ABSTRACT
In this book, I have argued that the supposed blackness of African peoples is not due to the colour of their skin but that they have been blackened because of certain ideas and values generated and held about them in the European sociocultural milieu. I undertook historical, theological, egalitarian and conceptual analyses of the term ‘black’ as it has been applied to African peoples. Historically, I analysed the genesis and evolution of the use of the term ‘black’ to describe and categorise Africans, and the consequences of this practice. Theologically, I explored the symbolic and categorical use of the term ‘black’ in the Bible and in early Christian literature, and the consequences of this practice. Conceptually, I delved into the meaning of the categorical use of black, its ontological and epistemological status and the implications of its use to describe and categorise Africans. Finally, from an egalitarian perspective, I contend that the use of the term ‘black’, on the one hand, to symbolise what is evil, bad and socially objectionable, and, on the other hand, to describe and categorise African peoples constitutes anti-African racism because this dual usage of the term ‘black’ has resulted in the establishment of a correlation between the negative symbolism of the concept ‘black’ and its human referents.
