African Kingdom Notes

regional networks

  • trade networks that connected communities across different regions

  • ex. eurasia, mesoamerica, malacca, etc.

  • types of change:

    • spreading new ideas

    • creating new relationships

    • growth of major cities

    • changing of social hierarchies

emigration

  • leaving a country / region to settle in another

immigration

  • entering a country or region with the intent to settle there

Why do people migrate?

  • economic opportunity

  • education

  • family

  • environmental factors

  • conflict

  • religion

  • demographic features

  • labor standards

Push / Pull Factors

  • push factors cause people to move away

  • pull factors cause people to move in

The Bantu

  • farmers and nomads who spoke various dialects of Bantu language

  • most prevalent in west Africa

    • Nigeria

    • Cameroon

    • Gabon

  • agriculture

    • millet

    • sorghum

    • dry rice

    • beans

    • oil palms

    • melons

  • metalwork

    • iron from iron ore

  • craftsmen

    • pottery

    • weaving

  • traders

  • learned from

    • themselves

    • Phoenicians

    • Egyptians / Kushites

  • migration: 2000 BCE - 1200 CE

    • brought the abilities to metalwork and cultivate high-yield crops

    • traced by their language

    • migrated to colonize, lack of resources, inter-tribal conflict, and resource competition

    • impact: deforestation, village settlements, and spread their food everywhere

  • migrated South and East, and dominated with the exception of South Africa, the Namibian desert, and the south of Nigeria and Kenya

oral history

  • the collection and study of historical information using sound recordings of interviews with people having personal knowledge of past events

  • non-western countries: oral history refers to the way that cultures passed down their history from generation to generation

  • often discredited due to being believed to be biased and unreliable / inaccurate

griots

  • high-ranking people in a West African tribe

  • comes from European languages