Precolonial Black Africa: A Comparative Study of the Political and Social Systems of Europe and Black Africa, from Antiquity to the Formation of Modern States

Front Cover
L. Hill, 1987 - History - 240 pages
"Diop compares the political and social systems of Europe and black Africa from antiquity to the formation of modern states. Throughout, his intent is not to provide a history as such, but rather guidelines for historians and others who seek a scientific understanding of precolonial societies in Africa, the Mediterranean, and Europe and their links with the earliest known stages of human development. Students and scholars of Africa and world history will be challenged by Diop's original -- thought controversial == analysis of the similarities and striking differences between black Africa and the West." -- Back cover.

From inside the book

Contents

ANCIENT CITY
18
FORMATION OF THE MODERN
35
POLITICAL ORGANIZATION IN BLACK
43
Copyright

11 other sections not shown

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

About the author (1987)

Cheikh Anta Diop was born in 1923 in Diourbel, Senegal. After earning a Litt.D. degree in France, Diop worked as a historian in addition to heading the carbon-14 dating laboratory for the Institut Fondamentale d'Afrique Noire in Senegal. He founded two political parties in the 1960s, the Bloc des Masses Senegalaises and the Front Nationale Senegalaise, but he is best remembered for his historical works about Africa. Diop's works includes Civilization or Barbarism: An Authentic Anthropology, 1991 and Alerte sous les tropiques: Articles 1946-1960: Culture et developpement en Afrique noire, Presence Africaine, 1990. Through his books, Diop attempts to prove that blacks had a larger role in the beginnings of civilization than is generally acknowledged. He was honored by the World Festival of Negro Arts in 1966 as the black intellectual who had exercised the most fruitful influence in the 20th century. Diop died February 7, 1986, in Dakar, Senegal.

Bibliographic information