Best quotes by John Henrik Clarke on History

Checkout quotes by John Henrik Clarke on History

• ‟ History is not everything, but it is a starting point. History is a clock that people use to tell their political and cultural time of day. It is a compass they use to find themselves on the map of human geography. It tells them where they are but, more importantly, what they must be.

  - John Henrik Clarke
  

• ‟ When the early Europeans first met Africans, at the crossroads of history, it was a respectful meeting and the Africans were not slaves. Their nations were old before Europe was born.

  - John Henrik Clarke
  

• ‟ It is unfortunate that so much of the history of Africa has been written by conquerors, foreigners, missionaries and adventurers. The Egyptians left the best record of their history written by local writers.

  - John Henrik Clarke
  

• ‟ I saw no African people in the printed and illustrated Sunday school lessons. I began to suspect at this early age that someone had distorted the image of my people. My long search for the true history of African people the world over began.

  - John Henrik Clarke
  

• ‟ In the closing years of the nineteenth century, African-American historians began to look at their people's history from their vantage point and their point of view.

  - John Henrik Clarke
  

• ‟ I want to make it clear that the black race did not come to the United States culturally empty-handed. The role and importance of ethnic history is in how well it teaches a people to use their own talents, take pride in their own history and love their own memories.

  - John Henrik Clarke
  

• ‟ My daddy wanted me to be a farmer; feel the smoothness of Alabama clay and become one of the first blacks in my town to own land. But, I was worried about my history being caked with that southern clay, and I subscribed to a different kind of teaching and learning in my bones and in my spirit.

  - John Henrik Clarke
  

• ‟ The acceptance of the facts of African-American history and the African-American historian as a legitimate part of the academic community did not come easily. Slavery ended and left its false images of black people intact.

  - John Henrik Clarke
  

• ‟ I am a nationalist, and a Pan-Africanist, first and foremost. I was well grounded in history before ever taking a history course. I did not spend much formal time in school - I had to work.

  - John Henrik Clarke