Throughout this period there was a gradual build-up of a new spirit of

nationalism
among the African peoples, particularly in the more advanced countries of
North
Africa, but also in the rest of Africa, led by the better educated Africans.
After the Second World War nationalist movements in Africa quickly gained
momentum.
And many more Africans had by now received the beginnings of a modern
education and begun to take an interest in political matters.
In many parts of Africa outstanding leaders arose - such men as Kwame
Nkrumah of the Gold Coast, Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya, Julius Nyerere of
Tanzania, Sékou Touré of (French) Guinea, Houphouet- Boigny of Ivory
Coast.
The following entry discusses the literary and ideological movement amongst
French-speaking black intellectuals during the 1930s, in opposition to the
political and economic oppression of colonialism, and espousing a
reaffirmation of traditional African culture and identity.
Negritude is characterized by many scholars as a formative movement of
African literature, a significant ideological and literary development that
originated during the 1930s. In essence, the movement aimed to break
down established boundaries and stereotypes of blacks that had been
cultivated through several centuries of colonial rule. Led largely by a small
group of writers living in France, including Léopold Sédar Senghor, Léon
Damas, and Aimé Césaire, Negritude gained popularity among many black
intellectuals over the next few decades, inspiring works of literature, poetry,
and drama that celebrated black identity and culture as integral and
dominant elements of the art of these writers.
Negritude was both literary and ideological mvt led by French speaking black
writer’s intellectuals from France colonies in Africa and Caribbean. The mvt is
marked by its rejection of European colonization and its rule in the African
diaspora, pride in blackness and traditional African values and culture.
Pan-Africanism is an ideology that purports Africans and people of African
descent share a common past and destiny. This mutual understanding of the
past and future portrays how Africans and people of African descent mobilize
against colonialism, racial discrimination, and social, economic, political, and
cultural exploitation
The chapter discusses African ideologies from the eighteenth to the twenty-
first centuries. Two distinguishing characteristics are identified: a definition
and promotion of human rights for Africans, and a global authorship of
continental Africans and their descendants in the African Diaspora. The
movement of ideologies between Africans and their descendents in the New
World served to cross-fertilize political movements such as Pan-Africanism,
many of which were formulated outside the continent. Key ideologies
discussed include African Abolitionism and anti-colonialism, African Socialism
and Marxism, the Non-Aligned Movement, Negritude, ujamaa, ubuntu,
African feminism, environmentalism, and postcolonialism. Emerging as a
response to racist Western ideologies, African responses were directed
initially to Western audiences. The attempt to vindicate African humanity
and human rights has evolved to an assertion of African contributions to
world history and culture and to an engagement with African communities to
promote a postcolonial independence.