Listen Siblings, I come in peace,
“Europeans and Asians corrupt our children so much that our children see them as protectors and teachers.” — Onitaset Kumat
Today’s article discusses the “K” in Afrika. It’s an informative reading toward remembering ourselves. This is one of the goals of African Blood Siblings. Subscribe and subscribe your friends to assist in our reawakening. Applying yourself to building African Blood Siblings Community Centers is a most noble gesture. Apply today: Write the ABS. Subscribe, share, love.
Why spell Afrika with a K?
Posted: February 17, 2002
An analysis by
Dr. Kwame NantambuAccording to the Afrikan-American poet and writer Haki Madhubuti in his From Plan to Planet (1973), there are basically four reasons to spell Afrika with a K.
They are:
1. Most vernacular or traditional languages on the Continent spell Afrika with a K. K is germane to Afrika.2. Europeans particularly the Portuguese and British, polutted Afrikan languages by substituting ‘C’ whenever they saw ‘K’ or heard the ‘K’ sound B as in Kongo and Congo, Akkra and Accra, Konakri and Conakry B by substituting Q whenever they saw KW. No European language outside of Dutch and German has the hard ‘C’ sound. Thus, we see the Dutch in Azania calling and spelling themselves Afrikaaners.
We are not certain of the origin of the name Afrika, but we are sure the name spelled with ‘C’ came into use when Afrikans were dispersed over the world. There the ‘K’ symbolizes our coming back together again.
3. The ‘K’ symbolizes a kind of Lingua Afrikana, coming into use along with such words and phrases as Habari Gani, Osagyfo, Uhuru, Asante, together constituting one political language, although coming from more than one Afrikan language.
4. As long as Afrikan languages are translated (written) into English, etc., the European alphabet will be used. This is the problem. The letter ‘K’ as with the letter ‘C’, is part of that alphabet, and at some point must be totally discontinued with the original name of Afrika used. The fact that Boers (peasants) in Azania also use the ‘K’, as in Afrikan to represent the hard ‘C’ sound demonstrates one of the confinements of the alphabet. Azania is the original name for South Afrika.
Shem Hotep (“I go in peace”).
Dr. Nantambu is an Associate Professor, Dept. of Pan-African Studies, Kent State University, U.S.A.
Source: http://www.trinicenter.com/kwame/2002/Feb/172002.htm
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thank you as I often wonder what the meaning of that actually is.
The word “Africa” originated as the Roman name for the lands across the Mediterranean Sea to the south. They had no direct knowledge of the sub-Saharan area of the continent, although they received trade goods from there. The classical Roman alphabet did not contain a letter K. The original Roman alphabet also had no lower-case letters. They would have written it “AFRICA.”