We, the African Americans happen to be United States residents, tracing our origins from populations in Africa (Jesse, 2000). Our forefathers found their way into the United States as slaves, who had been captured and shipped to work in the various expansive farmlands, such as cotton farms, in the northern and southern regions of the United States.
Even after having been born and raised in the United States, my mother and grandmother before her all are extremely attached to our African heritage, a trait that seems to be catching up with me as we. I guess nothing beats the act of one having a true identity of their roots.
I remember when I was younger, probably five or six years, my grandmother would narrate to me how our ancestors had to be separated from their former owners, and shipped into the United States via a Dutch ship to work in plantations. Perhaps it is due to these narrations that I still yearn to know more about the origin of our race.
As per the 2000 census, 54.8 percent of our population was shown to reside in the south of the United States. A further 18.7 percent were shown to reside in the Midwest region, while 17.6 percent of the members of our race resided in the Northeast (Jesse, 2000).
The Western states were only shown to be home to a partly 8.9 percent of the members of our population. State-wise, New York has the largest concentration of African Americans followed closely by the state of Georgia, the Florida. Even California, the largest American state, is also home to a substantial size of our population (Lewis Mumford Center, 2000).
Our race experienced during the 20th Century, what has since come to be referred to as the ‘great migration’, in which our ancestors moved from the southern states to settle into the cities in the northern states (U.S. Census Bureau, 2000). Thanks to this great migration, a remarkable geographical redistribution of our race ensured.
Besides, the southern regions suffered profound consequences, what with a majority of the native-blacks migrating (Lewis Mumford Center, 2000).
I cannot help but observe that as a member of African American group, episodes of segregation and extermination have always dogged us. Though I was born after the racial animosity had watered down, and the various ethic groups in the United States had really started to warm up to each other, the same cannot6 be said of my grandmother, who now in her late 70s, was quite youthful at the height of the racial segregation rules, notably the Alabama bus strike episode.
Then, blacks were massacred on a large scale merely fro asserting their human rights, a core principle that is enshrined in the United States constitution. And who could ever forget the impact of the draconian Jim Crow laws on the African Americans? These are the draconian laws of the 19th century that sough to segregate the African Americans from attending public schools, and boarding public transport (Jesse, 2000).
Furthermore these laws also segregated the African Americans in restaurants and restrooms, with the result that they could not access the facilities which served their white counterparts (Jesse, 2000). The process of assimilating us, the African Americans, appears to be based on our social standing; which is at the bottom of the developing and evolving infrastructure.
As such, this lead to the existence of racial inequality, with our race being viewed at as inferior, at least based on our origin. The fact that our ancestors were shipped into the United States, having been bought from their masters back in Africa to come to the united states and work under plantation is the hallmark of colonialism.
Since then, we as the black people have been trying hard to assert for our rightful place in the society, sometimes with drastic consequences that have on numerous occasions, have led to the imprisonment and worse still, death of our very own. The eventual ascending into power of one of our very own is that a dream comes true and as such, a welcome respite for all of us who are proud to be linked to the black identity.
References
Jesse, M. “The black population: 2000 United States Census bureau”, 2000.
Lewis Mumford Center. “The size and regional distribution of the black population”, 2000. Web.
U.S. Census Bureau (2000). U.S. census bureau American fact finder. Web.