Black Women Leading From the Front:

Melanated Beginnings

Dr Marie Charles- Director

Dir MFIT: Many Faces In Teaching & Founder/Editor Missing Faces In Teaching Magazine https://mfit.productions

A Critique & Celebration

• This presentation begins with how the Media through television shopping channels portray a racial hierarchy ‘reformulated’ from early 16th, 17th & 19th century representations of ‘Races of Man’.

• The presentation continues with an overview of the Melanated woman through history and time;

• And concludes with ‘how do we reclaim, restore and rescue our power?

• (photo credit opening slide: Black History Studies)

Dr Amos WilsonApparently, the re-writing, the destruction and the stealing of our history must serve vital economic, political, and social functions for the European, or else he/she would not bother and try so hard to keep our history away from us, and to distort it in our minds” (p.15).

Nana Amos Wilson (1993):

Let’s Begin with a Correct Orientation of Ourselves.The mass media such as newspapers, magazines and television advertising in particular, depict the Original Melanated woman on the bottom of a false hierarchy .She is portrayed as a late comer to the human family.

Our psychological space is constantly bombarded with historical inaccuracies, myths and fabrications. It is time to set the record straight. For example, in 2021 in the following slides, this is how the Original women is consistently shown on shopping channels when selling cosmetics:

Cosmetic Colour chartA clear, distinct and organised hierarchy of mainstream beauty. Well, you may think ‘not so bad, its just a colour chart on selecting the correct colour shade for make-up”.

Cosmetic Colour Chart

Again, you may say “It’s a very helpful chart on skin tones- no big deal and there is nothing inherently damaging in these images.

Cosmetic Colour ChartBut let us examine the dominant tropes which big organisations and Marketing brands such as QVC – a global leading shopping channel that can have up to 20 million viewers at any one time

Households QVC reached in 2019:

UK & Ireland: 27 million

Germany: 41 million

Japan: 27 million

Italy: 25 million

China: 35 million

The power and influence which can be transported through the television screen in terms of cultural identity, and the images that are valued and prized within the culture, is tremendous.

So, where and how did this all begin-what are the roots of racial hierarchic ranking?

statistics: Wikipedia

27

41

27

25

35

0 0 0 0 00 0 0 0 0

UK & IRELA ND GERMA NY JA PA N ITA LY CHINA

QVC GLOBAL HOUSEHOLDS IN 2019 (IN MILLIONS)

Historical Context: Setting the sceneIn Francois Bernier’s (1684) publication: Nouvelle division de la terre ( A New Division of the Earth), a French physician and traveller, his document sets the scene for racial hierarchizing. It is considered the first published post-classical classification of humans into distinct races. His racial taxonomy proposed that there were four or five types of races.

Historical Context: Setting the SceneCarl Linnaeus a Swedish physician (1707-1778) was considered the father of anthropology who also claimed that there were four or five basic races. He placed them in order of superiority: Europaeus Albus (White European), Americanus Reubescens (Red American), Asiatic Fuscus (brown Asian), Africanus Niger (black African).

Historical Context: Setting the sceneThe leading racial theorist of the late 18th century Europe was the German born physician Johann Friedrich Blumenbach (1752-1840) who devised the colour system and the ‘ Caucasian’ Blumenbach argued had been the original racial form of mankind, of which the four later types were degenerations.

Historical ContextThis is from George F. Cram’s (1884) edition: New Family Atlas of the World. Notice how the language is conveying a replacement, reordering etc through the use of the word ‘New’- just like Bernier’s 1684 ‘New Division of the Earth’.

Look at the clear ranking of top and bottom scaling to denote superiority and inferiority..

Historical ContextThis photo is from Smallwood et al (1952, p.264): The Races of Men and clearly shows the ranking and ordering of people based on their phenotype.

The Western concept of race must be understood as a classification system that emerged from, and in support of, colonialism, oppression, and discrimination (AAPA- American Association of Physical Anthropology, 2019).

So from 1684 to 2021 how is all of this relevant?

What has changed in over 300 years?This is the new racial trope which masquerades as ‘diversity’ inclusion’ and empowering ‘women of colour’. Meanwhile, the dominant ranking and the image of Late Europeans at the top and Original Europeans languishing at the bottom secures the antecedent caste system devised by Bernier, Linnaeus and Blumenbach. What is the effect on our psychological conditioning when we perceive this imagery daily through the Media?

What are they not showing you?

Afrikan woman is the original Guardian Angel

• History, archaeology, anthropology, etymology-linguistics and numismatics all inform us that She,the Afrikan feminine essence was revered all over the world. Yes, overwhelmingly, the above disciplines and historical documentation have revealed beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Afrikan women was the first beauty on Earth and the adoration of her exquisite comeliness so inspired the imagination of human creative thought that she was projected into the heavens. Let’s look at our Primal Mother:

The Primal MotherThe image of the primal mother goes back to early antiquity. The ground-breaking study by Rebecca Cann in 1987, in which as part of her PhD, she persuaded 147 pregnant women to donate their babies’ placentae to science. Doctor Cann, trained in molecular biology, collected samples of human placentas (abundant source of mtDNA) from different populations from Europe, New Guinea, Australia, and Asia. In her report (1987) Cann stated that: “Mitochondrial DNAs from 147 people, drawn from five geographic locations have been analysed by restriction mapping. All these mitochondrial DNAs stem from one woman who is postulated to have lived about 200,000 years ago, probably in Africa” (p.31). (Please see whole chapter-Origins of the Human Family in press)

The Primal MotherIn examining the thousands of cave etchings, and paintings throughout the African continent, we note that women are painted in a startling variety of styles and actively assumed many roles (Rosalind Jeffries, 1884: Woman in Antiquity)

The Primal MotherThe head of an Ife ruler- an ancient Yoruba city in south-western Nigeria. It is cast in a zinc-brass alloy as far back as 800 years ago.

(Charles Finch, 1998, A Star of Deep Beginnings).

Notice, that she wears the Adinkrahene symbol as her crown, which stands for greatness, charisma and leadership.

The Primal Mother

A central principle of African philosophy and culture is the principle of Ma’at. In ancient Kemet (Egypt), Ma’at served as the ordering principle of the cosmos and earth. Ma’at was conceived as the ‘rudder of heaven and the beam of earth’. Ma’at governed family responsibilities and duties, personal conduct, the judicial system, the governance of the nation, and life after death (Obenga, 2012).

Ma’at was represented by a female neter wearing an ostrich feather. She symbolized truth, justice, balance, order, harmony, reciprocity, and beauty.

(T’Shaka, 2005, p.16)

The Primal Mother

We find carved statues of the primordial female located all over Europe. Italy, France, Czech Republic, Hungary, Russia and Romania. Some of them date to over 27, 000 years old.

Czech Republic France

Russia

Hungary

Italy

Italy

Mother Nut• The Netchr (Divine Creator) who personified the sky or livable atmosphere. Sometimes she is shown as a women spangled with stars, arched over the body of her husband Geb, or sometimes supported by her father Shu. She is frequently referred to as Mother Nut.

SekhmetSekmet was a lioness Ntchr who personified the fierce, destructive heat of the sun. Her name literally means “The powerful One”. She is the lady in red, a powerful female whose vengeance is terrible and swift, a great mother who shields her children from all adversity with the fierce love of a lioness. (Mfundishi, 2018: The Spiritual Warriors are Healers

African Goddess

Egypt, Greece and Rome bowed down to this African goddess, and the pictures and sculptures wherein she is represented in the act of suckling Horus formed the foundation for the Christian paintings of the Madonna and Child.

She is virtuous-the Greek goddess of chastity, Artemis is black; she is wise. The goddess of wisdom is Minerva, an African princess, she is a saint, as the black Madonna's of Loretta in Italy, Nuria in Spain, Czestochowa in Poland.

(Ivan Van Sertima, Black Women in Antiquity)

Original Madonna in Europe

Remember that we must place these art-facts within a correct conceptual framework. Cheikh Anta Diop (1991),who was an anthropologist, physicist and historian stated: “The migratory Negroid was responsible for the Aurignacian industry” (p.40), also the International Union of Prehistoric and Proto Historic Sciences (UISSP) declared that this Upper Palaeolithic industry spanned the entire Upper Danube basin of Austria, France, nineteen indexed sites such as the famous villages of Willendorf in Austria; Slovakia; Romania; Poland; Moravia; the Balkans in eastern Europe and Belgium” (p.44).

Original Madonna in EuropeSo, when we see the Original Madonna & Child in Switzerland, Poland, Spain, Luxembourg, France and so on, we must see them as a continuation of cultural traditions- i.e. the reverence, beauty and celebration of the Original woman. The antecedent is…

The Original Goddess from KemetAst is the Divine Great Mother, here she is seen suckling Heru and is the wife of Asr. They form the first trinity in world history- Asr, Ast & Heru. She gives birth to the ruling line of power that comes forth from her son Heru the power of truth and balance on Earth. She is the great wife who loves her subjects and cares for the weak and helpless. Her spiritual Konsciousness is entirely selfless. Her name means ‘throne’ and is sometimes worn on her head. She is the great Hmt. (wife or woman)

(Mfundishi, 2016,The Spiritual Warriors are Healers

Greek names: Isis, Osiris &

Horus

Andromeda: Ethiopian princess

The Melanated Global Majority female and her creative feminine energies traversed the world. The Greeks told stories of great Ethiopian kings and queens in their mythological stories, but the Greek mythology of Andromeda is a true story of those First Timers. In the study of ancient affairs, folklore and tradition throw an invaluable light on historical records. King Cepheus, whose fame was so great that he and his family were immortalized in the stars, the star groups of the celestial sphere are called the Royal Family (the constellations: Cepheus, Cassiopeia, and Andromeda). It may seem strange that legendary rulers of ancient Ethiopia should still have their names graven on our maps, but the voice of history gives us a clue (ibid, pp. 27-28).

The False Face of Andromeda

A book on astrology attributed to the Greek writer and historian Lucian (180-120CE) declares that: ”The Ethiopians were the first who invented the science of the stars, and gave them names to planets, not at random and without meaning but descriptive of the qualities which they conceived them to possess; they are superior to most nations and partly to the happiness of their situation, for the air is always serene and tranquil around them; and it was from that this art passed, still in an imperfect state to the Egyptians” (in Perennius, 1807). How did an Ethiopian princess become the male face seen in this popular TV series promo image?

The correct image of Global Majority womenWe must be unapologetic in taking our correct position as the Primordial Mothers and Fathers of the planet.

See the world and Ourstorythrough our own eyes and restore our psychological faculty by studying our history.

“History is not the mere recapitulation of dates and times, it is our total orientation within and towards the world” (Baba Amos Wilson)

Sankofa-go back-fetch what is ours

Because we do not own any major media organisations or studios in Britain, to correct our history. We must teach & live in Ourstory instead of His-story which dominates our educational spaces. To correct this imbalance I have created my own publishing house and organisation MFIT which is rooted in the decolonizing of a Eurocentric curriculum. Let us conclude with Dr Marimba Ani & Listervelt Middleton:

Minute by minute hour by hour when you lose your history you lose you power.

MFIT Publications:

https://mfit.productionsAvailable on Amazon.com

Ourstory