Congo: The Epic History of a People

The fact that they did not ask for political power, however, did not mean that they were happy as ever. The native’s political apathy was more an indicator of a lack of education than of any surplus of satisfaction. In

But it was definitely a hecatomb, a slaughter on a staggering scale that was not intentional, but that could have been recognized much earlier as the collateral damage of a perfidious, rapacious policy of exploitation, a living sacrifice on the altar of the pathological pursuit of profit.

Early anthropology was not at all seen as art for art’s sake; it was intended to facilitate the colonizer’s work.

Scientists were the embodiment of this new-fangled sobriety—impartial, businesslike, colorless, and reliable. Or so people assumed. For in actual practice, it was their supposed impartiality that allowed them to gain so much influence. One

Mission schools were factories for tribal prejudice. Children who were not allowed to leave their villages were suddenly told that the Bakongo lived on the other side of their vast country and what they were to think of them.

came from the mines in Kivu.42 The area around the