• BOOK REVIEWS: WHO'S WHO IN BLACK CANADA - 12/03/2003
  BLACK SUCCESS AND BLACK EXCELLENCE IN CANADA - A CONTEMPORARY DIRECTORY - AUTHOR: DAWN P. WILLIAMS - PUBLISHER: d.p. Williams & associates, 3 Massey Sq. Unit 1706, Toronto, ON M4C 5L5, Canada 2002 - Pages: 421 - PRICE: Soft-cover: C$45.98; Hard-cover: C$68.98

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  TITLE: MILLENIUM MINDS 100 BLACK CANADIANS - AUTHOR: W.P. HOLAS - PUBLISHER: PAN-AFRICAN PUBLICATIONS, Box 83023, Ottawa, ON Canada K1V 1A3, 2002 - Pages: 205 - Price: C$39.95

REVIEWER: KOFI AKOSAH-SARPONG

Coincidently, the two publications came during the celebration of Black History Month, a period where Africans in North America, and increasingly being embraced by other Africans in the western hemisphere, reflect about their achievements and pains in the past year in an environment that has for long overlooked their contributions and discriminated against them in the larger scheme of things. Like African-Americans, African-Canadians, despite being just over one million achievements have come in struggles, simultaneously filled with pain and elation-a true North American "experience manifest in a profound, groundbreaking and influential culture." Like the United States of America, Canada, despite its small number of Africans compared with its neighbor in the south, has embraced African music, with blues, jazz, rap and rock 'n' roll making their way into the mainstream. Canadian radio play lists reflect this fusion, and even the pop benchmark, the Toronto-based MuchMusic, an equivalent of U.S.'s MTV, is dominated by African artists.

It is therefore not surprising that Who's Who in Black Canada and Millennium Minds: 100 Black Canadians move beyond the long-running marginalization of African-Canadians contributions to the Canadian society and inform us that behind the silence, or rather the near marginalization of African-Canadians contributions until recently when an opening is dawning, African-Canadians have been contributing significantly to Canada's development. "You hold in your hands the story of one hundred Black Canadians whose efforts and achievements have contributed to making Canada a better place to live," said Ms. Heidi Fry, Canada's Secretary of State for Multiculturalism, in a forward to 100 Black Canadians. Ms. Fry also tells us that the contribution of African-Canadians to Canada's development dates back to the "diverse beginnings of Canadian society." She particularly singles out Mathieu da Costa, an African-Portuguese navigator "who acted as interpreter between the early French explorers and the Mi'kmaq people. His contribution is commemorated by the Mathieu da Costa Awards Program, which Parliament officially designated in 1995."

While da Costa is the reference point of early African settlers in Canada and the fortitude of African-Canadians ability to navigate through a system that does not open up adequately for their progress, the first African settlers who came to Canada were freed slaves who were United Loyalists supporters in the United States during the American Revolution. Some 600 Maroons from Jamaica joined them later in Nova Scotia. The next Africans who settled in Ontario were "refugee slaves" who arrived through the so-called Underground Railway from the United States, searching for "new life, without racism and segregation, in a new country." Their campaigns during the First World War in support of Britain was so spectacular that William Hall (1827-1904), the first African-Canadian, or rather the first African, in the world to became receive the "coveted Victoria Cross, the highest military honour in the British Commonwealth." Following this, the 1967 revised Canadian Immigration Act saw a wave of African-Caribbean professional and skill workers settling in Toronto, Edmonton, Winnipeg and Vancouver. However, the most recent vast and vibrant African settlers came from refugees from war-torn areas in Africa such as Somalia and Ethiopia.

The two books showcase a long list of African-Canadians, from teachers, athletes, doctors, religious and political leaders, chefs, artists, engineers and inventors, social workers, military and police officers, community and international development workers, journalists and authors, and others who have in diverse ways been helping in the Canadian nation-building, making it the best country the live in on earth. For this reason, the two books contain biographical directories of African-Canadians excelling in their respective fields. While 100 Black Canadians give only the biographical profile and pictures of those featured, Who's Who in Black Canada, which has no pictures, contains biographical profiles of 705 individuals listed alphabetically and indexes arranged by province and by primary activity, current contact information, career highlights and achievements, places of study, honours and distinctions, publications, and many more.

The central issue here is that character drives these African-Canadians who have played significant role in Canada's greatness and not their colour, confirming legendary author James Baldwin's observations that being African in north America is about attitude not skin colour. It is the ability to face tough challenges in the quest to succeed in a system that does not prop up Africans that has seen the likes of Yvonne Appiah, executive director of the Ottawa-based CODE (Canadian Organization for Development through Education), Michael Kofi Baffoe, executive director of the Montreal-based Black Star Project, Lorraine Klaasen, a well-known singer and performer, Charmain Hooper, a global female soccer player of distinction with numerous national and international awards and captain of Canada's national female soccer team, and Pat Peterson, a teacher and local historian, are among the growing number of African-Canadians who belong to Canada's pantheon of great achievers who profoundly shaped Canada's day-to-day existence.

Like the African-American experience, the African-Canadian experience is about ideals, and testing those ideals in the long battle to participate in the Canadian mosaic, as enshrined in the Canadian Constitution and the Charter of Rights, to see whether those high standards extend to all Canadians, and working to make sure they do. As someone said, "One hundred years after W.E.B. Du Bois, in The Souls of Black Folk, said race would be the defining problem of the 20th century, academics, artists and everyday people are still struggling with gauging" African-Canadians' role and the impact of racism on Canadian society. Despite racism pinning down African-Canadians rapid advancement today, Holas tells us how from the vintage point of the 21st century one will find it difficult to see how slavery was so terrible that freedom was a dream for many Africans. "Today, we live in a distinctly multiracial, multicultural society that promotes peaceful co-existence, while fully embracing our heterogeneity…"

Nowhere does one see the sounds of struggle and joy among African-Canadians today than perhaps the greatest athlete Canada, and the world, has seen, Donovan Bailey. He is five-time World and Olympic Champion, and "the first man in history to achieve, in a single year, the titles of Olympic Champion, World Champion and World Record Holder." Like most African-Canadians, Donovan Bailey came to Canada as an immigrant at age 12 from Jamaica in 1980. He was born December 16, 1967 in Manchester, Jamaica. He is now resident in Oakville, Ontario. While in business he dabbled in basketball but found out that was not his calling and so he switched to tracks in 1994. Using his 182cm/6' height and 83kg/182lbs body frame, Bailey became the first Canadian since Percy Williams in 1928 to win the Olympic 100 meter sprint. Ben Johnson won in 1988, but tested positive for using performance enhancing drugs.

Off the track, Bailey owns a stock-broking, management, telemarketing business and construction company with one of his four brothers. Before this he had earned a diploma from Sheridan College in Business Administration (Marketing). Bailey is married with a daughter. After retirement from track, Bailey is involved in several business initiatives and speaks for numerous charities such as the Canadian Cancer Society. His Donovan Bailey Foundation is committed to the advancement and financial assistance of Canada's most talented amateur athletes.

The two books demonstrate the celebration of the long-running African-Canadians "quiet triumph of spirit that conquers adversity." Reflected Charles Conteh, a Sierra Leonean-Canadian international development expert, "The African-Canadian community has a shared heritage, a shared journey in the north American diaspora and a shared destiny. So I belief we have to work together for our common development purpose, pushing the frontiers of progress." And it is for this shared purpose that Holas meditates that African-Canadian children can reflect on those featured in the books and those of distinction not featured because of space as positive role models since they need "strong identity base in order to rise above the stereotypes and the negative images they see about themselves…They need to have greater awareness and understanding of the contributions made by their forebears, and by the present generation, so they can better appreciate their place in the Canadian society and history."