Randall Robinson The Sacrifice Of The Ancient Self Summary

Randall Robinson is an African-American author, lawyer, and activist. Robinson is also remarkable as the founder of Trans Africa. Trans Africa is an organization that influences the foreign policy of the United States of America concerning African diaspora groups. Therefore, Robinson uses that same devotion to enlighten the African American community to find themselves by looking through their past, and to a great extent notify American the true value of an African American man and woman. Robinson begins this book by addressing his new self and an ancient self. The ancient self refers to the black soul, who has a long story of fighting, but still finds a way to still be the African man who has been taken from his home. On the other hand, the new self is damaged psychologically and cannot remember or find his true African identity.

The African identity is more than just the slavery, but the African people who came together to mold beliefs, traditions, culture, love, and determination from generation to generation.

Consequently, the ancient self and the new-self continue to attack to each other to finally release the trapped spirit. Moreover, he describes that Africans have been through horrendous conditions for more than two hundred years and deserve numerous amounts of reparations. For example, the Jews were given their reparations for the millions of Jewish people killed by Adolf Hitler and his Nazis during World War II. In addition, the forced relocation of Japanese Americans into camps due to the suspicions of being connected to the enemies in World War II were given compensation as well. However, the African American community is expected to just move on and forced to believe that their people did not live grating conditions. Slavery has affected the African American community mentally and physically, that it can stand as a trait passed down by each

generation.
The damage done to Jewish and Japanese American is certainly gruesome, but it is not even closely similar to the length and depth of struggle that the African people have experienced. The Jewish and Japanese people still are intact with their culture. The African American community have an ongoing battle between their ancient self and new self to find what they have been detached from for so long. African Americans have nothing sufficient to fall back on and do not have reparations to encourage them. Therefore, Robinson strongly motivates that the African American race must know who they and where they are from to finally gain an insight to what they can truly achieve.
For instance, when asked about what or who Jewish and Japanese people are; everything from their strong culture to religion is spoken and only a small detail is entered about the tragic hardship of concentration camps. However, when asked about African Americans the only thing in discussion is slavery. Of course, African Americans are no longer physically owned, but mentally and emotionally we are still trapped. Slavery is not the beginning of our story just as it is not for the Jews and Japanese, however why is African American hardship only correlated with the race and Jews and Japanese are notable for their culture. The African history is far more beautiful in depth and this novel encourages that everyone needs to repair their views and see the true role African Americans play. When asked, what did African people contribute to this country reply with what haven’t the African race bestow to this country who treat them as dirt?