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Walter Rodney

Walter Rodney Quotes

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Famous Walter Rodney Quotes

“In response to the demand for more black culture and history, the national bourgeoisie of the U.S.A. has adopted a technique different from that of their neo-colonialist puppets in the West Indies. Having that security which comes from the possession of capital, they feel confident in making certain concessions to black culture in their educational institutions and media of public communications. As always, they concede the lesser demand to maintain the total structure of white capitalist domination, hoping to siphon off young blacks into a preoccupation with African history and culture divorced from the raw reality of the American system as it operates on both the domestic and international fronts. That gambit must not work. Imagine the juicy contradictions — Rockefeller finances chair on African history from the profits of exploiting South African blacks and upholding apartheid! Black revolutionaries study African culture alongside of researchers into germ warfare against the Vietnamese people! We blacks in the Americas have missed the opportunity when a more leisurely appraisal of our past might have been possible.”

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Book:The Groundings with My Brothers
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“From the beginning, Europe assumed the power to make decisions within the international trading system. An excellent illustration of that is the fact that the so-called international law which governed the conduct of nations on the high seas was nothing else but European law. Africans did not participate in its making, and in many instances, African people were simply the victims, for the law recognized them only as transportable merchandise. If the African slave was thrown overboard at sea, the only legal problem that arose was whether or not the slave ship could claim compensation from the insurers! Above all, European decision-making power was exercised in selecting what Africa should export – in accordance with European needs.”

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Book:How Europe Underdeveloped Africa
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“There were a few farsighted Europeans who all along saw that the colonial educational system would serve them if and when political independence was regained in Africa. For instance, Pierre Foncin, a founder of the Alliance Francaise, stated at the beginning of this century that "it is necessary to attach the colonies to the metropolis by a very solid psychological bond, against the day when their progressive emancipation ends in a federation as is probable that they be and they remain French in language, thought and spirit.”

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Book:How Europe Underdeveloped Africa
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