Runoko Rashidi

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Runoko Rashidi is an historian, writer and public lecturer with a pronounced interest in the African foundations of humanity and civilizations and the presence and current conditions of Black people throughout the Global African Community. He is particularly drawn to the African presence in India, Australia and the islands of the Pacific. To date he has lectured at ninety universities and has made major presentations in ten countries. He is the author of African Classical Civilizations and the editor, with Dr. Ivan Van Sertima, of the African Presence in Early Asia--the most comprehensive volume on the subject yet published. Rashidi is very active online and has coordinated an educational tour to India entitled "Looking at India through African Eyes".

For additional information contact Rashidi at: RRashidi@swbell.net or (210) 648-5178

Definitely visit this Brother's web site at http://www.cwo.com/~lucumi/runoko.html

Introduction to African Civilizations
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John G. Jackson, Runoko Rashidi, John Henrik Clarke (Introduction)

ISBN: 0806521899
Format: Paperback, 400pp
Pub. Date: January 2001
Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corporation

"This is not just another book on African history. It is, in my opinion, one of the best books that has so far been written on the subject." —from the Introduction by John Henrik Clarke

"The picture we get today of Africa in past ages from the history taught in our schools is that Africans were savages and that, although Europeans invaded their lands and made slaves of them, they were in a way conferring a great favor on them, since they brought to them the blessings of Christian civilization," writes John G. Jackson.

With brilliantly objective scholarship, Jackson obliterates that picture and presents one infinitely more rich, colorful, and varied. This book challenges all the standard approaches to African history, from the dawn of prehistory to the resurgent Africa of today. It will challenge the parochial historian, devastate the theoretical pretensions of white supremacists, and expand intellectual horizons. It is a fascinating book to be read and reread by the layman and the scholar for pleasure and knowledge.

The African Presence in Early Asia edited by Runoko Rashidi, co-edited by Ivan Van Sertima

Format: Paperback, 168pp.
ISBN: 0887386377
Publisher: Transaction Publishers
Pub. Date: March 1997
Edition Desc: 10TH ANN

The story of the African presence in early Asia is as fascinating as it is obscure. It covers a period of more than 500,000 years beginning with the first Homo erectus migrations out of Africa. - Runoko Rashidi

As a scholar, Runoko Rashidi has been called the world's leading authority on the African presence in Asia. Since 1986, he has worked actively with the Dalits (India's Black Untouchables). In 1987, he was a keynote speaker at the first All-India Dalits Writer's Conference, held in Hyderabad, India, and spoke on the "Global Unity of African People." In 1998, he returned to India to lecture, study and sojourn with the Dalits and Adivasis (the indigenous people of India). In 1999, he led a group of seventeen African-Americans to India, and became the first ever non-Indian recipient of the prestigious Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Memorial Award. For twelve years he served as United States representative of Dalit Voice: The Voice of the Persecuted Nationalities Denied Human Rights, published fortnightly from Bangalore, India.

It has been said that "History is a light that illuminates the past and a key that unlocks the door to the future." This column is designed to help redirect the history of the Global African Community from the periphery of our imagination to the center of our attention. It is devoted to a review of what Ivan Van Sertima calls, "That other African."

"That other African" is not the stereotypical African savage so graphically depicted in Hollywood movies, but the African that first peopled the earth, and gave birth to and significantly influenced the world's oldest and most magnificent civilizations. This is the African that first entered Asia, Europe, Australia, the islands of the South Pacific and the early Americas, not as slave, but as master, in control of his and her own destiny. We believe that this African, whom many wish to remain invisible, is to be found wherever one truthfully seeks the origins of nations and religions.

We now know, based on recent scientific studies of DNA, that modern humanity originated in Africa, that Black people are the world's original people and that all modern humans can ultimately trace their ancestral roots back to Africa. If not for the primordial migrations of early African people, humanity would have remained physically Africoid, and the rest of the world outside of the African continent absent of human life. It is with this perspective that we introduce this column to our readers.