Dr. John Henrik Clarke
Jan. 15, 1915 to Jul. 16, 1998

The following article by excerpted from larger work originally published;
 Los Angeles Times, 3/03/1991, Part E, Page 1, "Elder Statesmen An Era Is Passing for Five Authors Known for Reclaiming the Role of Blacks in History," by Yemi Toure

John Henrik Clarke was born in Union Springs, Alabama on New Years Day, 1915. His family came from a long line of sharecroppers.

Clarke noticed that although many bible stories "unfolded in Africa...I saw no African people in the printed and illustrated Sunday school lessons," he wrote in 1985. "I began to suspect at this early age that someone had distorted the image of my people. My long search for the true history of African people the world over began."

That search took him to libraries, museums, attics, archives and collections in Asia, the Caribbean, Europe, Latin America and Africa.

What he found was that the history of black people is worldwide; that "the first light of human consciousness and the world's first civilizations were in Africa"; that the so called Dark Ages were dark only for Europe and that some African nations at the time were larger than any in Europe; that as Africa sends its children to Europe to study because that is where the best universities are, early Greece once sent its children to Africa to study because that was where the best universities were; and that slavery, although devastating was neither the beginning nor the end of Black people's impact on the world.

Clarke gathered his findings into books on such figures as the early 20th century mass movement leader Marcus Garvey, into articles with titles like "Africa in the Conquest of Spain" and "Harlem as mecca and New Jerusalem," and many books including American Heritage's two volume "History of Africa."

While he was teaching at Hunter College in New York and at Cornell University in the 1980's, Clarke's lesson plans became well known for their thoroughness. They are so filled with references and details that the Schomburg Library in Harlem asked for copies. Clarke plans to provide them, he said, "so that 50 years from now, when people have a hard time locating my grave, they won't have a hard time locating my lessons."

In 1985, the year of his retirement, the newest branch of the Cornell University Library- a 60 seat, 9,000 volume facility- was named the "John Henrik Clarke Africana Library."

 
Dr. John Henrik Clarke's "A Great and Mighty Walk," an excellent historical film narrated by actor Wesley Snipes. View it here.

John Henrik Clarke and the Power of Africana History: Africalogical Quest for Decolonization and Sovereignty
Click to order via Amazon

Paperback: 368 pages
Publisher: Africa World Press; First edition (December 2, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1592216277
ISBN-13: 978-1592216277
Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.9 x 0.8 inches

In the late 1960s through the late 1980s, the late John Henrik Clarke (1915-1998) was one of the foremost architects of the emerging discipline of Africana Studies/Africalogy as Professor of African World History in the Department of Black and Puerto Rican Studies at Hunter College of the City University of New York and as the Carter G. Woodson Distinguished Visiting Professor of African History at Cornell University’s Africana Studies and Research Center.

The study explores Clarke’s development and conceptualization of Afrikan World History by examining his intellectual influences and training, his approach to teaching Afrikan World History, his notions regarding Afrikan agency and Afrikan humanity, his explorations of themes of Pan Afrikanism and national sovereignty, his ideas concerning the relevance of Afrikan culture in historical perspective, and his legacy in Afrikan intellectualism and culture, including his contribution to the Afrocentric paradigm that is the core of the discipline of Africana Studies/Africalogy.

As an academician and intellectual, Clarke emerged as one of the leading theorists of Afrikan liberation and the uses of Afrikan history as a foundation and grounding for liberation. Under Clarke’s formulation liberation was defined not simply as freedom from European domination, but fundamentally as the restoration of Afrikan sovereignty. He explored history’s utility in moving an oppressed and subordinated people from a position of subjugation on multiple levels to full status as a self-sustaining, self-defining, self-directed, free, and independent people on a global stage.

Further, the study examines the influence of indigenous Afrikan intellectualism in the United States in Afrikan cultural and intellectual history. Although a leader among European academy-trained Afrikan intellectuals who joined the European academy largely beginning in the 1970s, Clarke’s education and training were the product of a movement for the indigenization of Afrikan academic intellectualism in Harlem of the 1930s that can be traced back to the early nineteenth century. This is the first extensive critical examination of Clarke as an exemplar of indigenous intellectualism in Afrikan culture in the United States.

About the Author
Ahati N. N. Toure is Assistant Professor of Africana History and Black Studies at Delaware State University. He earned his Ph.D. in American History at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and an MA in Africana Studies at the State University of New York at Albany. He is the author of several essays exploring subjects in Africalogy and in Africana History, including “John Henrik Clarke and Issues in Afrikan Historiography: Implications of Pan Afrikan Nationalism in Interpreting the Afrikan Experience in the United States” in Pan African Nationalism in the Americas: The Life and Times of John Henrik Clarke published by Africa World Press.

John Henrik Clarke: A Great and Mighty Walk (DVD):

Release Year: 1996
Cast: Wesley Snipes
Director: Saint Clair Bourne
Categories: Historical Film
Running Time: 95 minutes

Grand Jury Prize/Best Documentary, UrbanWorld Film Festival

This video chronicles the life and times of the noted African-American historian, scholar and Pan-African activist John Henrik Clarke (1915-1998). Both a biography of Clarke himself and an overview of 5,000 years of African history, the film offers a provocative look at the past through the eyes of a leading proponent of an Afrocentric view of history. From ancient Egypt and Africa’s other great empires, Clarke moves through Mediterranean borrowings, the Atlantic slave trade, European colonization, the development of the Pan-African movement, and present-day African-American history.

“...compelling…this look at an important though little-known African-American leader deserves to be seen. Recommended for large black history collections.” - Video Librarian

“Clarke’s insights are challenging, thoughtful, and excellent starting points for class discussion. The work, like its subject, is organized, scholarly, and substantial." - School Library Journal

"...a veritable tour de force, plotting history from Africa’s ethnographic presence, dating back to the early Egyptian dynasties to the Million Man March...The film is equal parts Baptist sermon and history." - New York Amsterdam News

Related Links

Virtual Museum
http://www.nbufront.org/html/MastersMuseums/JHClarke/JHCvmuseum.html

THE HARLEM WRITERS' GUILD
http://www.harlemwritersguild.com/

The Harlem Writers Guild is a community of writers of African descent whose mission is to preserve the experience of black people in the written word.

The Guild was founded as a writers workshop in the "Village" of Harlem in New York City in 1950. The founding members included: Dr. John Henrik Clarke, Rosa Guy, John Oliver Killens, Walter Christmas.

Tel. number 212 946-1534
e-mail hwg1950@aol.com