Runoko Rashidi

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**Runoko Rashidi**

Born:
Occupation:	historian, research specialist, writer, world traveler, Activist

Runoko Rashidi is an historian, research specialist, writer, world traveler, and public lecturer based in Los Angeles. Runoko Rashidi is a focusing on the African presence globally and the African foundations of world civilizations. He is particularly drawn to the African presence in Asia, Australia, and the Pacific Islands, and has coordinated historic educational group tours to India, Aboriginal Australia, the Fiji Islands and Southeast Asia as well as Egypt and Brazil. His academic focus is in "the Black foundations of world civilizations" and has researched the Black presence in Asia, with an emphasis on India.

1 Professional Associations
2 Work in India
3 Quotes
4 Further reading
5 External links

[edit] Professional Associations

In 1979 Rashidi was a founding member of Amenta, in 1980 of the Southern Cradle Research Organization, in 1984 of the Egyptian Civilization Monitoring Committee and in 1985 the Africans/Ali Mazuri Monitoring Committee. In 1987 he inaugurated the First All-India Dalit Writers Conference in Hyderabad, delivering an address on 'The Global Unity of African People'. From 1981 to 1984 Rashidi worked on African history at Compton Community College, Compton, California and from 1985 to 1987 he worked for the National Black Computer Network as history editor. Rashidi has contributed regularly to the Journal of African Civilizations.

[edit] Work in India

Since 1986, he has worked actively with the Dalits (India's Black Untouchables). In 1987, he was a keynote speaker at the first All-India Dalits Writer's Conference, held in Hyderabad, India, and spoke on the "Global Unity of African People." In 1998, he returned to India to lecture, study and sojourn with the Dalits and Adivasis (the indigenous people of India). In 1999, he led a group of seventeen African-Americans to India, and became the first ever non-Indian recipient of the prestigious Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Memorial Award.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Quotes

"History is a light that illuminates the past, and a key that unlocks the door to the future." --Runoko Rashidi

[edit] Further reading

van Sertima, Ivan (1989). Egypt Revisited. Transaction Publishers. ISBN 0-88738-799-3 (an Afrocentrist volume "on the race and origin of the ancient Egyptians' black dynasties and rulers, Egyptian science and philosophy, and great Egyptologists".