ABSTRACT
In London, for instance, the very first meeting of representatives of the African diaspora was convened in 1900 by the Trinidadian lawyer, Henry Sylvester Williams, for the purpose of renegotiating colonial and imperial relations to better the global lot of the Black race. The Pan-African conference, so nobly conceptualized by Henry Sylvester Williams, was to be the forerunner of a succession of Pan-African Congresses led by W. E. B. Du Bois over the next half century after Williams' untimely death in 1912. Entering Harvard as a junior, Du Bois studied politics and philosophy and kept up his interest in Germany. To most Americans, and especially to most Black people, the name Du Bois triggers a moment of iconic recognition of one of the most legendary figures of Black history. Europe in general and Germany in particular were revelations to Du Bois. They connected him to larger humankind in a way he had not found possible in America.
