There is a belief that one can dispose of rem-
nants, things left over from disputes and contests,
such as anger and jealousy, at the crossroads
because it is a neutral place. As an altar of space
or, rather, a space for a neutral altar, one can
arrive at the crossroads feeling bad and leave the
crossroads, after having decided, feeling much
better. Of course, the opposite is also true.
Because of this possibility, the African believes
that the idea of Legba, Eshu, Ellegua is that
humans are bound to decide, but must not take
the decisions to be simple; it is like life—quite dif-
ficult, complex, and demanding. The person who
navigates the crossroads successfully, in African
belief, will be rewarded with the wisdom that is
reserved for the one who respects the crossroads.
Molefi Kete AsanteSeealsoEsu, Elegba; Orisha; Yoruba
Further Readings
Asante, M. K., & Nwadiora, E. (2007).Spear Masters:
An Introduction to African Religion. Lanham, MD:
Rowman & Littlefield.
Bascom, W. (1969).The Yoruba of Southwestern
Nigeria. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1969.
Eades, J. S. (1980).The Yoruba Today. Cambridge, UK:
Cambridge University Press.
Fadipe, N. A. (1970).The Sociology of the Yoruba.
Ibadan: University of Ibadan Press.
Lloyd, P. C. (1965). The Yoruba of Nigeria. In J. L.
Gibbs, Jr. (Ed.),Peoples of Africa(pp. 549–582).
New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.
CULTURALRELOCATION
Cultural relocation, sometimes referred to as cul-
tural reclamation, is a central theme in Africana
life and a cultural concept in the Afrocentric study
of Africana history and culture. The term origi-
nated in the United State in the early 19th century;
it is associated with various movements in the
Africana experience: Pan-Africanism, Negritude,
New Negro, and black Nationalism. The concept
should not be confused with the cultural explica-
tion of the black experience, which narrates text
and contemporary contexts without specific cul-
tural meaning for Africana peoples. In addition,
the concept is more than a black diaspora aspira-
tion to embrace an ancient African ancestry.
Rather, it is a social, cultural, and political
statement of black unity and Africanity. Cultural
relocation, once recognized only as a life theme
for Africans in the diaspora, has also become a
regenerative concept for indigenous African
people. It is a response to the holocaust of enslave-
ment (Middle Passage), cultural genocide, and
subsequent cultural deprivation theories. As a
global concept, cultural relocation has also
inspired Africans and gives support to other
groups that have addressed the debilitating lega-
cies of colonialism and imperialism.
For many Africans scattered throughout the
world as a result of enslavement, cultural reloca-
tion is the people’s direct response to domination.
For African Brazilians, the concept is expressed
through the history of Quilombismo. It is con-
tained in the ideology of Steven Biko’s Black
Consciousness Movement (BCM) in South Africa.
For African Americans, cultural reclamation has
found expression in the early back to Africa move-
ments, the African Blood Brotherhood, Marcus
Garvey and the Universal Negro Improvement
Association (UNIA), and Malcolm X and the
Organization of Afro American Unity (OAAU).
From the late 1980s through the 1990s, cultural
relocation was likened to a second awakening of
the Black Power Movement of the 1960s. However,
one of the most significant expressions of cultural
relocation is found in the Asantian literature.
Molefi Kete Asante initiated the Afrocentric move-
ment, providing one of the most important
20th-century topics within African cultural and
intellectual circles by elevating the discourse on cul-
tural relocation. Asante advanced theories of cul-
tural relocation, which explained the impact of the
distance that people of African descent have trav-
eled as a result of forced migration, cultural geno-
cide, and attempts at assimilation. His expansion
of the concept of relocation through Afrocentricity
included important terms such asagency,location,
dislocation, andcentering.
Asante situates African agency as the primary
idea in the actualization of freedom of black peo-
ples. In addition, people of African descent had
been verifiably dislocated from Africanity andCultural Relocation 187