Until 20th century
Africa and the African diaspora
W. E. B. Du Bois was a major Pan-Africanist intellectual and organiser whose work connected African history, African-American experience, and the wider African diaspora. He organised four Pan-African Congresses between 1919 and 1927 and continued to publish works defending the creativity and validity of African cultures and treating the diaspora as integral to African history.
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The Story
By 1940, W. E. B. Du Bois appeared to regard the earlier Pan-African Congresses as a completed episode, yet his intellectual contribution remained active. His role extended beyond organising occasional congresses: he publicised the contributions of Black people in Africa and the African diaspora to humanity, giving Pan-Africanism an intellectual and historical dimension.
Du Bois’s books continued a genre he had pioneered with The Negro in 1915. Black folk then and now, published in 1939, surveyed African and diaspora history and culture from ancient to modern times. The work defended the creativity and validity of African culture through the ages and presented the history of the diaspora as a vital part of African history and of the history of Africans.
The extract places Du Bois within an older generation of Pan-African leaders whose organisational influence had declined by 1940. No congress had been held since the New York Congress of 1927, but his writings continued to stimulate readers on subjects that were little known and to present Africa as a historical whole rather than as a collection of separate colonial territories.
Until 20th century
Africa and the African diaspora
W. E. B. Du Bois was a major Pan-Africanist intellectual and organiser whose work connected African history, African-American experience, and the wider African diaspora. He organised four Pan-African Congresses between 1919 and 1927 and continued to publish works defending the creativity and validity of African cultures and treating the diaspora as integral to African history.
Continue exploring
The Story
By 1940, W. E. B. Du Bois appeared to regard the earlier Pan-African Congresses as a completed episode, yet his intellectual contribution remained active. His role extended beyond organising occasional congresses: he publicised the contributions of Black people in Africa and the African diaspora to humanity, giving Pan-Africanism an intellectual and historical dimension.
Du Bois’s books continued a genre he had pioneered with The Negro in 1915. Black folk then and now, published in 1939, surveyed African and diaspora history and culture from ancient to modern times. The work defended the creativity and validity of African culture through the ages and presented the history of the diaspora as a vital part of African history and of the history of Africans.
The extract places Du Bois within an older generation of Pan-African leaders whose organisational influence had declined by 1940. No congress had been held since the New York Congress of 1927, but his writings continued to stimulate readers on subjects that were little known and to present Africa as a historical whole rather than as a collection of separate colonial territories.