Afrocentricity/Afrocentrism

Leon D. Caldwell

Afrocentricity/Afrocentrism is better referred to as African-centered thought . The term has endured several political and vernacular changes, but conceptually it has remained consistent. African-centered thought symbolizes the intellectual, psychological, and social struggle of descendants forcibly removed from Africa and placed in the Americas. It is representative of an intellectual and practical effort to reclaim a cultural legacy, consciousness, and history that positions an authentic cultural unity of the continent of Africa as the worldview lens from which human endeavors are interpreted and engaged. Afrocentricity/Afrocentrism is relatively recent nomenclature. The precursor to stake a modern literary claim recognizing a distinct cultural identity of African Americans can be found in the pioneering work of W. E. B. Du Bois in 1913, The Souls of Black Folk . Indirectly anchored in African-centered thought, Du Bois articulated a paradoxical condition of being an African in America. Du Bois's concept of “double consciousness” is ...

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