Africans

The term African people can be used in two ways:

Firstly, the term may refer to all people who live in Africa, regardless of ancestry, see also demographics of Africa.

It is also commonly used to describe people who trace their recent ancestry to indigenous inhabitants of Africa, in particular Sub-Saharan Africa, that is including members of the "African diaspora" due to Atlantic slave trade since the 15th century, but not including Sub-Saharan DNA admixture in Europe or prehistoric "out of Africa" migrations (which would derive all humans from Africa). Many people who live outside Africa, such as African Americans, identify themselves as African in this sense.

The term Black people is often used as a synonym for dark-skinned people of recent African descent, particularly in the Americas, and Europe, although the two terms are not synonymous in many other countries.

The indigenous population of Africa does not form a single ethnic group, and not all of the indigenous peoples of Africa have "black" skin colour. Indeed, the genetic variation in indigenous Africans is greater than that of populations in any other continent, including, for instance L1 and L2 as well as the more widespread L3 mtDNA haplogroups.

The inhabitants of Africa

The population of Africa is one of the most diverse in the world, genetically, culturally and linguistically.

Prehistoric populations

Family resemblances have probably been apparent and noted during all of human history, but during the second half of the twentieth century, information became available that could link very specific and measurable traits to the genetic inheritance of those who bore those traits. As with a photograph that is being put up random pixel by random pixel, it has often been impossible to guess how later-arriving pixels would modify and complete the picture. Sometime alternating ways of interpolating data have been suggested and the dots have been joined in competing ways. This process of gathering more information, retesting old hypotheses, and sometimes forming new hypotheses continues today. As more and more of the total picture fills in, it becomes less and less likely that radical changes in the general outlines of the picture can occur. Choices of what data to look at, and how to interpret it, have resulted in some contending pictures, but in general the picture has only become clearer as more information has become available.

File:African Genetics (primal).jpg

Study of Mitochondrial DNA show that the original Homo sapiens sapiens population in Africa has diverged into three main lines of descent, identified as L1, L2, and L3. See the world map here.

Perhaps it is a function of the number of excavations actually performed in given areas, but it is at least suggestive that the five very earliest out of the twelve of earliest archaeological discoveries of Homo sapiens sapiens have been in Africa and the adjacent Arabian peninsula. (Homo sapiens neanderthalensis and even more remote members of the genus Homo have their own sites and are not considered here.)

When genetic information became available, it appeared more and more likely that the earliest population of Homo sapiens sapiens evolved first in Africa and later spread over the globe from that single point of origin. Skeletal information available from these earliest sites does not provide information regarding skin color or other adaptations of features of human beings that interact most directly with the local environment.

As early as 1964, A. W. F. Edwards and others had discovered that three populations in Africa were related but distinguishable on the basis of a relatively small set of genetic information (20 alleles). Those populations were called Tigre (Ethiopians), Bantu (in southern Africa), and Ghanaian (West Africa).

When general anthropometrics were taken as the criteria for grouping, the African population was split into a different three groups: the more closely related Pygmy (such as the Mbuti) and Bushmen (such as the Khoisan) and the Bantu.

By 1988 more genetic details were known, more groups could be distinguished on the basis of genetic information, but the relationships among these groups were accounted as different depending on which was the data was construed. The groups analyzed at this time were Bantu, Berber and North African, Ethiopian, Mbuti Pygmy, Nilotic, San (Bushman), West African.

In 1994, Cavalli-Sforza Menozzi, and Piazza systematized information in their major publication, The History and Geography of Human Genes, Fig. 2.3.5, p. 82. The chart given there mentions much the same list: West African, Nilo-Saharan, Bantu, Mbuti, East African, San and Berber. Note that the list is given in rough sequence, bottom to top, of the lower right quadrant in which they are all graphed. It says nothing about the historical sequences connecting these groups. The San are regarded as being most similar in anthropometric terms to the archaeological information regarding the earliest Homo sapiens sapiens. Other groups may have diverged more and more from the ancestral San types (and their progeny) as a result of moving into more and more different environments. The East Africans and the Berbers are located closest to the land connection to the rest of the world by way of which early Africans must have migrated out into the rest of the world, and through which any travelers from outside Africa may have occasionally returned to their ancestral homeland in the course of their wanderings.

A representation of genetic distances by one analysis

The linguistic differences among these populations correspond closely to their genetic differences except in the case of the Mbuti who appear to have adopted another language for their own.

In his recent book, Spencer Wells traces the migration of the early Africans beyond their own continent by noting the appearance of new genetic markers on the Y-chromosome as the migrations progressed.

Studies of mitochondrial DNA conducted within the continent of Africa have shown that the indigenous population has diverged into three diverent main lines of descent.

A number of other scholars such as Alan Templeton hold that support is found for traditional racial categories only because many studies use the pre-defined categories to begin with, and subsequently insert data into those categories rather than let the data speak for themselves. Tempeton uses modern DNA analysis to argue that human "races" were never "pure", and that human evolution is based on "many locally differentiated populations coexisting at any given time" - a single lineage with many locally gradated variants, all sharing a common fate. Likewise Tishkoff and Kidd maintain that while there are very broad geographical clusterings of populations, slicing these up into racial zones or classifications do not adequately describe the distribution of genetic variation in humans or their evolution. The broad pattern is indicative of genetic drift from African origins of mankind, followed by expansion out of Africa and across the rest of the globe.

Researchers such as Richard Lewontin maintain that most of the variation (80-85%) within human population is found within local geographic groups and differences attributable to traditional "race" groups are a minor part of human genetic variability (1-15%). (Richard Lewontin, "The Apportionment of Human Diversity," Evolutionary Biology, vol. 6 (1972) pp. 391-398). Several other researchers (Barbajuni, Latter, Dean, et. al) have replicated Lewontin's results. According to a study by researcher L. Luca Cavalli-Sforza:

"It is often taken for granted that the human species is divided in rather homogeneous groups or races, among which biological differences are large. Studies of allele frequencies do not support this view, but they have not been sufficient to rule it out either. We analyzed human molecular diversity at 109 DNA markers, namely 30 microsatellite loci and 79 polymorphic restriction sites (restriction fragment length polymorphism loci) in 16 populations of the world. By partitioning genetic variances at three hierarchical levels of population subdivision, we found that differences between members of the same population account for 84.4% of the total, which is in excellent agreement with estimates based on allele frequencies of classic, protein polymorphisms. Genetic variation remains high even within small population groups. On the average, microsatellite and restriction fragment length polymorphism loci yield identical estimates. Differences among continents represent roughly 1/10 of human molecular diversity, which does not suggest that the racial subdivision of our species reflects any major discontinuity in our genome."

In the wake of this research, a number of writers question the classification of African peoples like Ethiopians into "Caucasian" groups, holding that given the minor proportion of human genetic diversity attributable to "race", grouping of such African peoples is arbitrary and flawed, and that DNA analysis points to a range or gradation of types rather than distinct racial categories. Rather than arbitrarily allocating such African groups to a European "race", the range of physical characteristics like skin color, hair or facial features are more than adequately covered by the 80-85% of differentiation within local geographic groupings. In addition, they argue, African peoples show a wide range of human variation, but that racial models often depend on definition of African peoples as a stereotypical "true type" south of the Sahara- allowing certain northeast African groups to be assigned elsewhere - while making no attempt to follow the same approach with European peoples.

Indigenous peoples and ancient settlers

Speakers of Bantu languages (part of the Niger-Congo language family) are the majority in southern, central and east Africa proper. But there are also several Nilotic groups in East Africa, and a few remaining indigenous Khoisan ('San' or 'Bushmen') and Pygmy peoples in southern and central Africa, respectively. Bantu-speaking Africans also predominate in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea, and are found in parts of southern Cameroon and southern Somalia. In the Kalahari Desert of Southern Africa, the distinct people known as the Bushmen (also "San", closely related to, but distinct from "Hottentots") have long been present. The San are physically distinct from other Africans and are the indigenous people of southern Africa. Pygmies are the pre-Bantu indigenous peoples of central Africa.

The peoples of North Africa comprise two main groups; Berber and Arabic-speaking peoples in the west, and Egyptians in the east. The Arabs who arrived in the seventh century introduced the Arabic language and Islam to North Africa. The Semitic Phoenicians, the European Greeks, Romans and Vandals settled in North Africa as well. Berbers still make up the majority in Morocco, while they are a significant minority within Algeria. They are also present in Tunisia and Libya. The Tuareg and other often-nomadic peoples are the principal inhabitants of the Saharan interior of North Africa. Nubians are a Nilo-Saharan-speaking group (though many also speak Arabic), who developed an ancient civilization in northeast Africa.

Some Ethiopian and Eritrean groups (like the Amhara and Tigrayans, collectively known as "Habesha") speak Semitic languages. The Oromo and Somali peoples speak Cushitic languages, but some Somali clans trace their founding to legendary Arab founders. Sudan and Mauritania are divided between a mostly Arabized north and a native African south (although the "Arabs" of Sudan clearly have a predominantly native African ancestry themselves). Some areas of East Africa, particularly the island of Zanzibar and the Kenyan island of Lamu, received Arab Muslim and Southwest Asian settlers and merchants throughout the Middle Ages and in antiquity.

Modern Colonisation

European

Beginning in the sixteenth century, Europeans such as the Portuguese and Dutch began to establish trading posts and forts along the coasts of western and southern Africa. Eventually, a large number of Dutch augmented by French Huguenots and Germans settled in what is today South Africa. Their descendants, the Afrikaners and the Coloureds, are the largest European-descended groups in Africa today. In the nineteenth century, a second phase of colonization brought a large number of French and British settlers to Africa. The Portuguese settled mainly in Angola, but also in Mozambique. The French settled in large numbers in Algeria where they became known collectively as pieds-noirs, and on a smaller scale in other areas of North and West Africa as well as in Madagascar. The British settled chiefly in South Africa as well as the colony of Rhodesia, and in the highlands of what is now Kenya. Germans settled in what is now Tanzania and Namibia, and there is still a population of German-speaking white Namibians. Smaller numbers of European soldiers, businessmen, and officials also established themselves in administrative centers such as Nairobi and Dakar. Decolonization during the 1960s often resulted in the mass emigration of European-descended settlers out of Africa — especially from Algeria, Angola, Kenya and Rhodesia. However, in South Africa and Namibia, the white minority remained politically dominant after independence from Europe, and a significant population of Europeans remained in these two countries even after democracy was finally instituted at the end of the Cold War. South Africa has also become the preferred destination of white Anglo-Zimbabweans, and of migrants from all over southern Africa.

Indian

European colonization also brought sizable groups of Asians, particularly people from the Indian subcontinent, to British colonies. Large Indian communities are found in South Africa, and smaller ones are present in Kenya, Tanzania, and some other southern and east African countries. The large Indian community in Uganda was expelled by the dictator Idi Amin in 1972, though many have since returned. The islands in the Indian Ocean are also populated primarily by people of Asian origin, often mixed with Africans and Europeans. The Malagasy people of Madagascar are a Austronesian people, but those along the coast are generally mixed with Bantu, Arab, Indian and European origins. Malay and Indian ancestries are also important components in the group of people known in South Africa as Cape Coloureds (people with origins in two or more races and continents).

Others

During the past century or so, small but economically important colonies of Lebanese and Chinese have also developed in the larger coastal cities of West and East Africa, respectively.

Contemporary Demographics

Main article: Demographics of Africa

Total population of Africa is estimated at 888 million as of 2006, projected to reach 1 billion by 2015.

The demographics of Africa is characterized by high population growth, high infant mortality, low life expectancy (partly due to malnutrition and HIV) and poverty (low Human development index).

These characteristics mostly apply to Central and sub-Saharan Africa, with the Mediterranean (Arabic) North and South Africa showing different patterns.

African-descended people outside Africa

Main article: African diaspora

There are substantial newcomer populations of people descended from indigenous Africans outside Africa, most notably in the United States and the Caribbean, as a result of the forcible removal of their ancestors from Africa through slavery. There are also large populations of people of African descent in many South and Central American countries such as; Brazil, Suriname, Guyana, Panama, and Belize. Brazil received one of the largest amounts of African slaves out of all of the countries in the Americas and today has the largest population of people of African descent of any country outside of Africa.

There are also substantial minority populations in Europe of African-descended people who emigrated to Europe, and Europe is a popular destination for recent migrants from Africa.

Recently, the idea of an African diaspora, encompassing all people of African identity regardless of where they live, has emerged. There are substantial newcomer populations of people descended from indigenous Africans outside Africa, most notably in the United States and the Caribbean, as a result of the forcible removal of their ancestors from Africa by the historical Atlantic slave trade. There are also large populations of people of African descent in many South and Central American countries such as; Brazil, Suriname, Guyana, Panama, and Belize. Brazil received one of the largest amounts of African slaves out of all of the countries in the Americas and today has the largest population of people of African descent of any country outside of Africa.

There are also substantial minority populations in Europe of African-descended people who emigrated to Europe, and Europe is a popular destination for recent migrants from Africa.

African identity

The term "African" has been used to describe people in a wide variety of contexts.

African Americans

In particular, people who identify themsevels as African American explicitly identify themselves as Africans, although in many cases they and their ancestors have lived outside Africa for hundreds of years.

Back to Africa movement

The Black nationalist Marcus Garvey was an important proponent of the Back-to-Africa movement, which encouraged those of African descent to return to their ancestral homelands. This movement would eventually inspire other movements ranging from the Nation of Islam to the Rastafari movement, which proclaimed him a prophet. Garvey said he wanted those of African ancestry to "redeem" Africa and for the European colonial powers to leave it.

See also

• Category:Ethnic groups in Africa for a list of articles about the ethnic groups of Africa