how to read but they did preserve some very important documents.
 
L

Lebron

Member
The Alamo is pretty shitty and the Texas Revolution is ridiculously boring, though. I still remember them skimming over the Slave issue as being one of the causes in class :lol
 
L

lightless_shado

Banned
Vic said:
Need to share one of my recent discoveries: a great amount of my Haitian ancestry came from the West African country called Benin. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benin
Click to expand...

Ha you have Yoruba people down there. Yoruba people live in Nigeria too. They're the people that most people associate us with these days(they're responsible for most of the 419 scams)


Himuro said:
Santa Anna, bitches.


You know he got swag.
Click to expand...

Keep thinking he just read something he didn't like in the letter and he's about to slice someone with that saber :lol

edit: any Canadians on the West Coast with Digicable and satellite turn on HBO. Right now they're showing Brave new voices 2010 Poetry slam. Rosario Dawson and common are hosting
 
V

Vic

Please help me with my bad english
lightless_shado said:
Ha you have Yoruba people down there. Yoruba people live in Nigeria too. They're the people that most people associate us with these days(they're responsible for most of the 419 scams)
Click to expand...
From which group of people your family's from? Fulani? Hausa?
 
L

lightless_shado

Banned
Vic said:
From which group of people your family's from? Fulani? Hausa?
Click to expand...

We speak Hausa, but I believe we're Fulani. I didn't know our people lived in other countries too. Some Hausa speakers live in Libya too and some of the countries that are in tune with Arabic culture like Niger.

Edit poetry slam update: Talib Qweli cut his beard and I didn't recognize him :lol
 
I

Imm0rt4l

Member
lightless_shado said:
Ha you have Yoruba people down there. Yoruba people live in Nigeria too. They're the people that most people associate us with these days(they're responsible for most of the 419 scams)




Keep thinking he just read something he didn't like in the letter and he's about to slice someone with that saber :lol

edit: any Canadians on the West Coast with Digicable and satellite turn on HBO. Right now they're showing Brave new voices 2010 Poetry slam. Rosario Dawson and common are hosting
Click to expand...
I don't think it's fair to attribute 419 scams to Yoruba people since Yoruba make up 20 something percent of Nigeria(perhaps I'm wrong though and in that case you could enlighten me). Naturally it's going to be Yoruba people more than any other, but Nigerian crooks are crooks. There was a piece on CNN about Nigerian crooks in America, particularly Texas. They were all into things like forgery and what not, some pretty clever stuff, but the caught a couple of em' chris hansen style.
 
I

Imm0rt4l

Member
Himuro said:
I want to slip my meat into Rosario Dawson's kitty box.
Click to expand...
1255689450_rosario_dawson_tonguing.jpg.gif


I want her to sit on my face.....
 
L

lightless_shado

Banned
Imm0rt4l said:
I don't think it's fair to attribute 419 scams to Yoruba people since Yoruba make up 20 something percent of Nigeria(perhaps I'm wrong though and in that case you could enlighten me). Naturally it's going to be Yoruba people more than any other, but Nigerian crooks are crooks. There was a piece on CNN about Nigerian crooks in America, particularly Texas. They were all into things like forgery and what not, some pretty clever stuff, but the caught a couple of em' chris hansen style.
Click to expand...

I believe they make up most of the country yeah. No offense to any Yorubas out there. We northerners can be troublesome too because some are Islamic extremists. My family is an even bigger minority because we're Northerners who aren't muslims:lol

Poetry slam update: These kids are pretty intense.
 
L

Lebron

Member
Any of you own some African drums? My Uncle crafts and makes his own, he has a ton. I've got a few lying around that I use to play when I was younger.


They normally look similar to this, size and design varies though obviously.
vTkbO.jpg
 
L

lightless_shado

Banned
Lebron said:
Any of you own some African drums? My Uncle crafts and makes his own, he has a ton. I've got a few lying around that I use to play when I was younger.


They normally look similar to this, size and design varies though obviously.
vTkbO.jpg
Click to expand...

I posted some of the Nigerian stuff my mom brought back a few pages back, strangely enough we don't own any drums.

Edit wait nevermind, my bro actually bought a drum when he went to south africa for the world cup. Its a small drum that I put on my TV
 
I

Imm0rt4l

Member
Any bilinguals/polyglots in this thread? I don't speak any other language, but I can understand casual conversation when my parents speak. I peep this dude Laoshu's Youtube page and it really makes me want to learn another language. Dude is a language freak, speaks mandarin Fluently, speaks Japanese, some arabic and he's learning Yoruba and shares all sorts of resources. I'm sure I can get Spanish down, but I've even given some thought to French since it's spoken in so many parts of Africa, the other language that interests me is Japanese.

Himuro said:
Ban the dude who posted how Vanity looks now because every time I think of Vanity now I can only think of that image.
Click to expand...

selective memory ftw.
 
L

Lebron

Member
lightless_shado said:
I posted some of the Nigerian stuff my mom brought back a few pages back, strangely enough we don't own any drums.

Edit wait nevermind, my bro actually bought a drum when he went to south africa for the world cup. Its a small drum that I put on my TV
Click to expand...
Weren't kidding about a few pages :p

But yeah, they have a lot in their house that he made, not just drums. Wish I had some pictures. He made my dad(his brother) a badass walking cane that I eventually broke thus earning myself an epic beatdown. I always liked the different styles of art from Africa.
 
L

lightless_shado

Banned
Imm0rt4l said:
Any bilinguals/polyglots in this thread? I don't speak any other language, but I can understand casual conversation when my parents speak. I peep this dude Laoshu's Youtube page and it really makes me want to learn another language. Dude is a language freak, speaks mandarin Fluently, speaks Japanese, some arabic and he's learning Yoruba and shares all sorts of resources. I'm sure I can get Spanish down, but I've even given some thought to French since it's spoken in so many parts of Africa, the other language that interests me is Japanese.



selective memory ftw.
Click to expand...

I can understand my native language, but can't quite speak it. I got Rosetta stone's Japanese edition, but I never got around to using it. I want to learn French, Arabic, Spanish and Portugese.
 
I

Imm0rt4l

Member
lightless_shado said:
I can understand my native language, but can't quite speak it. I got Rosetta stone's Japanese edition, but I never got around to using it. I want to learn French, Arabic, Spanish and Portugese.
Click to expand...
that's the case with me. I find it annoying when old heads ridicule me for not being able to speak it when I was never taught, I had to pick it up myself as I was spoken to in English the majority of the time. I'm thinking of trying Rosetta stone when I get the money.
 
S

spindashing

Banned
Holy shit, I thought I was one of the only ones to not be able to speak my language but to understand it (Haitian Creole). Oh, how I was ostracized for not knowing how to speak Kreyol. :lol
 
L

Lebron

Member
Imm0rt4l said:
Any bilinguals/polyglots in this thread? I don't speak any other language, but I can understand casual conversation when my parents speak. I peep this dude Laoshu's Youtube page and it really makes me want to learn another language. Dude is a language freak, speaks mandarin Fluently, speaks Japanese, some arabic and he's learning Yoruba and shares all sorts of resources. I'm sure I can get Spanish down, but I've even given some thought to French since it's spoken in so many parts of Africa, the other language that interests me is Japanese.
Click to expand...
I can understand casual Hindi and Spanish, but can't read either for shit.
 
I

Imm0rt4l

Member
Lebron said:
I can understand casual Hindi and Spanish, but can't read either for shit.
Click to expand...
I knew a decent amount of spanish but never put it in practice and as a result I'm forgetting a lot of it. I have no excuse to not practice it since my best friend is Latino, and I'm from Las Vegas which has a large Hispanic population. How'd you pick up Hindi?
 
L

Lebron

Member
Imm0rt4l said:
I knew a decent amount of spanish but never put it in practice and as a result I'm forgetting a lot of it. I have no excuse to not practice it since my best friend is Latino, and I'm from Las Vegas which has a large Hispanic population. How'd you pick up Hindi?
Click to expand...
I live in Houston, so knowing casual Spanish just comes with the territory. As for Hindi, my first cousin married an Indian woman. They would watch us a lot when we were younger and she would teach us, or more to the point, yell at us in Hindi. She taught us some other less common Indian languages, but I don't really remember them much unless I hear it being spoken. It has come in handy when being around other Indian people(mostly females) who start conversations with each other thinking I can't follow along. So many "GOTCHA BITCH!" moments :lol
 
L

lightless_shado

Banned
Himuro said:
I took 3 years of Spanish in school. Don't remember shit.
Click to expand...

I'm surprised you would have forgotten arent there a ton of spanish speakers in texas?

and how do you guys say texas? do you say it like "Tecksis" or "Take-sis"
 
B

Bad_Boy

time to take my meds
I hate it when people touch my car radio/cd player. My AC/Heat too.

ASK ME if you want to change shit, I'm in the car too dammit.

Not really sure if thats a black thing or not, I just remember chris tucker saying something about it. :lol
 
V

Veidt

Blasphemer who refuses to accept bagged milk as his personal savior
lightless_shado said:
And I think that's a damn shame. We should be learning about all the different things that went on in the past and what is being done today at the high school and maybe even elementary level. If the internet didn't exist I would have a tougher time digging up this stuff and learning about my ancestors.

Another fun fact for any Muslims out there who didn't already know: One of Muhammad's close followers was an Ethiopian. He was the first Muezzin of the Islamic faith.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bilal_ibn_Rabah_al-Habashi

I strongly suggest you guys check out the BBC special about the kingdoms of Africa and some of the programs on Black Public media. I know we can have a lot to talk about because they have shows on America and Africa, shows that shed light on Black Culture

EDIT: Another Documentary you can watch is Lost civilizations: Africa a history denied.
Click to expand...
Did you know that Muhammad's adopted son was Abyssinian too? He never had a biological son.
Abyssinia was pretty big. Basically all of east-africa.
 
C

crazy monkey

Banned
Veidt said:
Did you know that Muhammad's adopted son was Abyssinian too? He never had a biological son.
Abyssinia was pretty big. Basically all of east-africa.
Click to expand...

Hazrat bilal story always makes me cry. It is very inspirational.
 
V

Veidt

Blasphemer who refuses to accept bagged milk as his personal savior
Imm0rt4l said:
Any bilinguals/polyglots in this thread? I don't speak any other language, but I can understand casual conversation when my parents speak. I peep this dude Laoshu's Youtube page and it really makes me want to learn another language. Dude is a language freak, speaks mandarin Fluently, speaks Japanese, some arabic and he's learning Yoruba and shares all sorts of resources. I'm sure I can get Spanish down, but I've even given some thought to French since it's spoken in so many parts of Africa, the other language that interests me is Japanese.



selective memory ftw.
Click to expand...
I speak 3 ( Somali, Dutch,English) languages fluently, not including Arabic( Formal arabic, which I can read and somewhat understand). Strengthening my German and learning Russian this year. I like languages. They're pretty awesome.

crazy monkey said:
Hazrat bilal story always makes me cry. It is very inspirational.
Click to expand...
Yeah, he's one of the sincerest people I've ever read about.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

I need cultural research help
35
911
finalflame replied
Black Myth Wukong on Steam Is Still at 10/10 Score Even After 200K User Reviews
2 3
127
9K
Spukc replied
  • Locked
Console wars not culture wars - its tedious
2
75
3K
semiconscious replied
Is The Song "Kung Fu Fighting" by Carl Douglas Racist/Cultural Appropriation?
2
85
9K
FunkMiller replied
LTTP: COD Black Ops 2 (PS3)
9
953
calistan replied
Top Bottom