My problem with Wakanda as a fictional concept

[jamie]

Before I start understand
Full disclosure: If I want to see a depiction/representation of various personal truths I'll watch the news / documentaries. For me fiction should depict "the ideal" put under various contextual stressors. I.E. what is the ideal African man & woman and how do they react/build within the context of [insert stressor here]

Fiction for me is the same as the "artist rendition" of a new building to be constructed in the future.

(I acknowledge not everyone holds this view)





NOTE: We can go off into the discussion of who's "ideal"? What if there are multiple "ideals"?, etc. MY point here is to simply make the fundamental case.
(Continued below)​

[jamie]

My problem with Wakanda as a fictional concept
(...even though the Black panther character may be ok)

​
I originally wrote the quote below for the "comics explained" video on ta nehisi coates black panther run, a year ago back around march 2017...


I.E. I didn't just popup out the wood work with this position :whoa:​

I was already skeptical about this story when the writer tanishi coates was talking about using historical events around European monarchy / revolution to speak on a fictional story set in Africa. I'd much rather he take inspiration from various ethnic groups throughout African history as the "ingredients" for his "narrative soup" and commentary on whatever issue he had in mind. The closest thing I can think of to this story would be the disposal of Haile Selassie by the communist derg in Ethiopia.

Leaving Tanishi Coates aside for a moment, this is before the general issues I have with marvel over the idea of black panther ...or really wakanda itself.

1. How is wakanda sitting in the middle of Africa without being swarmed by migrants/refuges/...students; or at least speaking on the issue(I'm paralleling/amplifying north African European migrants & South Africa here)
2. How is it that multiple African nations came together via the O.A.U planning/engaging in military conflict to end political colonialism(economic colonialism is still an issue) but wakanda is twiddling thumbs on the sideline?
3. How is wakanda on the sidelines while Ethiopia via Haile Selassie rallied other African nations via the O.A.U. and even made the E.W.F. "Ethiopian world federation" in response to the issues of African people abroad?(even offering free land in Ethiopia to Diasporans)
4. How is wakanda on the sidelines while Cuba via Fidel Castro brings an entire freak'n army to Africa to fight against the colonialist?
5. How is Congo being raided for it's resources but wakanda ....well, wakanda is raided so they got that right!!!
6. How is freak'n Muammar Gaddafi forward thinking enough to put up $300mil to buy a $400mil African communications satilite and even push politicaly for the African Union / "United States of Africa" but wakanda is twiddling thumbs on the sideline with the tech to make whatever communications tech Africa needs?
7. How is freak'n Muammar Gaddafi forward thinking enough to conceive of the gold dinar backed monetary system to free Africa from foreign controlled monetary system but wakanda is twiddling thumbs on the sideline with the material reserves(vibranium ore) and infrastructure Africa needs to both build out and defend an indigenous monetary system?
8. etc etc etc

I'd much rather a story dealing with "wakanda" deal/add in this kind of context. Though I have no real prob with "black panther" as an individual globetrotting off to places for various adventurers ...for varieties sake if anything.


Basically marvel uses Africa as a visual context for the wakandan backdrop but ignores the political African backdrop ...as far as I can tell anyway.
In light of that I can't take the entire body of work called Black Panther seriously.(Single shot stories in isolation are more digestible though)

I say that to say this...
An African "Black Panther" wakanda(a nation) without the anti-colonialist struggle in all it's forms(military, political, economic, educational, spiritual, etc) "on the table" is an illegitimate narrative corpus on the story of an African nation.
(obviously an individual story such as this is fine but I'm talking about the entire body of work called black panther since the 1970's)

Ironically the above being hinted at by black panther writer Peter B. Gillis


Via a 4 issue black panther series



​
Which was the story of the panther spirit leaving T'Challa because of the degree of his inaction to apartheid I.E. Ignoring the larger African political landscape which foreshadows/echos my central gripe.

(Continued below)​

[jamie]

Which leads us to the writers:
Now how can we have over 3 decades of story about an African society with little commentary on the anti colonial panafricanist thrust; as we have marvel commentary on something like WW2, vietnam, cold war, etc?
(closest we have are marvels small apartheid SA stories, the Suez Crisis where storm lost her parents, etc ...but again these are "character" stories not the mobilization of "wakanda the nation")


Well that's easy, it is devoid of an African political vision because it wasn't created by African people. The idea of wakanda was created by...

Jack Kirby and Stan Lee


and perpetuated / maintained by folks like...

Roy Thomas(via avengers)


Don McGregor


Within that time the base foundation of what wakanda is and it's dynamics to the rest of their fictionalized world had already set in regards to wakanda's relation to the real world political/academic aspirations of leaders on African issues at that time.

The idea of black panther and subsequently wakanda came out of ingredients like...




















As a matter a fact black panther(solo) appeared alongside it's contemporaries/antecedents above via jungle action comics #5...




....and to give a solid idea. Here are the 4 issues before black panthers solo debut.


Jungle action #1


Jungle action #2


Jungle action #3


Jungle action #4



Don McGregor, who was then proofreading all of Marvel's publications, noted to the editorial staff that the series' preponderance of white protagonists in African settings was culturally outdated to the point of being incongruous. Marvel responded by assigning McGregor to write original material for Jungle Action, with the only creative restriction being that the stories must be set in Africa. Thus an actual African protagonist, the superhero the Black Panther, took over the starring feature with issue #5

- Jungle Action - Wikipedia

Jungle action #5


Jungle action #6




While yes the initial outings of the character took place along side the fantastic 4 in a more "technologically advanced" wakanda


That doesn't hide the same "jungle action" assumptive base. "Techno Wakanda" was simply a reproduction of a common scifi trope at the time. Take existing ideas and toss random "techno babel" on top of or off of it.



(Continued below)

[jamie]

Examples
Step 1: Take existing concepts




Step 2: Dump random techno babel on top



Converse example
Step 1: Take existing concepts


Step 2: Remove random techno babel from top


For an extremely twisty example of taking existing ideas and changing the context see


The preexisting fundamental idea of what a "barbarian" is didn't change much only the context that idea exist in. likewise the same was done in the case of black panther's African back drop.

(Continued below)

[jamie]

The preexisting fundamental idea of Africa and Africans.

The peoples of the Great Northwest Quadrant, as far back as we know anything about prehistoric men, have all been members of the white race. They differ markedly, however, in certain physical characteristics. On the Northern Flatlands, we find fair-haired long-headed people, such as the Scandinavians, who are sometimes called Nordics. Their neighbors on the south are round-headed men dwelling in the Highland Zone, and hence are often called Alpine or Armenoid peoples. On the Southern Flatlands live dark-haired men with long heads, now commonly known as the Mediterranean race. These three types have peopled the whole of the Northwest Quadrant, and the ancestors of the population now living there were the creators of the civilization we have inherited.

If we look outside of the Great Northwest Quadrant we find in the neighboring territory only two other clearly distinguished races— the Mongoloids on the east and the Negroes on the south. These peoples occupy an important place in the modern world, but apparently they did not contribute directly to early civilization in the Northwest Quadrant.....
......
On the south of the Northwest Quadrant lay the teeming black world of Africa, as it does today. It was separated from the white race by the broad stretch of the Sahara Desert. The valley of the Nile was the only road leading across the Sahara from south to north. Sometimes the blacks of inner Africa did wander along this road into Egypt, but they came only in small groups. Thus cut off by the desert barrier and living by themselves, they remained uninfluenced by civilization from the north, nor did they contribute appreciably to this civilization.

We shall therefore confine ourselves to the rise o£ civilization in the Northwest Quadrant, We have seen that the men of the Neolithic Age lacked principally writing, metals, and sailing-ships, among those things necessary to progress toward a less primitive manner of living. These things were discovered or invented not in Europe but on the other side of the Mediterranean, in Egypt and Western Asia— in lands which we now call the Near East.

NEW EDITION: Fully Revised and Reset
THE CONQUEST OF CIVILIZATION (1926)
JAMES HENRY BREASTED
pg.43-45

"Apart from relatively late Semitic -influence whether Phoenician (Carthaginian) and strictly limited, or Arab (Muhammadan) and widely defused- the civilizations of Africa are the civilizations of the Hamites, its history is the record of these peoples and of their interaction with the two other African stocks, the Negro and the Bushmen....

...the incoming Hamites were pastoral Caucasians—Arriving wave after wave—better armed as well as quicker witted than the dark agricultural Negroes, for it must be remembered that there was no Bronze Age in Africa and we may believe that the Negro, who is now an excellent iron-worker, learnt this art from the Hamite. Diagrammatically the process- may be described as follows. At first the Hamites, or at least their aristocracy, would endeavor to marry Hamitic women, but it- cannot have been long before a series of peoples combining Negro and Hamitie blood arose; these, superior to the pure Negro, would be regarded with disdain by the next incoming wave of Hamites and be pushed further inland to play the part of an incoming aristocracy vis a vis the Negroes on whom they impinged. And this process was repeated with minor modifications over a long period of time, the pastoralists always asserting their superiority over the agriculturists, who constantly tended to leave their own mode of life in favor of pastoralism or at least to combine it with the Latter, The end result of one series of such combinations is to be teen in the Zulu...."

The Races of Africa (1930)
C. G. Seligman
pg. 96,158

At this point we leave Africa, not to mention it again. For it is no historical part of the World; it has no movement or development to exhibit. Historical movements in it—that is in its northern part—belong to the Asiatic or European World. Carthage displayed there an important transitionary phase of civilization; but, as a Phoenician colony, it belongs to Asia. Egypt will be considered in reference to the passage of the human mind from its Eastern to its Western phase, but it does not belong to the African Spirit. What we properly understand by Africa, is the Unhistorical, Undeveloped Spirit, still involved in the conditions of mere nature, and which had to be presented here only as on the threshold of the World’s History.

The Philosophy of History. (1956)
G.W.F. Hegel
pg. 99

The preexisting fundamental idea of Africa didn't change much...



...only the context that idea exists in.




Ultimately most importantly culminating in a lack of the larger PanAfrican ideals prevalent in African politics & academia over the last century or so.


It wasn't till ruffly 2 decades after the lore was in place that an "African"(American) voice was even heard with any significance.
Christopher priest

And that doesn't even mean that Christopher priest and subsequent writers hold any knowledge or commitment towards the ongoing panafricanist project/process that lead to the concrete establishment of regional/continental...

• pan-African economic zones
• standby army
• air transport zone
• political passport
• (not to mention future plans) etc etc.

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[jamie]

So whats wrong with wakanda not being a vision of predominate PanAfrican politics?
I repeat what I've said previously.

If I want to see a depiction/representation of various personal truths I'll watch the news / documentaries. For me fiction should depict "the ideal" put under various contextual stressors. I.E. what is the ideal African man & woman and how do they react/build within the context of [insert stressor here]

Fiction for me is the same as the "artist rendition" of a new building to be constructed in the future.

(I acknowledge not everyone holds this view)


Wakanda as depicted by marvel is not an ideal to shoot for. A society that's essentially the best of a worst case scenario for "white supremacy".
"Ok, wakanda got out from under us, but at least they aren't seriously challenging our..."

• automotive / airline industry with their flying cars
• military industrial industry with their advanced weapons
• monetary system with their monopoly on rare minerals
• political/fiscal hedgamony and leverage over African nations
• etc etc

"Hell, they even help us with international issues, and check this... not only did I not have to tell them to 'go back to' Africa ...I think those mf's just 'went back to' space..."


"...and left the whole African pie to us."



(Continued below)

[jamie]

Assumed Questions/Positions:

Assumed Position1 - "Chill bruh It's just entertainment"
People often think "oh it's just entertainment":yeshrug: ...which is to me like saying "oh it's just desert":flabbynsick:.
Your digestive system(biological or physiological) doesn't know the difference. All it recognizes is sustenance it may be able to use as a resource now or later.

The designation of something as "just" entertainment(or desert) is more or less a memory mnemonics(like tying a ribbon around you finger to remember something) so that you know how much to ingest in relation to other things; or how to categorize/offset what was ingested.

Put another way people need to know what they are taking in(and where it came from) even if it's "just entertainment" because those ideas then form the bases for further decisions.


Assumed Question 2 - "So are you saying you don't like the movie?"
I assume any gripe I'd have with the movie will be reflective of the source material(which is the point of this post not the movie). That said I'll go see the movie when It comes out.


Assumed Question 3 - "Why won't you just let folks enjoy themselves?"
I'm not stopping anyone from enjoying themselves. What I'm doing amounts to a travel advisory/warning. You don't stop your vacation because you've been advised to stay off the east side of the island due to [insert issue here]. You enjoy yourself on vacation and let the gov deal with the large contextual issues.

Instead of a geographical travel advisory/warning I'm giving a ...psychological travel advisory/warning. Warning aside, enjoy yourself.


Assumed Question 4 - "So your saying nothing is redeemable about wakanda?"
God no, there is plenty redeemable about it...

• Africans running a society rooted in their own political system
• Africans running an education system rooted in their own culture.
• Africans running a society free of christian beliefs
• Africans running a society with a stable economy
• Africans running a society with a strong military
• etc etc.

All I'm saying is the above is an incomplete meal without the PanAfrican main course.
(Or maybe I should say the above should be served on a PanAfrican plate)



Assumed Position 5 - "Well I don't care about context as long as I'm enjoying myself I'm fine"
Hey thats life.

• You don't keep up with the state of the city roads, as long as you can get back & forth your fine.
• You don't keep up with sanitation scores city wide, as long as you don't get sick & food is good your fine.
• You don't keep up with the postal service, as long as you can send & receive mail timely your fine.

No one keeps up with the context of everything they indulge in, likewise I don't expect people to keep up with the politics expressed in their entertainment. That said there are people who do account for those various contexts, be it out of duty or hobby. The context(politics) surrounding wakanda is of interest to me, so I put out an assessment.
Take it or leave it:yeshrug:

Remember you can be made to feel just "fine" and comfy in damn near any context.

It's not enough to be comfortable. You have to account for the context that comfort comes in.
wakanda is an incomplete conceptual context to find comfort in.



Assumed Question 6 - "So you don't have any issue with the movie?"

Looks fine for the most part. If I had to point out anything I didn't like given the previews it would be...:jbhmm:

1. It looks like they took random "cool African stuff" and just threw it at the wall in nonsensical ways.

• Hey lets use kente cloth for this tribe!
• Hey lets use Ndebele painted houses for this tribe!
• Hey lets use lip plates for this tribe!
• How bout those congo dandy guys!

Wait wait wait ...you just pulled from 4 opposite ends of the damn continent. Just where is this fictional wakanda yall throwing random Africanisms located at, floating over the continent in a circle?

2. To quote Marimba Ani...

(Time stamped for convenience)

There is no shared future vision among African peoples and in that vacuum your going to have a singular multimillion dollar vision painted for a generation to see. A future vision of Africa that was conceptualized by a bunch of Europeans.


It essentially turns into the MLK scenario were they try and pick our leaders while telling us that we are supposed to aspire to this fictionalized I have a dream speech were everyone is holding hands(while they are still holding the resources)

Except in this case it's an aspirational vision were we collaborate with them on international issues but otherwise leave them be(along with their grip on African peoples) when we create a viable African state.

A vision for the future of African peoples isn't for a bunch of white guys to create and push to our kids, that's our job(and the academic theory of that vision has indeed been put forth). That said failing to fill that hole with a singular/competing commercial vision, a huge vacuum is opened for that black panther movie.

When someone says Pan-Africanism everyone is going to assume something different(because they create a vision on the fly based on their own (mis)understanding of the theory). When someone says wakanda everyone is going to have the same vision, because they all actually saw the same vision on screen.

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[jamie]

Constructive Thoughts:
If I had to make an "ultimate universe" type change to wakanda/black panther to make it fall in line without changing the core of the 30 year lore to far ...I would do something like...

• Make wakanda ether a society(sorta like Ekpe/okonko society in nigeria) or keep wakanda the country and add the society function on top
• Instead of the couple of villages in wakanda the society would consist of representatives from traditional ethnic rulership/spiritual traditions across the African peoples.

(yoruba, vodun, dogon, serer, hatian vodun, zulu Sangoma, Candomblé, Santería, Louisiana Vodun)

Every tradition would have representatives under wakanda who would be trained in wakanda proper then sent back(home), as a result there would be wakanda bases all over Africa and the diaspora. These bases and individuals would serve as.

• wakanda intelligence gathering network
• global rapid reaction forces to external threats
• internal corruption police force
• etc etc

From that foundation writers could tell stories relevant to all African peoples and let black panther be like the super agent he essentially already is. With that small change above, they could keep his previous adventures pretty much intact because all thats being done is expand on wakandas boarders. AU is a Union of African nation-states, while wakanda is a Union of African ethnic/religious groups ...essentially a shadow of each other.

I could rock with that setup ok. ....


(Done)