HIST 410N WEEK 5: AFRICA AND THE WEST DISCUSSION

HIST 410N WEEK 5: AFRICA AND THE WEST DISCUSSION – What accounts for the rather late emergence of African countries as independent nation-states? Is there something peculiar about Africa that delayed its drive for independence? (Begin with a specific African country, and argue your case.)

Class, the European control of the continent of Africa was the primary reason for the late emergence of African countries as independent nation-states, right? Let’s compare what happened in Africa with what happened in the United States. As all of you know, the United States was a colony of the British Empire, the United States took a different course than African countries. Why? Your speculations?

HIST 410N WEEK 5: AFRICA AND THE WEST DISCUSSION SAMPLE

Colonization in Africa began in the 1400s, when Europeans came and set up trading posts. This created nations and shaped Africa’s political, economic, and cultural development. Africa benefited off of roads, technology, education and new markets from the change.However,colonization damaged traditional economies. Plenty of people were left poor and landless. Africans lost a lot of natural resources such as gold. Cash crops raised for export so people had to depend on foreign nations. Europeans divided Africa and did not care about what the continents genetic makeup was. “Most African nations began as a patchwork of disparate peoples. The story of Ghana is illustrative of the period. Several major civilizations flourished in what is now Ghana. The ancient empire of Ghana reigned until the 13th century, and that was followed centuries later by the Ashanti empire of the 18th and 19th centuries” (Week 5 Lesson).