How African are people in the African diaspora?

I'm going to talk about something that I came across whilst researching into why descendants of African slaves such as African Americans, Afro Caribbeans & Afro Latino's still suffer from mental slavery. I came across a page that was headlined "5 Signs Showing You May From Mental Slavery By Doctor Amos Wilson". The 5 key areas that are highlighted are clothing, food, language, names & religion, all these 5 things plus many more were what African slave descendants were tragically stripped off during slavery.

Clothing

Starting with clothing the majority of black people whether they are African, African American, Afro Caribbean etc are often seen wearing European inspired clothing. With that being said, African people who's ancestors were not slaves obviously do have their African culture and therefore are often seen wearing their cultural attire at special events such as weddings, christenings, funerals etc. Now its obvious as to why African Americans and Afro Caribbeans are not really seen wearing African attire due to slavery where our ancestors were forbidden from wearing such garments. Also many of us find it weird to wear African clothes because we are so used to and comfortable with following the European trend of fashion. Once upon a time I would never of even contemplated wearing any form of African clothing just because of pure ignorance, however as I have started to appreciate my origins a lot more, I would definitely wear African clothing such as a Dashiki.

Food

Secondly food is next on the list, now on this particular category I can only speak for African Caribbeans as that is what I self identify as. I know that a lot of African Caribbean food has African influences, foods such as okra, yams, plantain, rice, ackee, callaloo etc. Africans and African Caribbeans both share a fondness for hot and spicy food. There are big differences however in the way our foods are prepared, an example could be that Africans tend to use palm oil in their cooking where as African Caribbeans do not. What I found weird was why African Caribbeans eat foods such as ox tail, curried goat, pig feet and tail whilst Africans don't commonly consume these kind of dishes. From what I have read which kind of answers my question  was that in slavery times, slaves were often fed the scraps from what the slave owner's did not want. I was very proud to find that two dishes called "cou-cou and conkies" that are consumed in Barbados where my dad is from have possible origins in Ghana where a significant amount of slaves taken to Barbados descend from and are related to "fufu and kenkey" respectively. I have tried jollof rice which I really enjoy, and also plan to go to some Ghanaian and Nigerian restaurants to try dishes such as banku, fufu, egusi soup and others.

Language

Thirdly language, this alongside names which will be mentioned after annoys me the most out of the 5 topics being discussed. For African Caribbeans we have no real African language to speak due to our ancestors not being allowed to pass down their tribal languages. What we have is patois which is basically broken English, French etc with some African influences. Being able to speak an African tribal language allows for one to be able to identify with his/her African heritage. When I here that some of my friends who have African parents but cannot speak their tribal language wherever it be Igbo, Twi or Yoruba etc it pains me because they know exactly what tribe they come from and therefore should be able to speak their tribal language. This annoys me also because for me I have no choice but to speak the colonial English that was forced upon my ancestors whereas you have people that can't speak their tribal language whilst their parents can. From doing some research about Barbados and St Lucia I know I more than likely descend from the Igbo, Fon, Akan and Yoruba ethnic groups and so my ancestors would of spoken these languages. A part of me feels a bit envious when I hear an African person speaking their tribal language because it reminds me of what was stolen from me but it has also inspired me to learn an African language and try to reclaim some lost African heritage, with the aim of going to Africa and learning a language that some of my ancestors may have spoken.

Names

As mentioned previously this is another key area that frustrates me because a name can tell many stories. Too me a name is precious as it indicates where someone comes from culturally. Close to all African Caribbeans have European first and last names due to the effects of slavery which means that it can give no clue as to what tribe a person may originate from. I'm educated enough to know that if I hear the name Boateng the person mentioned is most likely from Ghana and is Akan, Adewale most likely Nigerian and is Yoruba in particular. All over the globe a name can indicate a persons race, country and ethnicity. We as African diasporans are still mentally enslaved due to us still using the European names that were forced upon us many years ago. Our ancestors were not authorized to give us African names which would have been strongly against the wishes of the slave masters. Recently I have thought about dropping my European last name and possibly first name, I think and ask myself  from time to time "Would my ancestors be proud of me for using a name that  was forced on me and has nothing to do with them nor my race?" of course NOT. So with that being said I have thought about adopting an African name to help reclaim an African identity. Many African Caribbeans have already started doing this in honor of our ancestors. I admit when I younger that I used to laugh at African names for looking and sounding weird but as I have got older I have realized that an African name is a true black person's name and not a European one.

Religion

Lastly religion is another area that has affected black people as a whole, due colonialism where foreign religions such as Christianity and Islam were forced upon Africans and were used to justify slavery. During this process Africans were taught that they were backwards and needed saving and my adopting Christianity and Islam that they would be saved and that their traditional spiritual practices such as voodoo, orishas etc were promoting evil. This has recently made me less religious and very confused because even though I am a Christian I always think to myself that my ancestors were not originally Christians and that the only reason I am a Christian is because it was forced upon  my ancestors.  But in the Caribbean islands many African spiritual practices are alive such as Obeah, Candomble, Santeria, Orisha, Kele, Shango and others which are fused with Christianity.  

Going back to the title of this page, is it fair to say that African Caribbeans are just African racially (genetics) because the majority of us do not speak any African language, wear African clothes, consume African foods, practice and African spiritual traditions nor possess any African names? Is this why some continental Africans see us as culture less people who suffer from an identity crisis? Many people would find what I have written as offensive but in harsh reality it is the truth. We are still practicing forms of self hatred without even realizing it. 

Who are the African-Caribbean people and how they came into existence Part 2

Continuing from part 1, some African Caribbean communities still practice variations of these African derived traditions. Now moving on to what was mentioned in part one where it was said that African-Caribbean people can be found in places like the UK and the USA, during the 1960's where most present day African and Caribbean nations were gaining their independence from the European nations that colonized them, the people from these two parts of the world in search of better opportunities and quality of life started migrating to Europe and North America in large numbers. In London most black people are from countries like Ghana, Barbados, Jamaica, Nigeria, others etc all of whom were former British colonies.

So focusing specifically on the UK, where on the census black people are divided into two groups (Black African & Black Caribbean) in the past there were some conflict between these two communities which still exists to this day however not as bad as it used to be. Some ignorant people from both groups often stereotype each other and see each other as superior to each other. The mentality of some Africans are that they feel they are superior to Caribbeans for example because they see themselves as "pure" African and black Caribbeans as impure. On the other hand the mentality of some ignorant  black Caribbeans are that they are superior because  they feel they are more British in the UK, perhaps due to having British names which often leads to discrimination towards Africans when it comes to applying for jobs and is seen as an advantage for black Caribbeans  who have European surnames.

The ignorance continues with both communities making offensive jokes about each other, Africans often using the fact that black Caribbeans don't know their African tribal, country of origin  and that black Caribbeans don't speak and African language as a way of causing offence, having European surnames (slave names/white boy names) and being a lost and culture less people who have no real culture (meaning no African culture) to cling on to. Caribbeans will respond with their ignorance making jokes about how Africans dress (i.e dashiki), the foods they eat and mocking their accents. The main reason why ignorance exists between these two different but very similar communities is because of slavery. Many Africans will say that black Caribbeans accuse their ancestors of selling out their ancestors to the Europeans and branding Africans as "sellouts" which is why they believe some black Caribbeans show some hatred towards them which breeds the argument of "Your forefathers sold our forefathers". It's fair to say that none present of the descendants of these to groups are to blame, how can present day Africans be blamed for slavery if they didn't exists those 400 years ago and it's not present day black Caribbeans fault why they don't know what tribe or African country they come from because that was all taken away from them due to creolization. Black Caribbeans are accused of denying that they are African and being ignorant, but what is not taken into account is that slavery took nearly everything African away from black Caribbeans and that during slavery were told negative things about Africa which promotes self hatred and ignorance.

The term African-Caribbean is inspired by the African-American term which enables one to acknowledge ancestral origins as well as their present day nationality and culture. The difference between the two is that with African-American you have race and nationality but African-Caribbean is race and culture as the Caribbean is more of a cultural thing due to being a region of islands that share similarities with each other. Plus the African-Caribbean term is broader and can be specifically broken down into Afro-Jamaican, Afro Trinidadian etc referring to specific islands but ultimately falls under Afro-Caribbean. Many Caribbeans of the Rastafarian faith show huge pride of descending from Africa and if anything see Africa as their homeland more than the Caribbean, consider themselves African and even drop their European names in exchange for African names because they feel that possessing a European name still makes them the property of a slave master. Within the black communities "Competition" is what causes division because black people love to find any little thing to say they are superior to each other. Whether its African music Afrobeats vs Caribbean music Dancehall, food rice and peas vs jollof rice, countries Jamaica vs Nigeria or sports football vs athletics. It's these little things that doesn't cause much issues among other ethnic minorities but black. Black people like to generalize, some Africans assume all Caribbeans are weed smoking, lazy, not academic, have no dad and want the easy life whereas some Caribbeans assume Africans are all fraudsters, money hungry, only care about education, do voodoo etc. If a black person is well spoken they are instantly accused of acting white or wishing they were white. Lastly skin color is also an issue, light skin black people are more favored than dark skin black people.

To finish off, as time has gone on the relationship between these to communities has improved, many black African and black Caribbean people do get on but some still hold old ignorant views. Many African-Caribbean societies exists in universities as a way to promote both cultures and to bring the two communities together. Also relationships between the two communities are on the rise and it is possible to find who are half and half i.e Ghanaian and Jamaican, the only way these communities can thrive is to unite and drop the ignorance that exists.

Who are the African-Caribbean people and how they came into existence Part 1

It is accurate to say that anyone who is black and is either born, has parents or grandparents and so on who were born in any of the Caribbean nations is classed as African-Caribbean. The African term is used to define race whilst the the Caribbean term is used to define culture. As it is well known that black people from the Caribbean nations descend from Central and predominantly West Africans just like their African-Americans and African Latin Americans counterparts.

African-Caribbean people can be found all over the world, with high concentrations especially in the UK, USA, Canada and of course the Caribbean. The Trans Atlantic Slave Trade is the sole reason why African-Caribbean people exist today due to the forced migration of Africans from Central and mostly West Africa to what was considered the "New World" which is the Americas "Caribbean and North and South America". From the 15th-19th century where Central and West African people were subjected to inhumane treatment on slave plantations located in the Caribbean and North and South America (USA & Brazil) lead to the process of what is called "Creolization".

 Basically this process is the combination of African, Asian, European and Indigenous lineages. Though African-Caribbean people are apart of the African diaspora, the African identity of enslaved Africans is complicated and was stripped off them which slavery and creolization can take credit for. They say that the Caribbean is a melting pot of different cultures which is very much true, if you go to the Caribbean you will see a variety of people such as Chinese, Indians, Europeans, Middle Easterns as well as people who are of African descent who form the majority in most of the nations. Over the period of slavery where Africans were forced to speak the language of the slave master wherever it be Spanish (Cuba, Dominican Republic i.e), French (Haiti, St Lucia, Dominica i.e) or English (Barbados, Jamaica, Trinidad i.e) and the fact that Africans from various ethnic groups were forced to reproduce with each other is the reason why African-Caribbeans don't have an African language to speak. Instead what African-Caribbeans speak is patois,patwa or creole which is either broken English, Spanish or French which has some vocabulary influences from African ethnic groups. Creolization also affected other cultural factors such as cuisine, music and religion, in places like Trinidad and Tobago where there is a significant Indian descended population you will find foods that have Indian influences like curries and rotis.

All was not lost because some African culture and traditions  did survive in the Caribbean,  the music styles such as calypso, reggae, soca etc has African influences, the foods eaten in the region are very similar if not the same as some of those consumed in West Africa such as yams, okra etc and some traditional African religious beliefs such as Orisha/Voodoo managed to survive in some Caribbean nations (Cuba, Trinidad, St Lucia i.e). Please read Part 2.