Conclusion

Abstract

The term African-American myth has been used in this book to refer to the welter of images and conceptions in Africa concerning African-Americans and the country they lived in. The United States occupied a unique place in the minds of Africans. More than any other country in the New World, the United States fired the imagination of Africans, who believed it to be a land of unlimited opportunity for people in general and for members of the black race in particular. That positive picture of the United States issued in a similarly positive image of the African-Americans who lived there. The positive image of the American blacks was inseparable from the image of the country itself. Landmarks in the history of the United States, events that related specifically to the black community, white American leaders who seemed to favor black development and equality, and black American celebrities — all these provided kindling that kept the flame of the American myth burning in Africa. Africans perceived African-Americans to have advantages which they themselves, subject as they were to colonial or white minority rule, only dreamed of. Blacks in America were free citizens. As Africans saw it, the federal government pursued a policy of equal rights for blacks, opposing the discriminatory regulations enacted by southern states. Large portions of the American white community openly supported black initiatives and donated money to black colleges.