Basil Davidson ~ Africa: The Story of a Continent Study Questions
Part One: Different But Equal
Auraria Library Media Center: DT20 A37 1984 V.1 Part One

Study Questions

1. How did Europeans explain the archeological ruins of great civilizations they found in Africa?



2. What is the essence of Hegel's/Burton's/Baker's views on Africans as people. Be specific



3. What is the `knowledge' that Europeans of the 18th and 19th centuries `preferred to forget' about African cultural history?



4. What does the European art of the Renaissance (15th, 16th centuries) suggest about Euyropean attitudes about Africans?



5. What ws the cause of the change in attitudes of Europeans towards Africans?



6. What is the significance of the Matapo Hills art?



7. What is the significance of the Tassili art of the Great Sahara? How did the cultures there evolve?



8. What are the examples of evidence of links between the Sahara culture and ancient Egyptian culture?



9. What caused the collapse of the Sahara culture? When did it happen?



10. What was the result of the collapse of Sahara culture?



11. What6 makes the Nile River sucha ruch source of life and culture for humanity?



12. What are the `main lines' of Egyptian cultural origins? Be specific.



13. How did European prejudices influence the discussion of Egyptian cultural origins?



14. What is the debate over Egyptian cultural origins? How does Diop's view contrast with that of Davidson?



15. What is Nubia? Where is it? What is the difference between Egypt and Nubia?



16. What ws the classical Greek thinking on the significance of racial differences?



17. What was the Greek (Herodotus) view of the cultural origins of Egyptian culture?



18. What stopped Herodotus from going further south into Egypt than he did?



19. According to Davidson, where is thhe origin of Egyptian culture located? What is the evidence for this theory?



20. Where are `upper' and `lower' Egypt? Why are they so named?



21. What has happened to the early Egyptian archeological sites in Upper Egypt?



22. What was `Kush'?



23. What role did Meroe play in African cultural history?



24. What is the relationship between the people of Meroe and those of modern Sudan?



25. What have been the different cultural influences in Nubia over the long-term?



26. What are some of the indication s that Meroe was a prosperous, enlightened culture?



27. Why are cultural historians interested in the people of the Nuba Hills? Be specific, use examples.