African Communities in the New World

'Maroon' is a Spanish Term, (taken from cimarron) to describe Africans who escaped slavery and created their own societies in the New World.

In almost every place in the "New World" are enclaves of the descendents of free Africans. The United States of America is one of the few places that does not have a large and independent Maroon community.

As early as 1512 Africans had escaped their Spanish owners in all the territories they occupied. In Brasil, the Portuguese lost many slaves to the forests. Getting Africans alive across the Atlantic Ocean did not mean that they would be slaves.

Although there were Maroon communities on the smaller islands of the Caribbean, many disappeared as the colonists moved further inland.

Jamaica is one of the best examples of how Africans escaped bondage, and maintained their freedom. There are rugged mountains running through the center of Jamaica. A group, reaching a plateau, could create impregnable villages where they could grow their own food and capture the indigenous animals for meat.

As the Spanish had committed genocide before the transportation of Africans to Jamaica there were no indigenous people. Hence, the Jamaican Maroons remained of unmixed African heritage.

In areas where genocide was not practiced,(as in Puerto Rico) Maroons would often intermarry, into the Ameri-Indian communities.

True Maroon communities maintain the culture and language of Africa. Many Akan words, for example, are in Jamaican dialect.

In Suriname, there are diverse tribes of Maroons, i.e. Saramaka, Paramakans, the Ndyuka, Kwiniti and the Matawai. The Saramaka for example, speak a language made up of words drawn from Portuguese, English, Dutch and Sub-Saharan languages, primarily Kongo, Akari and Gbe.

That most African Americans are unaware of the Maroon communities is the result not merely of the suppression of history by the "White" world not the brainwashing of the Black population, but the almost refusal to believe facts that go "against" accepted history.

That many of you are reading this essay as if a flight of fancy, a simple Google of "Maroons" will open a world of information you never imagined.