Africanisms in African American Culture

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Africanisms in America are a highly surveyed topic for the black community. Joseph E. Holloway describes Africanisms as “those elements of culture found in the New World that are traceable to an African origin” (Holloway 2). I believe, that africanisms are the traditions and cultural behaviors of African Americans that resemble the some of the same traditions and cultures in Africa. Which makes you ponder about what current elements does our culture use that ties back to Africa. Which in fact there are several africanisms that still exist. African Americans have retained an essence of Africa in their speech, hair care, clothing, preparation of foods, and music by over centuries of separation from the Dark Continent. Speech is a very influenced africanism in America. A word commonly used today by all races in America is the word “okay”, a Mande and Wolf term that means “that’s it” (Holloway 57). Ebonics is often tied back to african roots of west african language. Both lack the sounds and final consonant clusters (e.g. past), and that replacing or simplifying these occurs both in US Ebonics and in West African English varieties spoken in Nigeria and Ghana. Moreover, they argue that the distinction made between completed actions ("He done walked") and habitual actions ("We be walkin") in the Ebonics tense-aspect system reflects their prevalence in West African language systems and that this applies to other aspects of Ebonics sentence structure. Hair Care is another popular africanism present in America for African americans. For african american woman going for a natural hairstyle is quite common. Dating back to pre-colonial africa a natural afro hair style defined status and identity. Different styles indicated certain qualitie... ... middle of paper ... ... and appreciate their ancestors for creating such important and valuable things that are commonly used. Because without them a lot of these things wouldn't be here. Works Cited Brown, Ernest Douglas. "Africanisms in American Culture." JSTOR. University of Illinois Press, n.d. Web. 06 Mar. 2014. "Music - Black Music History Timeline | NOW Magazine." Music - Black Music History Timeline | NOW Magazine. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Mar. 2014. "Nike.com." Nike.com. Nike, n.d. Web. 06 Mar. 2014. "Post Navigation." Black Girl with Long Hair. Black Girl Long Hair, 5 Oct. 2011. Web. 06 Mar. 2014. Rickford, John R. "What Is Ebonics (African American English)." What Is Ebonics (African American English)? Linguistic Society of America, n.d. Web. 05 Mar. 2014. ""Soul Food" a Brief History." Welcome To The Black Box, Personal Narratives in High Definition. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Mar. 2014

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