Important Subject; Careless Presentation, August 14, 2011
By
Jim from Oaktown (Oakland, California) -
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This review is from: Hidden Colors: The Untold History Of People Of Aboriginal,Moor,and African Descent (DVD)
In the interests of full disclosure, I'll begin this review by stating that I'm an old white guy, and an amateur in the field of history. I'll also confess that I was able to sit through only the Introduction on the DVD, which had been brought to me by a person of color who wanted my opinion on the material. Why didn't I study the entire DVD, before beginning this review?--Because the Intro revealed an indifference to historical fact, and an outright contempt for the need for solid evidence to back up the assertions made by the various contributors.
For an example of indifference to historical fact, let's take the assertion in the Intro that the Roman general Scipio Africanus was given the right to name "Africa" after himself, that being the right granted to the conqueror of a territory. As a matter of historical fact, he was given the title "Africanus" after his victory over the Carthaginians (in an area the Romans knew as "Africa"), just as the legendary Gaius Marcius Coriolanus was given the title "Coriolanus" after his herioc actions in capturing the city of the Corioli. (This information is easy enough to find: see Wikipedia, for example.) A small point?--Maybe, but history is composed of small facts adding up to a complete story. Indifference to small facts is a very bad sign for the accuracy of the full story.
Here's a more significant item: the Intro asserts that the Vatican controlled the entire field of Egyptology in order to "filter out" anything that might make persons of color look better (wiser, more skilled, more knowledgable) than whites. I can readily believe that individual Egyptologist (particularly in the late 19th-early 20th centuries, when the study of ancient times became a popular fad) were racist, even bigoted, and allowed their bias to influence their work, but the idea that a vast conspiracy stemming from the Vatican was quietly accepted by all, or even most, Egyptologists, is ludicrous. Why would a Protestant Egyptologist go along with such a conspiracy? Why wouldn't he make an enormous public fuss, instead, if approached by a representative of Rome with a proposal to distort or lie about his findings?--Protestants and Catholics, regardless of race, were not exactly "buddies," at the beginning of the 20th century. If the evidence exists for such a conspiracy, it would rock the academic world: proving its existence would be worth an entire DVD all by itself. If the evidence doesn't exist, why include this empty conspiracy theory in the story?
It's absolutely true that the contributions to world culture of people of color--Africans, Asians, Native Americans--have been greatly neglected by mainstream (mostly white) historians and anthropologists. How to restore the balance?--The way to restore the balance is through solid evidence, not mere assertion. For example, see the book "1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus," by Charles Mann, who was inspired to write a book for the non-academic reader (a book that would include recent discoveries about the pre-Columbian world, many obtained by the use of new scientific methods and new scientific data) after discovering that his young son's school books contained the same tired old stories about the New World that he himself had read, as a boy. Mann is careful to provide the evidence for each astonishing revelation, and to include conflicting theories about the evidence, as well.
A book of "New Revelations" for Africa, based on science and solid historical research, has yet to be produced. It's very unfortunate that "Hidden Colors" has drafted speculation, unsupported assertions, and conspiracy theories to fill the gap left by this omission.
NOTE ADDED 7-8-2012: Since posting the above review, I purchased a copy of Hidden Colors, and watched the entire movie, start to finish.
Information that I found of interest include the following items:
--Names of the ancient kingdoms of Africa
--Names of European aristocrats, artists, and intellectuals of African origin, such as Angelo Soliman (a fascinating character!)
--The 18th-century African-American genius Benjamin Banneker and his (possibly) Dogon roots
--The African roots of Freemasonry.
Unfortunately, these are mentioned only in passing, among assertions with no supporting evidence, such as the following:
--That a wide variety of Asian ethnic groups, like the Ainu(!), were "African" (what does "African" mean, in this context?--Is there any evidence that their origin was in Africa?)
--That the Celtic Druids were a priesthood of African origin
--That Memphis, the capital of ancient Egypt, was located in America(!!), and that there was frequent travel between Egypt and America
--That the Malian Emporer Mansa Musa (died c. 1337) was the same person as the Aztec leader Montezuma (born c. 1446).
--That Hypatia (who was African, but probably of Greek origin) was killed by the Romans because she was too brilliant for their liking (she was actually murdered by Christian fanatics, for both political and religious reasons).
Personally, I found some of the assertions about languages--the incorrect etymologies for the words "Christ," "Europe," and "kraal," and the statement that Arabic didn't "exist" until codified by the Qur'an--especially annoying.
Each of these errors could easily be identified from readily available historical references, and edited out of the movie, so my initial verdict--that this movie was carelessly edited, and that it is consequently unreliable as a documentary--still stands. It might be useful to viewers as a starting point for their own research projects, but--as the Amazon reviewer "jojo" remarked--"be prepared to cross check everything."
Your definition of "associating with blackness" is dikkriding Tariq Nasheed's nonsense...or is it dikkriding Ron Paul and saying black people should join the tea party? I don't know. You change your entire ideological worldview about once every fiscal quarter.
@these responses. Apparently you're c00n/cac if you don't believe in a bullshyt propaganda documentary riddled with with historical falsehoods and pseudoscience. 
Goes to show how some people like to be in hermetically-sealed bubbles of their own reality and can't stand it to be questioned. Y'all are only into this HC shyt because it makes you feel good, not because it's truth.
. A cac?
