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OUR
NATIONAL
NAME

By

Z0LO AGONA AZANIA

MONMONORONONMORORONORONOAOAD,

AAAAAAAAAAAAA

Zolo Agona Azania #4969 South

Indiana State Prison A m(l'g'pm
I Park Row / P.O. Box 41 P.0. Box 721

, 30
Michigan City, TN 46360 Momewecd Le0s
W

&
F:

OUR NATIONAL NAME
New Afrikan Cultural Identity

By

Zolo Agona Azania

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s A N A

S

Published July 19w
(c) By Zolo Aguna hzauia

Second Printing Hay 1999
lizated to all the beloved brothers
and sisters who remain resolute and
have not sold out the armed struggle
“o Frae The Land!
PREFACE
s

El-Hajj Mallk El-Shabazz (bstter lziowa
as Malcolm X) said: "Power in defenss of
freedom is greater than power in behalf of
tyranny and oppression, because power, real
power, comes from conviction which produces
action, uncompromising action. It also pro-
duces insurrection against oppression. This is

the only way you end oppression--with power."

The aforesaid axiomatic (tested and
widely proven true) statement echoos loudly
and clearly the tone of this essay. For w@ith-
out power, in every senss of the word, moral,
spiritual, material, scientific, iniustey,
money, transport, secure communication, the
whole works, Wa're lost. Not found. ind,
would probably remain that way for anothsr
long period of tims if We fall to get poder
to end Our oppression. As you already laou,
this is the meaning behind the dewand for

"Black Power".

ii
e nuthor spont his tino and energy .

narefnlly researching the information on Our

cnal name as part of the solution (answer)
to Cor identity problem. He tried to make this
pamrblet (booklet) easy to read. Words written
" pa-ren-the-ses («—») are meanings of words

77 *the reader can be sure what the author

intend to say,

Crewing from the cornerstons (foundation)
°ne tuilds their temple not of stone, but of
"neself who have 1ight and of those who choose
hear. This means that calisthenics (physical
srerelse), education for self-knowledgs, love,
esmnpassion, understanding and healthy family
relationships (social organization) are the
things We use to build Our temple (bodies,
minds), cur families, the whole community
(ommon-unity), the whole people (nation)
fram uithin for a better quality.of life, is
pover in defense of freedom. Self-determi-

n7tien ds the highest expression of genuine

iit
demoracy. It's axiomatic (tested and wiaely

proven true). It all matters in many ways.

7

But one does not build their temple of
oneself in truth without reaching down to

one's cultural roots and up to one's branches.
Wiy is this, you ask? It is the basic, concrete
foundation upon which all else that's worth.
anything is established (firuly, set, stubled)
in balance. The mutual (shared) bond that
develops one's sense of consciousness, of
belonging, of continuous comnection to tho
source of one's cultural roots, is history.

Do not be ashamed. Things have changed a littlc.
Look forward. We are a bustling (stirring)
nation on the move, rising. The honest messas
in Our-story (sometimes called history), thie
good, the bad, happy and sad, are great

lessons to be learned for all times to come.

Those who choose not to reas

, think and listen

for themselves cannot be forced to do su. Yo
fores angthing down someone's throat,

reeardless how mond it is, and make them like
i, b4

adaze (saying), 'sticks and stones

A77 Preak my bones, but words will never
hervme, ' is not exactly true. That is because

when ron allow anybody to heap false history,

atwaive nanes, corses and insults on you, and

~ut of irmorance, blindly accept the insulting
namea (words, terms, phrases) as your own and
prez them on to your children, does grave

(earinus) harm in the long run. They cut deep

At “ur roots and branches, undermines Our

om-unity, and divides Us against one
arether, s 1ifeless stumps. With power to

271 Our epprossion We shall change the whole

arranpement for Lhe hetter.

Z.ALA.
It March, 1992

v
vi
I

Alik E1-Ghabazz (Malcolm X),
v kon ated in chair),

ailhonette), and
fnarge L. JTackaon

vit
"

" ARMED WITH THE KNOWLEDGE OF OUR PAST, \i
CAN WITH CONFIDENCE CHARTER A COURSE FOR
OUR FUTURE. CULTURE IS AN INDISPERSALLE
WEAPON IN THE FREEDOM STRUGGLE. WE MUST
TAKE HOLD OF IT AND FORGE THE FUTURE UITH
THE PAST."

-- EL-HAJJ MALTK EL-SHB.
( MALCOLM X )

OUR NATIONAL NAME
Vew Afriken Cultural Identity /%

“ie pover to tax somebody is the power to
*strey them. The power to name somebody is
“law Whe pouer to destroy. It's a power rame,
the erercise of power, of 1ife and dsath over

~ methivg, acmebody, or both.

P2 deatroy i3 to call it by any name you

ave fit. lowever the case may be, whole

Lioas b

n destabilized, disrupted,

pat fate socisl confuslon, brainvashed, mis-

. deprived of feod and renamed after

sere conquernd. The power to educate and

i reopla to uplift themselves on Lhe one

Tl oand b tare down and destroy somebody

on the other, is a pover rame to name.

The foreirn namo hecomes the domestic
vemo. Tun domestic name hesomes the foredign.

Tttt Mtopar turvy” adventure. Pottoms up,
13
tops doun. Upside down, down side up. A state

of social confusion. That is what happens to u
Ppeople who allow themsslves to be named or
renamed by an enemy. Your enemy will call you
anything, end you can be assured they'll be
bad, negative, degrading, the worst name. ill

designed to destroy.

The act of naming oneself is ulso an uct
of power. A good, positive meaning name with
long, historical connections to a vanglorious
pust, raises the aspirstions and gaze of the
dountrodden to seek, and reattain their place
upon the stage of world power, to judge and
determine their oun destiny. Future is neu
1life, new beginning. To name this new lire is
an act of power. The first step in one's
struggle for freedom (free-mind) is the raning
of onesell with the best of names that

identify with the best of ones vanglorious pest.

Rejecting the slave name, protesting
nst ik, s actually defying it. This marks
‘*he rloce where a substantial step towards /Y
ce1f-Jetermination is made. Push out the 1lie.
311 in the truth. Ones mind is disturbed by
alave names. Liberation education leads to
lizsnziation from identifying with slave names.

Ther're 1like fire-brands on a persons' skin,

ot scorehing and painful.

The bitter truth is a hurting thing when
~ne i1 Fuilty. The discussion for freedom
tering with naming oneself and the independent
1lireration movement that one represent. The

Afscussion centers around a wake-up call; to

=-up the sleep walkers, the mentally,

1iving dend. Truthdom and froe-

are interrelated. The anawer to the

wiiversality of the problem caused by oppres-

o seeial 1ivirg conditicns and dysfuntional
("'rormal) family relationships are found in

© ruttle of the great civilizations of the

Anprized, colenialized poople.

L
It is an objection to oppression aid

s
slavery, it is a gesture of self-love, it is
steadfast, resolution, it is an affirmation
of faith with eyes open, it is doing ths
right thing, without let up, in the process
of striving to reawakening the spirit or
humanity, to make a dignified statement to
the world, by rejecting false labeling, &
direct expression of self-respect, to nams
oneselr with the most beautiful namss, that
inspire (motivate) hope in the heurts and
minds of the vietimized people. These sanec
advancing principles apply to all nations wio

are oppressed universally.

Culture is to rebuild the best cf orc's
civilization during the process of the libe-
ration movement for independence. This in-
clude naming onesclf and rejecting the ralse,
sbusive labels imposed by the wicked pcuers,

the oppressors. Language i3 a powerrul

medium, channel of communication, to ircite

n
nction, for effective change, to

crrate

a better 1ife for the oppressed. This

frelnde naming oneself in knowledge and /&

To look back on it, knowledge and
aled by things you build. Knowl-
~@=e and power is expressed in the physical

form by the things you construct and the names

miven to the independent liberation movements

the victimized people that they choose for

themselvea.

[t $ollows that culture is the on going
procean of 1ifn, interconnected with the
nover o name oneself. The ability to choose
or reject a national name for Ourselves is
the ahility to choose or reject the names and
1nbels put on Us by othors. We are a nation
=14 captive within a nation. It's Our solemn

Aky to Lreak free and make no excuses. The

rurcle to redofine Ourselves as a historical,

~91%iral and spiritual rroup is to set the

recor? atrairht in good falth on the realities

of ar very existence,
Moreover, Our struggle for power is purt
and parcel of the process to name Ourselves |7
to fit Our national mood, social behuvior und
ancestral cultural heritage. If your struggle
for power is for the upliftment of hLumanity,
if 1t's for love and kindness, for pesce &nd
happiness, then the names you choose for your-
self would also reflect this attitude, and the
way you act or conduct yourself would be the

way you think about yourself and your pecple,

past and present.

Living in any pert of North Amerildkica
doesn't make you an Amerikkken. The term,
Afrikan-imerikkkan was only & collective,
symbolic move closer to identify with Our

Afrikan roots. But, no, We're not Amerikkica:

We were only made paper citizens, without Gur
informed consent, by the fourteenth amendrient
of the U.S. Constitution. Brother Malcolm X,

the beloved Muslim martyr, said that he wusn't

an Amerikkkan but "...one of...ths victime of
A ey feature of Amerikidanism
12 r2inl bigotry. The United States of Amo-
kA 19 a prison house of bondags for a11
nFrressed people, especially for those of ¥
ffrikan dascent. They make a mockery of our

cilture, disrespect Our names and manner of

33 that aren't Euro-Amerikidcan fashions,

Tt fellows that, the rise of ethnic Euro-
Fran rationalism, for world conquest by force

°f "rma, was white raciat supremacy in disguise.

7+ 72 used in this context, stands for
Furopeans (Caucasians) who think white, They
fusist that others accept their world-view of
thirca. Amerikkkanism is European imperial

“rolenialism (institutional racism). It

27n% every vital organ in its body.

fhe historical reality is that jealousy,

vain, smug, arrogant influences of

"711 Bigotry has been the cause of death,

[P

"nand ruin to the very same nations
#ho thought they were superior. Preatige of

racial superiority is tantamount to terminal

cancer on the brain.

19
There is no dignity being anyone's door-
mat. The oppressors wipe dirt from their feet
on the faces of the poor and oppressed. The
People who had accepted a racially inferior
station in life went to sleep, the same as
being in a coma. Those who used to, but no

longer, accept a racially inferior, debased
existence are expressing a new mold of

thought and action to resist oppression.

The humiliation and anguish of the oppres-
s+d are compounded by the vicious torment of
false, abusive names and labels accepted as
*helr own. To illustrate this, We may use the
example of & person who had named their pet

cat or dog "nigger". The dog was obedient and
would come running, lapping its tongue and

Waggling 1ts tail whenever the master

whistled or called 1ts name, nigger. Wnat a

9
disgrace for a whole people to be named like
dogs! Worse still, is for the oppressed to 20
accept the names and labels put on them 1like

beast by the oppressor, colonial master.

This is the type of genocidsl power under
which Afrikans in Amerikkka are subjected.

The human sentiments to be independent of the
U.S. Amerikkka are self-evident by the term
"New Afrikan." The fear to be free and self-
reliant is the fear to be yourself, that
reflect the best of your culture. Verbal or
physical abuse without protest is no longer
accepted passively. Ethnic New Afrikan people

will decide their future.

Nationalism isn't a bad term for des-
cribing the New Afrikan independence move-
ment. Nationalism must be an essential part
of the psychic of New Afrikan people, because
1t was through nationalism of foreigners
from distant lands that conquered and subjug-

ated the ancestors of New Afrikan people for

10
pleasure and profit. We'ro not New Afrikans
in name only, but, also in soctal conduct of
Our daily activities who shun false pride,

filth and all that which tare down the comm-

unity. 2z

Yew Afrikan people doesn't recognize
themsolves as members of different tribes
anymore. Our collective historical and spir-
1tual group cohesiveness is not found in
tribalism nor in racial appeal, but in nation-
al (New Afrikan) and international (Pan-Afri-
kan) unity, in relation to the cultural ident-
1ty of every aspect of Our daily social 1ife-
style. In the dotailed book, Afrika Yesterday
And Today, it is written that:

" Watlonalism as a historic force

is primarily of European origin.

It was born of the French Revolu-
tion and the Age of Enlightenment,
and dominated the political devel-
opment of Europe during most of
the nineteenth century.

By the early twentieth century,

Asian natjonalism was pitted against
Furopean national intarnsts. After

1n
Vorld War II, sparks of nationalism
burst into flame all over Afrika,
although not without modifications

as it grew in this new environment."s

EX3
‘The historical pattern of ethnic European

nationalism has been based on economic greed,
barbaric ignorance, commercial rivalry, mono-
poly trade, lust for global domination and
personal gain, to benefit the wealthy few rul-
ing clique, and falsely justified by racism.
In the process they stole credit from the van-
glorious cultural civilization achievements of

others, and claimed it as their own.

Tribalism is a grave hinderance because
the ancestors of ethnic New Afrikan people
fought back as individual tribes and not as a
unified nation for the mutual (shared) defense
and support of the whole group. Afrika is one

nation. This is a prime example, among meny,

why Afrika must unite!

% Afrika Yesterday And Today, Edited and
with an introduction by Clark D. Moore and Ann
Dunbar, Part 5, Afrika Since Warld War II,

Nationulism: A Dynamic Force, Bantam Books, Inc.
(1968) p. 203
23

Black Queen of Egypt, Afrika
Nofretete (Nefertiti), wife of
Ikhnaton (Amenophis IV) 18th
Dynasty, 1375 B.C. Nofretete's
husband Tkhnaton or Akhnaton is
credited with accepting and
spreading the monotheistic

(belief in onc God) idea among

the people. The seed of thought
that her husband planted did not come to flover

in Egypt, but among the Original Afrikan Hebrew
Israelites.

13
Injustice is mainly a flagrant abuse of
power. Arrogance and selfishness towards the
poor and helpless, the women, orphans, young
and innocent, treated in a manner designed to
deprive, hurt and destroy, is injustice, the
manifestation of wrong doing to others. Com-
pensation for the wrong doing is reparation.
It's not a full payment to a person, or to a
whole people, for the injustice inflicted by
the hands of others, but as a token of recog-
nition, acknowlsdgment, to make amends and
ask forgiveness. That is, to pay money, public
apology, atonement and remorse. The damage is
the result of the injury, wrongful act, and
flagrant abuse of power, a crime. Reparations

are paid for these reasons.

Furthermore, flagrant sbuse of power is
the denial of reparation for war crimes,
ralse imprisonment and genocide. We are the
courageous descendants of Black people who
constructed the first civilization, religion,
science and art on sarth. We never stop being

U
their descendants. We have to be compensated
for Our, as well as their, enormous pain and
sufforing caused by the entire slavemaking

process, economic explotation, wrongful death
and false, abusive labels imposed on Us, over

a span of several hundred years.

2§

War is necessary sometimes, as in the
case where oppressed people are denied repa-
rations by the oppressive power structure.
Human beings have human rights, or people
rights. Ono has to fight for their human
rights. Kindness and remorsefulness are mot in
the hearts of some who has wronged others. It's
not wise, nor practical to willingly accept
poverty and oppression as a way of 1ife. Power
only respects an equal pover. It's plain and
simple as that. The New Africentric world-view
is 1in direct opposition to the Eurocentric

world-view. Our human rights shall be respect-

ed, or else!
Self-determination imply self-naming.

15
There's definitely a kind of power in the use
of words. An example of this is the term New
Afvikan. The unfearful demand for land is 5/
another example. People identify themselves
with land, earth, the bases of independence.
The name of this area of land is New Afrika

(not Afrika-Amerikkka).

Amerikkkanism und imperialism are two
sides of the same coin. It began as ethnic
European nationalism, which constituted
racial discrimination, because it's built upon
racial appeal, white supremacist, rather than
grussroots social class appeal. And when it
expunded outside of its own borders it became
imperialism, like the tentacles of an octopus
spread far and wide in Afrika, Asia, the

Caribbean, everywhere.

We're the mincemeat that's fed into this
spineluss monster to satisfy its voracious

appetite. We do their dirty, hazardous, low

16
ray worl; the captive consumer market where
overpriced, cheap quality goods are dumped;
Our collective multi-billion dollar spending
power is sucked ont of Our community into
their jaws. They used Us to fight their wars.
They polluted the environment with toxic
waste, and experiment on Us 1like laboratory

rats, animals.

27

The imperialist octopus of the North-Euro-
Amerikkkan empire cannot live when its tentacles
are cut off from its body by the political,
economic and military independence of the New
Afrikan Nation. The monster would collapse,

starve, bleed to death.

There 1s strength in numbers and words.
We are pulling together with confidence for
the mutual benefit of the whole group from all
strata (layers or levels) of society to be
froe from racial discrimination regardless of
fage or gender, and to engare in earnoat pro-

duction for Our own use. Thers are New Afrikan

17
Christians, New Afrikan Muslims, New Afrikan
Communist, and so forth. We're not oppressed

as individuals. We're oppressed as a whole

group, nation.

2

Our struggle is national, because it
involves poople from all over the country and
from all social classes. It is international,

because it involves people from all social
classes worldwide; to protect Our own funda-

mental intersst in peace and security; to

prevent Ourselves from being absorbed, assim-

ilated and destroyed; to strive and fight to

attain (achieve) knouledge and power by any
and all intelligent means necessary, to call

the shots that govern Our lives.

138 Ne.13

macrsm
Wanted: White
Caddies

Drivers on the Tri-State Toll-
[ ¥ay just southwest of Chicago
were startled ast week by bill
board plugging the Afro Coun
ry Club, "where only the ball s
white" They were even more
starled the nex day, after over.

1 vandals wrote NIGER (sc)
and x.xx. and daubed a swast.
K on the sign. Similr racist
#rafit were sprayed on road
sign i the town of Justice, the
racally mixed hedroom com-
manityof 11,500 where th bil
board was located.

Designed bv artist Mark
Heckman, who has put up other

‘Turnabout:afake bilboard gives whites.

sgaasd
atesteof dacimination
activitposters, e tollway s
outing he mythica i e
intended s 2 sardonic com
ment o the exclusion of hacks

from many of the nation's golf
courses.

wanted white people to
et the fecling of what discrimi

- “A lot of people.
don't think racism is there. In
many subile ways of course it

‘Within 48 hours, ol
Rurry of protest calts and a per
sonal request from Mayor Ed-
ward Rusch of Jusiice, the bl
board's owners ook the artwork
down. A satisfied Heckman
said, “The sign_ accomplished
its goal, and I'm more than
pleased.”

19

JET MAGAZINE, Vol. 81, No. 8,
Dec. 9, 1991), Pg. 28
30

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35

The author has also written many papers
and articles published § azines,

nevsletters, and journal
the world.

AFRIKAN?

by Zolo Agena Azania

AARAAAAAAAAAAN

MASALASSASS AR