Mass emigration from Africa (no enforced one)

As we know, there are many people in history who emigrated to find a better life somewhere else - Indians and Pakistani to Britain, Arabs to France, Turks to Germany, Chinese to many other countries, and almost every nation to the US.

However, the number of Africans leaving their continent is pretty small. of course, many Africans have been brought by slave trade to America, but the number of non-enforced emigrees from Africa is pretty small. France has some, since it had many colonies in Africa, but even there the number of sub-saharan Africans is much lower than the number of Arabs.

WI a big number of Africans (I'm talking about some hundred thousands or even millions) had emigrated to some western country where they formed the largest minority then? I'm not asking for a special POD - but what kind of (sub)culture would've developed there, compared to OTL where emigration was enforced? How would it be different?

I'd been thinking about a similar thing. In European fairy tales, light skin and hair is associated with goodness, and dark skin and hair is the opposite. How could that have been different?

The plague of 1349 could have been worse, and could have killed many Byzantines and Turks; or there could have been additional pandemics a few decades earlier or later. These could have killed off many Scandinavians as well. So the people in the north don't want to go south for a long time.

But Africa is more distant, and the stigma of Europe isn't as strong there. And the Arabs in this timeline brought gunpowder to Africa before gunpowder got to Europe. And/or maybe the Arabs got the secret of Greek Fire.

Some time after the pandemic(s), Moslems from North Africa invade Spain and Italy, and expanding northward from there. Christians of Syria, Egypt and Ethiopia also begin settling Europe and the Mideast.

Agriculture begins again, and the African settlers of Europe begin sending trade goods to Africa, and the African kingdoms become stronger and wealthier. Trade with Europe grows even more, and eventually Brazil is discovered and colonized.

Kiev and Russia are out of the picture but Ukraine begins to expand by 1500, and the Ukrainian Empire reaches Siberia by 1800. By then, Africans had been trading with China for a hundred years, and Chinese-influenced African goods filter into the Ukrainian Empire. But war looms on the horizon, and the Ukrainian navy invades Japan, threatening them with war unless Japan opens its markets to outside goods.
(The situation is very like how Peary opened trade with Japan in OTL.)

The Japanese refuse, so the Ukrainians make an alliance with the Okinawans and maybe the Philippinos to help overthrow the Japanese government and are successful, so the Okinawan Empire is born. They help defeat the Chinese in a war.

The Ukrainian admiral didn't want to take the time to confer with his government. He wanted to do the invasion now, and didn't have enough men by himself, and the Okinawans looked enough like Japanese to be good spies.

Unfortunately, the Okinawans start expanding to the Philippines and Hawaii, becoming a threat to Ukrainian monopolies.

The Okinawans find gold in Australia and form the Australian Empire, which becomes a rival to the Ukrainian, Okinawan and Chinese Empires.

By 1900, the Hawaiians have broken free of Okinawan ties and are beginning their own empire.

The Aztec alliance had collapsed with the first invasion of the Moors who had colonized Spain, and had made alliances to form the Tetzico Empire, which by 1900 was fighting the Hawaiians for control of Central America. Finally they cooperate with the Hawaiians in building and operating a canal at OTL Panama.

The Ukrainians, the only mostly Caucasian power in the world, have settled much of W. Canada and N. America. The European-Africans have settled E. Canada and Eastern N. America. The Zulus formed an empire under Bantu influence, conquered the Incas and settled S. America. The Moors, Tetzicos and Hawaiians share Mexico and Central America.

Australia controls much of the W. Pacific, Indonesia and the Philippines. The Okinawan Empire has shrunk to Japan, Korea and Sakhalin Island.

The Ukrainian Empire is pretty much OTL Soviet Union in 1980.

The Chinese Empire is pretty much OTL China. There isn't any equivalent of Hong Kong, Taiwan or Macao.

Africa is divided among 20 different nations of varying degrees of wealth and democracy.

All of Europe is like the German Confederation just after the Napoleonic Wars-- divided up among many small territories with many different languages, religions and ethnic groups. The international community has many rules limiting and governing the conduct of war.

I feel like I should have read the original note more carefully. I hope you liked the timeline I posted, but I oughta try again.

What kind of subculture would have formed if emigration were not enforced? I think it might have been very similar; the whites didn't command the blacks to create various elements of the subculture. The black slaves and former slaves weren't *told* to create jazz or whatever.

Here are a few possibilities.

If there's civil war in Algeria, plus a very liberal French government, sometime between 1914-1945, Algerians might emigrate to France en masse. Maybe they do during WW II, they help in the Resistance, and once the war ends they stay put, and the French government is too weak and unable to force the Algerians to go back home. Islamic/Arab/African features form a greater part of French literature, more African dishes in the restaurants, more African images in paintings and in French movies. American blacks continue emigrating to France.

If Grenada had somehow held onto the Iberian Peninsula...Ferdinand and Isabella both die early, so Spain never becomes a power, Moors continue emigrating to Grenada for whatever reasons. Grenada would be a wealthy Islamic state, tolerant of Jews and Christians, with a good mix of all three traditions.

A local epidemic or pandemic in Italy, Sicily and Sardinia might allow a conquest by North African blacks. But the other European powers are strong enough to limit their conquests. There'd be Islamic influences in music, opera, cuisine. There'd be few or no representations of living things.

A popular cult in Europe arises. Followers of the cult believe in certain stereotypes and pseudoscientific ideas regarding black Africans, with no malice toward the blacks. They encourage Africans to come to live in Europe. Followers of the cult have well-meaning intentions, and offer good wages and living conditions to the blacks, and live up to their promises.

It's not all good for the blacks; the cultists are condescending, patronizing, controlling, demanding, etc. But the blacks came willingly.

Perhaps it's a cult which arose in Africa among Africans, and it spread among white European colonialists who believe in occult African lore, and the blacks emigrate to Europe or the Americas en masse. Or it was started by a European colonist in Africa.

Any of these would have effects similar to what I suggested for the France/Algeria one. More black images and African folklore elements in literature and the arts; more African dishes in the cuisine; African musical styles and instruments; the specifics depend on where in Africa they came from.

Is that good enough?

How did you like the first timeline?

Sunsurf,

North Africans for the most part aren't blacks, they're Arab or Berber.

Now, further south, you get more mixing with black Africans. The Almohad dynasty that ruled Islamic Spain towards the end were black Africans (or at least some of them were), but I think they were from Senegal, not parts north.

I wonder what would happen if the Almohads brought more of their distant relatives with them, and they stayed in Spain even after the Reconquista (assuming they don't all get murdered by the government).

Matt Quinn said:

Sunsurf,

North Africans for the most part aren't blacks, they're Arab or Berber.

Now, further south, you get more mixing with black Africans. The Almohad dynasty that ruled Islamic Spain towards the end were black Africans (or at least some of them were), but I think they were from Senegal, not parts north.

I wonder what would happen if the Almohads brought more of their distant relatives with them, and they stayed in Spain even after the Reconquista (assuming they don't all get murdered by the government).

Click to expand...

If Portugal is any example, not much. Mind you, this was from slavery, but at one point 5 to 10% of the Portuguese population was African. There are no Afro-Portuguese anymore, as they have essentially assimilated into the population. Of course, there are still Portuguese who vary in color from very dark to red hair and freckles, but I have never heard from my Portuguese friends of any 'race' issue within the nation.

Absent chattel slavery, I would think most SubSaharan African immigration to the new would would have resulted from recruited employment opportunities, similar to those which brought the Chinese and other Asians to work in California and other parts of the west. This would have then led rise to mechanisms for additional family-based immigration.

Although African immigrants would still have been low on the social totem pole, a major difference would have been the survival of African religious/cultural traditions, familiy ties, and to some extent language. Africans would have been one of many discriminated-against non-European immigrant groups, but the crushing effects of slavery would be absent - both in how the immigrants perceived themselves and were perceived by the dominant culture. "Blacktowns" might still develop, but they would evolve more like "Greektowns" and "Chinatowns" with greater internal and external support for the rise of a local middle and professional class.