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Africa

the second largest continent; it consists of 54 countries and is located between the Atlantic and Indian Oceans.

 

African

of, relating to, or characteristic of the continent of Africa. A native or inhabitant of Africa; a person of African ancestry; esp. Negro or Black.

 

altar

a raised structure or place at which sacrifices and offerings are made or incense is burned, as a part of worship.

 

Americas

the 49 nation states that make up North America, Central America, the Caribbean, and South America.

 

ancestor

one from whom a person is descended; forerunner.

 

archive

an organized body of records pertaining to an organization or institution; a place in which public records or historical documents are preserved.

 

archivist

one who is in charge of an archive.

 

Arthur A. Schomburg

one of the foremost bibliophiles and collectors of African diasporan history and culture.

 

autobiography

the story of a person's life written or narrated by the person him or herself.

 

bibliophile

a book collector; one who loves books.

 

biography

a written history of a person's life.

 

Black Americans

people of African ancestry born in the Americas.

 

Black Indian

a person of mixed African and Native American ancestry.

 

broncobuster

one who breaks wild horses to the saddle, a cowboy.

 

bulldogging

throwing a steer by seizing its horns and twisting its neck.

 

call and response

while the leader sings a solo, the group answers and repeats a line without change until the concluding phrase.

Caribbeans

persons born or living in the Caribbean region.

 

chuck wagon

in the West, a wagon carrying supplies and cooking provisions at a ranch or lumber camp.

 

colony

a body of people living in a territory ruled by a distant power called a mother country or parent state.

 

continent

one of the main land masses of the globe (Africa, Asia, Europe, North America, South America, Australia and Antarctica).

 

crop

a plant or food product such as a grain, vegetable or fruit, grown and harvested for feeding people or for profit.

 

culture

behavior patterns, acts, beliefs, manners, and characterizations of a society; the customary beliefs, social forms, and material traits of a racial, religious, or social group.

 

curator

one that has the care and superintendence of a museum, library or other similar institution or place of exhibit.

 

customs

practices followed as a matter of course among a people.

 

descendant

one proceeding from an ancestor; descended from another, or common stock.

 

diaspora

dispersion of a body of people of similar origin throughout the world, usually far from an ancestral homeland.

 

dominant

commanding, controlling, or prevailing over all others; exerting authority or influence as in dominant culture or dominant trait.

 

enslaved person

one who is forced to become the property of another and who is under another's control.

 

equator

the great circle on the globe that is equidistant from the North Pole and South Pole and divides the earth's surface into the northern and southern hemispheres.

 

ethnic

of or relating to large groups of people classed according to common racial, national, tribal, religious, linguistic, or cultural origin or background.

 

Europe

a continent north of Africa and west of Asia.

 

excavate

dig out; a hole or cavity; to expose to view, e.g., the remains of an ancient culture.

 

exhibit

to present for the public to view (exhibition -- a display for the public, as of art objects).

 

family

a group of persons of common ancestry; clan.

 

gallery

a building or hall in which sculpture, paintings, photographs or other artistic work is displayed.

 

generation

the average time interval between the birth of parents and the birth of their children.

 

gospel music

based on or related to religious songs of African-American origin; associated with evangelism; marked by simple melody and harmony with elements of folk songs and the blues; urban spiritual.

 

hereditary

characteristics genetically transmitted from parent to offspring.

 

heritage

cultural information or property passed down to a person from ancestors.

 

improvisation

to make, invent, or arrange music spontaneously as one performs.

 

index

a device or guide that serves as a reference or indicator of something; a list arranged alphabetically of some specified data, items, etc., e.g., books.

 

Indian

a citizen or inhabitant of the subcontinent of India or one of the original inhabitants of the Americas, misnamed by Columbus.

 

kombit

a rotating cooperative approach to planting and harvesting, usually organized spontaneously.

 

lariat

a lasso, rope for picketing animals while grazing.

 

legacy

a gift from an ancestor or predecessor

 

legitimate

in accordance with law or established legal forms or requirements; conforming to recognized principles or accepted rules and standards.

 

lineage

descent in a line from a common progenitor or ancestor.

 

manuscript

a book, document, or other composition written by hand or typed.

 

market women

women who sell things in markets, esp. of Africa and the Caribbean region.

 

Maroon

any of a group of blacks descended from fugitive slaves of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, living in the Caribbean and Guiana, esp. in mountainous areas.

 

melisma

an expressive vocal passage sung to one syllable in plainsong.

 

Middle Passage

the journey across the Atlantic Ocean made by slave ships from the west coast of Africa to the Western Hemisphere.

 

migration

the process of moving from one country or region and settling in another.

 

Moor

African-Arab Muslims who conquered and occupied Spain in the eighth century A.D., originally of North African Berber origin.

 

museum

a place where works of artistic, scientific, and historical value are cared for and exhibited.

 

narrate

to give an oral or written account of; to tell a story.

 

Native American

a person who is indigenous to the countries in the Western Hemisphere, known as the Americas.

 

Negro

(from Spanish and Portuguese) black; (from Latin-Niger); pertaining to the dark-skinned peoples and descendants of central and southern Africa.

 

Olmec

of or designating a Mesoamerican civilization, c. 1000-400 B.C. Early African visitors are believed to have interacted with the Olmecs, c. 800 BC

 

oral tradition

an African practice of passing down information by word of mouth.

 

orisha

divinized natural forces; deities associated with the Yoruba religion.

 

percussion instruments

musical instruments that can be shaken, rattled, or struck in some way to make a tone, such as the drum, cymbal, triangle, xylophone, or piano.

 

pitch

the location of a musical sound as to degrees of high or low, determined by the number of vibrations of the sound; tonal standard.

 

plantain

a tropical green banana fruit that can be eaten boiled or fried. Rich in iron, plantain is a staple food in tropical regions.

 

Quilombo

a fugitive slave settlement; Palmares in Brazil, called the "Negro Republic," was the most famous and long-lived.

 

race

a group of persons related by common descent, blood, heredity; any of the traditional divisions of humankind, characterized by supposedly distinctive physical characteristics.

 

research

diligent scholarly or scientific investigation or inquiry into a subject in order to discover or revise facts or theories.

 

reservation

tract of land set aside for Native Americans.

 

resistance

the act or power of resisting, opposing, or withstanding, as political oppression.

 

resources

an available supply that can be drawn upon when needed; the collective wealth of a country or its means of producing wealth.

 

sacrifices

an act of offering deities something precious, usually animal or plant, as propitiation or homage.

 

Santeria

a syncretized religion combining traditional African religious forms with Roman Catholicism, practiced in Cuba; other examples include Vodun in Haiti, Candomble in Brazil, and Shango in Trinidad; (see syncretism).

Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture

a research division of the New York Public Library located in Harlem, named for Arthur A. Schomburg; it contains over 5 million items documenting African diasporan history and culture.

 

segregated

to require, often with force, the separation of a specific racial, religious, or other group from the general body of society.

 

shouting

a manifestation of spirit in the religious experience, in which one moves in dance-like steps, exclaims aloud with hands outstretched, or otherwise seems to have an outside force in control at that moment, such as an orisha, the "Holy Spirit", or ancestral spirits; can include fainting, "speaking in tongues," crying, etc.

 

slave

a person who, by law, is the property of and wholly subject to another.

 

subordinate

subject to or under the authority of a superior or dominant being.

surmount

to mount upon; to get on top of; to get over or across; to prevail over.

 

syncretism

the combination or union of opposing forms of beliefs, principles, or practices; the merging of two categories or systems, e.g., language, philosophy, or religion (see Santeria, Candomble, Vodun, etc.).

 

time capsule

a sealed container preserving articles and records of contemporary culture for scientists and scholars of the distant future.

 

timeline

a model showing characteristics and points of progress in history in a chronological form.

 

tradition

the handing down of beliefs, legends, customs, information, etc., from generation to generation; a long-established, inherited way of thinking or acting; a body of customs, laws, or doctrines.

 

transatlantic

crossing or reaching across the Atlantic Ocean.

 

transport

to carry, move, or convey from one place to another.

 

tribe

any collection or group of people united by ties of descent from a common ancestor, community, or tradition.

 

Vodun

a polytheistic religion practiced chiefly in the Caribbean region, deriving principally from traditional African religious forms and containing elements borrowed from the Roman Catholic religion (see syncretism; Santeria).

 

work

exertion or effort directed to produce something; labor; toil.

 

yams

a starchy, tuberous root vegetable; yams supply vitamin A.

 

Zambo

archaic term for a person of mixed African and Native American ancestry; used in New England in the eighteenth century.