The United Nations International Decade for People of African Descent: Reflections, Challenges, and Future Directions

The United Nations International Decade for People of African Descent:Reflections, Challenges, and Future Directions Uju Anya, John T. Maddox IV, and N. Michelle Murray In Memory of Georgina Herrera (1936–2021), one of many among the Ancestors after COVID-19 (Diario de Cuba) The years 2015 to 2024 were declared by the United Nations to be "The International Decade for People of African Descent" (United Nations). This initiative is rooted in the UN World Conference against Racism 2001 in Durban, South Africa, the 2000 Regional Conference of the Americas in Santiago de Chile, and Afrodescendants seeking freedom, representation, and cultural preservations globally (Bello 3). The UN Year for People of African Descent was celebrated in 2011, and its celebration became precursors to the full Decade. As the latter closes in 2024, we look to the next ten years and beyond, acknowledging that Afrodescendants have been an essential part of the Luso-Hispanic world since before the Conquest and will continue to have a critical impact in diverse, democratic pedagogy, cultural production, and cultural analysis. This issue includes articles on applied linguistics, teaching methods, literature, and cultural production from Africa, the Americas, and Europe. What follows is an overview of the last two decades of "Afrodescent," a concept that emerged in Santiago and bloomed during the commemorative year and decade (Campos García 52). "Afrodescendants," a term that recognized Black and mixed-race people descended from Africans as part of a politically recognized minority, tied Blackness to diasporic identity and human rights discourse (15). UNESCO has worked to educate populations of famously mestizo, or mixed-race, nations, in the often overlooked uniquely African and Black contributions to national and regional cultures, particularly in Latin America. Simultaneously, the UN Commission on Human Rights has worked to promote the protection of Afrodescendants' rights. The following introduction is a brief overview of the victories, tragedies, and creations regarding the African Diaspora and the Luso- and Hispanophone regions of Africa. A Parade of Flowering Molasses, Sorrow, and Pain: From "Afrodescent" (2000) to the End of an Era (2024) "Las caras lindas de mi gente negra. / Son un desfile de melaza en flor." —Puerto Rican Tite Curet Alonso, "Las caras lindas" (1978) (Casanova-Burgess). End Page 195 Barbara Abadía-Rexach considers Curet Alonso's lyrics, popularized by Ismael Rivera, an inversion of racist stereotypes for a general audience through popular music (Abadía-Rexach 102–03). Likewise, literary awards are by their very nature exclusionary, but they can often recognize merit and innovation. There has yet to be a Black Spanish- or Portuguese-speaking author who has received the Nobel Prize (as African American Toni Morrison did in 1993) or even the Cervantes. Portugal's establishment narrowly dodged similar shortcomings when it recognized Mozambique's Paulina Chiziane with the Prémio Camões, in a way affirming that the language of the great poet belongs to Black speakers and writers as well as the communities they represent (Ministry of Culture).1 Brazil has had a mixed legacy in how it awards its writers. A polemic emerged in Brazil when 2015 Jabuti literary award-winner, Afro-Brazilian author Conceição Evaristo, was nominated for but ultimately denied a seat on the Academia Brasileira de Letras in 2018, sparking an international debate about racism in the academy (Porto). Nonetheless, she went on to win the 2018 Caribbean Philosophical Association Nicolás Guillén award and be named the 2023 Juca Pato Intellectual of the Year (Amaro; Brasil de Fato). Several other victories are of note as well. Fellow mineira Ana Maria Gonçalves's neo-slave narrative Um defeito de cor won Cuba's 2007 Casa de las Américas award (Araújo Côrtes). That same recognition would go to Brazilians João José dos Reis, Flávio dos Santos Gomes, and Marcus J.M. de Carvalho's O alufá Rufino (2012), the biography of an enslaved African Muslim in Brazil, which marks the first time a history book won recognition as "Brazilian literature" on the island (U Federal da Bahia). The organization also recognized Colombian Adelaida Fernández Ochoa for La hoguera lame mi piel con cariño de perro (2015), which reimagines the...