ABSTRACT
“Black,” “African,” “African descendent” and of “African heritage” are just some of the ways Africans and Africans in the diaspora (both old and new) describe themselves. This volume seeks to understand concepts of race, ethnicity, and identity as they are ascribed to black people around the world. The essays in the volume examine the different ways the process of identity formation has occurred and is changing as a result of globalization and increased interactions with global forces. It also seeks to examine how identity influences African agency, that is, how people of African heritage maneuver between race and their identities in successful ways within different context throughout the world. To best illustrate these processes, this volume has collected case studies of populations at stake. These populations do not exist in the mainstream, and as a result must grapple with more than just issues of race, ethnicity, and identity. The goal of this volume is to bring together these themes in an exploration of how the global African forms his or her identity today, and how the contemporary, mobile, and changing people of African descent, that are dispersed around the globe, understand themselves and their position in this rapidly changing world.
