A Practice Guide For Working With African American Families In The: Fill & Download for Free

**Deferring to my mother's request, I've made this response anonymous.**I'm not sure if I quite qualify, but I can possibly answer this.I grew up from 1986 - 2003 (when I went away to college) as a rich black kid in Baltimore, Maryland. That's rich in a relative sense: my parents' combined annual income when I was growing up was probably around $250k, which places them in the top 5% of household earners in the United States. Definitely a comfortable upbringing, but not by any means a 'super rich kid' or 1% trust fund baby.My dad worked in high-level civic service for the Mayor of the city, later taking a appointment position in the Department of the Interior in Washington, D.C. -- after which point he commuted from Baltimore -- and then as a vice president in a Washington, D.C. university. My mom worked occasionally/part-time as a real estate broker and then later as a consultant for fundraising/development. I have two older brothers -- one became an attorney, and the other became a real estate broker.Both my parents also did campaign consulting for various political candidates (mostly state-level, but they were early contributors to Clinton's first campaign as well, and some of my favorite young memories were getting phone calls from Little Rock), so growing up, I spent a lot of time at very fancy functions. I can recall pulling down a table cloth for hide and seek at more than one black tie gala, and playing you-can't-catch-me in the press room at the White House.I grew up in Ashburton, an affluent Baltimore neighborhood that had been home to generations of wealthy, politically-connected Blacks since the 1950's.My neighborhood friends were the kids of judges, prominent lawyers, senators, and black business owners. We all went to various private schools around the city, drove similar cars, went to the same parties at the homes of other rich black kids (and many rich white kids), joined the same social clubs (Jack&Jill for the kids, the Forest Park Golf Club for mom&dad), got in trouble for the same silly kid stuff (missing curfew, kissing a boy in the street where other people might see you, secretly getting a piercing/tattoo), had our cotillions/debuts at the same time (although this was a declining practice when I was growing up), vacationed in the same neighborhoods of Martha's Vineyard, and applied to the same kinds of colleges (great poli-sci programs, legacy universities, and one or two top HBCUs). I suppose, if pressed for a pop-culture example, growing up was like some sort of The Cosby Show-meets-Gossip Girl experience.And here's something that (now) stands out to me about my upbringing (especially when I watch mainstream black films) -- many of the things that other black kids are congratulated for went unremarked in our community. You have a 4.0 GPA? Of course you do. Got early admission into Yale? Of course you did. As I've gotten older, and had more experience with black kids who grew up in other economic strata, I've realized how valuable it was to have these things go un-celebrated; it made clear the fact that we were expected to win.Our parents were also educated enough, aware enough, wealthy enough, connected enough, (and in some cases, paranoid enough) to give us advantages that countered or sheltered us from many (but definitely not ALL) of the challenging experiences of racial discrimination that other black kids faced. Some of that was intentional, and some of it was just a by-product of being in our socieconomic strata/community.I think this is one way in which my experience differs from some other RBKs -- my sense of community. I spent a lot of time around a lot of other wealthy black leaders and families, something that I believe was essential in positively shaping my self-esteem and permanently linking my understanding of black identity to wealth and success. We were our own little community, our own private culture in a way that paralleled the experiences of the rich Jewish, Greek, Korean, Russian (and other ethnic minority) kids growing up in little ethnic-economic squares of the city's cultural patchwork at the time.In fact, I hadn't reflected on it until I read Chloe's answer for this same question, but it's quite a bit like being a part of an immigrant ethnic minority community. And as I go through life, I'm sort of always subconsciously seeking out people like me. It's like being part of some secret tribe or club whose handshakes are how you're dressed, how you speak, where you grew up, what organizations you're a part of, and something particular to the way you carry yourself. Sometimes I'm in a mixed crowd, and I see another black person with some little 'tell' -- maybe a Black Dog sweatshirt -- and inside I squee and go yay! my people are here!For college, I went to an HBCU, and was exposed to a wider array of blacks than I had been before -- there were kids from embattled urban centers, from the rural South, from military families, etc., and the distinctions between us all became clearer and clearer. I made all kinds of friends, but for deep emotional bonds, tended to gravitate toward those who'd had upbringings like mine. We shared a sense of privilege and of responsibility that was/is difficult to convey to kids who grew up differently.tl;dr -- You get the fantastic cultural advantages (strong sense of social responsibility, tight community, moderately conservative values about behavior) of Black American culture. You also get the fantastic social advantages of wealth (access to better schools/education, pipelines into high-paying careers, support/nepotism from parents & their friends). Responsibility for others (esp. poor blacks) is high, and rules of social behavior can be strict.Anyway, that's a little bit about it, but if you'd like a much more thorough/better-written look at life from that angle, I'd suggest the following resources:Books:1. The BAP Handbook: The Official Guide to the Black American Princess by Kalyn Johnson2. Our Kind of People: Inside America's Black Upper Class by Lawrence Graham3. Finding Martha's Vineyard: African Americans at Home on an Island by Jill Nelson4. Howard University: The First Hundred Years 1867-1967 by Rayford W. Logan5. The Hidden Cost of Being African American: How Wealth Perpetuates Inequality by Thomas M. Shapiro6. Style and Grace: African Americans at Home by Michael Henry Adams7. The Emperor of Ocean Park by Stephen L. Carter8. The Elite of Our People: Joseph Willson's Sketches of Black Upper-Class Life in Antebellum Philadelphia, by Julie Winch9. The Souls of Black Folk by W. E. B. Du Bois10. Aristocrats of Color: The Black Elite, 1880-1920 (Black Community Studies)by Willard B. Gatewood Jr11. Woman of Color, Daughter of Privilege: Amanda America Dickson, 1849-1893 by Kent Anderson Leslie12. The Senator and the Socialite: The True Story of America's First Black Dynasty by Lawrence Otis Graham13. The Sweet Hell Inside: The Rise of an Elite Black Family in the Segregated South by Edward Ball, Edwina Harleston Whitlock14. How to Succeed in Business Without Being White: Straight Talk on Making It in America by Earl G. GravesMovies/Films:1. Something New ~ Starring Sanaa Lathan & Simon Baker2. Medicine for Melancholy ~ Starring Tracey N. Heggins3. A Place of Our Own ~ Starring Cecelia Antionette, Henry Louis Gates, Lani Guinier4. Jumping the Broom ~ Starring Angela Bassett, Paula Patton, Laz Alonso5. Peeples ~ Starring Kerry Washington & Craig Robinson6. This Christmas ~ Starring Regina King, Columbus Short, Nia Long

Nope [by the way, colonization came later after Africans became very weakened by the slave trade]… Black Africans did indeed sell their souls to the devils and they were the devils themselves.The truth is: black African chiefs (kings, generals, etc) sold their own black African enemies initially to muslim-Arab slave traders (during the trans-Saharan slave trade) and then later to European slave traders (during the trans-Atlantic slave trade). What did they get in return? Weakened African enemies and trade goods (guns/arms, crafts, etc) from muslim-Arabs and Europeans. This is the truth. No muslim-Arab or European placed an African chief to hunt for other Africans to be sold to them the muslim-Arab/European slavers. Just no.The African slave traders were as evil (or as guilty) as the muslim-Arab/European slave traders. In Africa, the Black African slave traders were the most evil, more evil than the muslim-Arab/European slave traders.Slave trade along the Senegal river, Kingdom of Cayor. [Do you see who has the whip whipping the others? Do you see the soldiers too? They are all black Africans, paid by the local black African chief to hunt for other Africans to be sold as slaves to either muslim-Arabs or Europeans]Black Africans knew of the harsh slavery that awaited slaves in the New World. Many elite Africans visited Europe on slave ships following the prevailing winds through the New World. One example of this occurred when Antonio Manuel, Kongo’s ambassador to the Vatican, went to Europe in 1604, stopping first in Bahia, Brazil, where he arranged to free a countryman who had been wrongfully enslaved. African monarchs also sent their children along these same slave routes to be educated in Europe, and thousands of former slaves eventually returned to settle Liberia and Sierra LeoneSlavery has historically been widespread in Africa way before both muslim-Arab and European slave trades, and still continues today in some countries. Systems of servitude and slavery were common in parts of Africa, as they were in much of the ancient world. In many African societies where slavery was prevalent, the enslaved people were not treated as chattel slaves and were given certain rights in a system similar to indentured servitude elsewhere in the world. When the Arab slave trade and Atlantic slave trade began, many of the local slave systems began supplying captives for slave markets outside Africa. Slavery in historical Africa was practiced in many different forms: Debt slavery, enslavement of war captives, military slavery, and criminal slavery were all practiced in various parts of Africa. Slavery for domestic and court purposes was widespread throughout Africa. Plantation slavery also occurred primarily on the eastern coast of Africa and in parts of West Africa. The importance of domestic plantation slavery increased during the 19th century due to the abolition of the Atlantic slave trade. Many African states dependent on the international slave trade reoriented their economies towards legitimate commerce worked by slave labor.[1]African Slave Owners [2]Many societies in Africa with kings and hierarchical forms of government traditionally kept slaves. But these were mostly used for domestic purposes. They were an indication of power and wealth and not used for commercial gain. However, with the appearance of Europeans desperate to buy slaves for use in the Americas, the character of African slave ownership changed.GROWING RICH WITH SLAVERYROYALTYIn the early 18th century, Kings of Dahomey (known today as Benin) became big players in the slave trade, waging a bitter war on their neighbours, resulting in the capture of 10,000, including another important slave trader, the King of Whydah. King Tegbesu made £250,000 a year selling people into slavery in 1750. King Gezo said in the 1840's he would do anything the British wanted him to do apart from giving up slave trade:"The slave trade is the ruling principle of my people. It is the source and the glory of their wealth…the mother lulls the child to sleep with notes of triumph over an enemy reduced to slavery…"LIVING WITNESSSome of the descendants of African traders are alive today. Mohammed Ibrahim Babatu is the great great grandson of Baba-ato (also known as Babatu), the famous Muslim slave trader, who was born in Niger and conducted his slave raids in Northern Ghana in the 1880's. Mohammed Ibrahim Babatu, the deputy head teacher of a Junior secondary school in Yendi, lives in Ghana."In our curriculum, we teach a little part of the history of our land. Because some of the children ask questions about the past history of our grandfather Babatu.Babatu, and others, didn't see anything wrong with slavery. They didn't have any knowledge of what the people were used for. They were only aware that some of the slaves would serve others of the royal families within the sub-region.He has done a great deal of harm to the people of Africa. I have studied history and I know the effect of slavery.I have seen that the slave raids did harm to Africa, but some members of our family feel he was ignorant…we feel that what he did was fine, because it has given the family a great fame within the Dagomba society.He gave some of the slaves to the Dagombas and then he sent the rest of the slaves to the Salaga market. He didn't know they were going to plantations…he was ignorant…"Listen to Mohammed Ibrahim Babatu, great great grandson of the famous Muslim slave trader Baba-ato SONGHAYThe young Moroccan traveler and commentator, Leo Africanus, was amazed at the wealth and quantity of slaves to be found in Gao, the capital of Songhay, which he visited in 1510 and 1513 when the empire was at the height of its power under Askiya Mohammed."...here there is a certain place where slaves are sold, especially on those days when the merchants are assembled. And a young slave of fifteen years of age is sold for six ducats, and children are also sold. The king of this region has a certain private palace where he maintains a great number of concubines and slaves."SWAHILIThe ruling class of coastal Swahili society - Sultans, government officials and wealthy merchants - used non-Muslim slaves as domestic servants and to work on farms and estates. The craftsmen, artisans and clerks tended to by Muslim and freed men. But the divisions between the different classes were often very flexible. The powerful slave and ivory trader Tippu Tip was the grandson of a slave.Listen to historian Abdul Sheriff introducing Tippu Tip's autobiography followed by a BBC dramatisation of the slave trader's own writingThe Omani Sultan, Seyyid Said, became immensely rich when he started up cloves plantations in 1820 with slave labour - so successful was he that he moved the Omani capital to Zanzibar in 1840.Find out more about the SwahilisPUNISHED FOR KEEPING SLAVESThe Asanti (the capital, Kumasi, is in modern Ghana) had a long tradition of domestic slavery. But gold was the main commodity for selling. With the arrival of Europeans the slaves displaced gold as the main commodity for trade. As late as 1895 the British Colonial Office was not concerned by this."It would be a mistake to frighten the King of Kumasi and the Ashantis generally on the question of slavery. We cannot sweep away their customs and institutions all at once. Domestic slavery should not be troubled at present."British attitudes changed when the King of the Asanti (the Asantehene) resisted British colonial authority. The suppression of the slave trade became a justification for the extension of European power. With the humiliation and exile of King Prempeh I in 1896, the Asanti were placed under the authority of the Governor of the Gold Coast and forced therefore to conform to British law and abolish the slave trade.SLAVERY DECREED BY THE GODSIn 1807, Britain declared all slave trading illegal. The king of Bonny (in what is now the Nigerian delta) was dismayed at the conclusion of the practice."We think this trade must go on. That is the verdict of our oracle and the priests. They say that your country, however great, can never stop a trade ordained by God himself."See more from Shayn McCallum's answer to I’ve heard “history buffs” say that slaves were purchased from blacks in Africa, but I’ve heard black historians say that blacks were placed there by colonialists to sell black slaves. Who do I believe?Remarkable Facts· In 1462 Pope Pius II declared baptized Africans should not be enslaved. Columbus never saw North America. He visited many Caribbean islands and the northeastern tip of South America, as well as the Eastern coast of Central America, but never the mainland.· The father of Olaudah Equiano, one of the most famous former slaves and leading abolitionists, kept slaves.· An English surgeon thought that two thirds of deaths on the journey were due to melancholy - people captured in slavery just willed themselves to die.· A Sonyo prince from the Congo region was captured whereupon the Sonyo people refused to trade anymore with the Dutch; he was returned with apologies.· In 1726 the King of Dahomey suggested Europeans should establish plantations in his kingdom - he would supply the slaves.· One of the few successful on ship slave rebellions took place in 1840 on the Amistad.· In 1930, the Liberian government was accused by the League of Nations of using forced labour to carry out public works.FURTHER READINGTwenty-two Years a Slave and Forty Years a Free Man: Embracing a Correspondence of Several Years, while President of Wilberforce Colony, London, can. By Austin Steward. Greenwood Publishing Group, June 1968.Life of Olaudah Equiano, of Gustavus Vassa, The African. By Olaudah Equiano. Dover Pubns, April 1999.The Slave Trade: The Story of the Atlantic Slave Trade 1440-1870. By Hugh Thomas. Touchstone Books. February 1999.Slaves, Spices and Ivory in Zanzibar. By Abdul Sheriff. Ohio University Press, September 1987.Black Ivory. James Walvin, Fontana Press.The History of Mary Prince. By Mary Prince. Penguin USA, January 2001.Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass: an American Slave. By Frederick Douglass, Signet, December 1997.Account of the Slave Trade on the Coast of Africa. By Alexander Falconbridge. AMS Press, June 1977.Slavery and African Life: Occidental, Oriental and African Slave Trades (African Studies Series, 67). By Patrick Manning. Cambridge University Press, November 1990.How Europe Underdeveloped Africa. By W. Rodney. Bogle l'Ouverture, 1983.The African Slave Trade. By Basil Davidson. Little Brown, 1980.Forced Migration. By J. Inikori. Hutchinson, 1982.The African Slave Trade from 15th to the 19th Centuries, UNESCO Reports and Papers 2, 1999.USEFUL LINKSUNESCO Slave RouteThis is an extensive information base linking to a large number of sites concerned with the Transatlantic Slave Trade.Modern Civil Rights MovementLearning Network.Anti-slavery campaignsCurrent reports on slavery around the world. Website by Antislavery International, London.Life story of J.J.Roberts.Columbus's life Lingua Center, University of Illinois, Urbana-Campaign.Site on Frederick DouglassDepartment of History, University of Rochester.American Independence, Native Americans and Slavery Internet History Sourcebooks Project, edited by Paul Halsall, Fordham University, New York.LiberiaAfrican-American Mosaic, a resource guide for the study of black history, The Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.History of early firearmsWebsite by David Lazenby, Middelaldercentret, Denmark.On slavery and exploitationdrawing parallels with white on white exploitation. World History Archives site.Eyewitness accounts of slaveryBy Professor Steven Mintz, University of Houston.Did We Sell Each Other Into Slavery?By Oscar L.Beard, Consultant in African Studies, World History Archives.African Presence in the Americas 1492-1992, provided by Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York Public Library.Olaudah EquianoExtract from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African. The British Library.Global Slavery Resource Center siteAmerican Antislavery Group.On SlaveryBBC SiteAfrican Ancestry SiteCompiled by Howard UniversityAfricana LibraryCornell UniversityEDIT: Please also read David Maynard’s answer as a good complement to my answer here; David Maynard's answer to I’ve heard “history buffs” say that slaves were purchased from blacks in Africa, but I’ve heard black historians say that blacks were placed there by colonialists to sell black slaves. Who do I believe?. My answer only discussed black African slave owners/traders in Africa. Also, I am/was very surprised to see that many did not know that there were black African slave traders/owners in Africa.Footnotes[1] Slavery in Africa - Wikipedia[2] The Story of Africa| BBC World Service

Yes, Zebras can be domesticated and trained but it is not necessarily practical or humane to do so.Lord Rothschild in his zebra-carriage in London.When I was a child my father used to take me to visit the Brereton family who farmed in a place called Tengwe in Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia). They had a zebra that used to live with the dairy cattle. It was just as tame as the cows and very relaxed, unless they tried to prevent her from walking through the dairy with the cows when they went to be milked. If that happened she would go completely crazy, trying to bite anyone she could through the gate and kicking at anyone or anything.Many people suggested someone try to train this animal to be ridden but Mr. Brereton refused. He felt that her nature would not allow it and that "breaking" her would destroy her. What a kind-hearted and wise man.Many efforts were made to train zebras for riding, drawing and carrying during the late 19th and early 20th Century. There were very practical reasons for doing so.Many parts of Sub Saharan Africa were (and still are) inhabited by tsetse flies. These areas were known collectively as "the Fly Belts".The tsetse fly carries animal trypanosomiasis and human sleeping sickness.Although sleeping sickness was and is quite uncommon, "tryps" was not. Domesticated animals such as cattle and horses are particularly susceptible to it, with horses being the most likely of all to die.Trypanosomiasis therefore made large areas of Africa inaccessible to European powers.A good example of this was the fact that when the explorer and hunter, Frederick Selous arrived at the Cape of Good Hope in 1871 and announced that he was going North to Matabeleland to hunt elephant, he was laughed at. This was because most of the elephants outside the fly belt in Matabeleland had for the most part already been hunted out.A few months later, he arrived at the Bulawayo and requested permission from King Lobengula to hunt elephant in his Kingdom. Lobengula laughed and gave his consent, believing that the then nineteen year old would get nowhere near the elephants before his horse died under him.Selous then set off on foot and began his slaughter of thousands of elephants. He hunted entirely on foot and used porters to carry his equipment and the ivory.Selous also hunted in nothing but a loin cloth and ate what the locals ate. He also married half a dozen local girls but that was hushed up in Britain.This was a dramatic change from the norm and considered "savage". Explorers were expected to maintain the Britishness at all costs and impose their norms on the locals, not adopt the customs of the locals nor adapt to the local environment. For this reason it was believed that Europeans simply could not survive any extended amount of time in the African interior.Selous wrote a book called A Hunter's Wanderings in Africa: Being a Narrative of Nine Years Spent Amongst the Game of the Far Interior of South Africa (1881) which was a huge best-seller.This book dramatically changed British attitudes. It suddenly became popular in some quarters (although definitely not in most) to "go native".The book especially affected attitudes amongst white settlers in Southern Africa. Although they weren't interested in adopting the habits of the indigenous peoples, they did begin to experiment on a large scale with adapting their surroundings to suit them. There were fanciful and unrealistic dreams of farming Cape buffaloes and using leopards as guard dogs and other such ill-informed and ill-advised ideas.Although game ranching, keeping the animals wild or semi-wild, was very much a practical solution (the carrying capacity is much better and the animals less susceptible to disease), very few seemed to have understood this. There was a need to dominate and control in the way European domestic animals were controlled. They wanted to try and farm wild animals the way European domestic animals were farmed.One wonders why they didn't ask themselves despite having both domestic donkeys and horses, such as Basotho people and their Basotho ponies, why the indigenous people hadn't already done it...Sotho man riding Basotho Pony (Photo:commons.wikimedia.org)Using the zebra to do the work of horses, mules and donkeys was a very popular idea and there were widespread attempts to do so.One of the most famous of these attempts, and the most successful, was that of the accomplished but eccentric zoologist, Walter Rothschild, 2nd Baron Rothschild .He put great effort into training zebras to pull carriages, eventually driving a carriage drawn by six Zebras to Buckingham Palace in order to prove the viability of doing so.Rothschild did not train Zebras to be ridden. He realized that this was not practical for two reasons. Firstly they are small animals and have not had the benefits of thousands of years of breeding to produce animals with backs strong enough to support the weight of a man.Secondly he must have quickly realized what many others would learn, zebras are aggressive. They have not evolved in tamer temperate regions, They have instead evolved to survive as a species in Africa where lions are their main predator.There are many recorded cases of zebras killing lions. This is usually caused by a kick to the head, causing death or a broken jaw, thus causing the lion to starve.To give an idea of the power of a zebra's kick one need just point out that no horse has ever broken a lions jaw. Furthermore, few people have ever walked away after being kicked by a zebra.A zebra doesn't just kick with the leg. Instead it looks between its legs in order to accurately place its kicks and then bucks and kicks violently with both back legs.(Photo:http://wildthornberrys.wikia.com/wiki/File:Lion_Kick.JPG)Zebras also inflict nasty bite wounds on each other and on people when they are habituated or "tame" and people get too close.In order to get them to draw a carriage Rothschild must have realized something important about wild zebra behaviour. This can be seen in the following image:(Image source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/)Zebra herds are made up of groups of females and young with one adult male.The females follow a strict order of precedence. The most dominant female walks in front followed by the other females in order of dominance from most dominant to least dominant.The male goes wherever he wants but usually stays in the side or back of the group. If there is any perceived threat he will put himself between the danger and the herd.If a zebra passes or attempts to pass another zebra that is more dominant than themselves then they will be bitten or kicked ferociously by the more dominant animal. Passing is a challenge.Young animals take the position of the mother in the hierarchy but are allowed to move ahead of the mother in order to accompany another youngster. However, when they do so they adhere to the position of the more dominant zebra's young.In the 1980s a herd of zebras was captured for relocation in Zimbabwe. Sixteen animals were loaded into a truck and driven off. When the truck arrived at its destination only one zebra was left alive. The others had kicked each other to death.Attempts were made by the Zimbabwe Department of National Parks and Wildlife Management to train and use zebras for work in the 1970s and 1980s but it was determined that in order to train them it was necessary to first drastically change the natural instincts of the animal.The project was abandoned with the conclusion that changing the animals natural instincts and taming their aggression inevitably required very harsh treatment which was deemed to be inhumane.So, yes, they can be trained to be ridden and work but the methods used to do so to date have been cruel. I wonder what the poor animals in the pictures below went through to be trained to placidly allow a young lady to sit on its back or a fat fellow to jump with one?Whilst checking the facts of my own answer I came across the following amazing story:http://www.dailyprogress.com/lifestyles/article_bde6a0f2-6597-11e2-a595-001a4bcf6878.htmlAn American teenager called Shea Inman bought and trained a zebra to be ridden.She didn't use harsh treatment but instead she used persistence and lots of treats:"According to Shea, zebras have short attention spans, and are not as good as retaining information as horses. She said that she uses a lot of treats to train Joey, such as rubbing peanut butter on the bit to help Joey take it easier."What a wonderful story. No doubt, if the colonials had been more gentle and persistent we might have been riding zebras in the Zambezi Valley today.. I find the idea of doing a zebra-back riding safari intriguing.Below is a picture of a friend and fellow professional guide Mike Woolford on a horse-back safari. He is an expert horseman and farrier in addition to being a professional guide/ranger, so I take his opinion on this subject seriously.Could he do this on a zebra some day? I asked him.His answer; "As you said Rory I don't think Zebras would be strong enough to carry people on their backs without going lame or at least being uncomfortable! Who knows what they would do to the rider then?".Photo: Mike WoolfordI think we can conclude then that although they could possibly be used to pull carriages or carts (as long as they were harnessed in order of dominance) it is not humane or safe for the average-sized man to ride them.I guess this also means we won't be seeing Mike plodding around on a zebra then..