Four undercelebrated black women who contributed immensely to Pan-Africanism

Claudia Jones

Claudia Jones was born in Belmont, Port of Spain, Trinidad, on 21 February 1915. Her family migrated to New York when she was nine years old due to the post-war cocoa price crash in Trinidad. She had a more international and elitist approach to Pan-Africanism where she vehemently spoke against the exploitation and imperialism conducted by the US in developing countries.

Her writings, We Seek Full Equality for Women and An End to the Problems of the Negro Woman depicted the oppression of working-class African women. Cooper was also present at the first Pan-African Conference in London, England, in 1900 and delivered a paper entitled “The Negro Problem in America”. Jones was deported from the US because of her activism and refused entry into Trinidad and Tobago as she was thought to be troublesome. She gained residency in the UK based on humanitarian ground and intensified her Pan-African pursuit.

Jones created the West Indian Gazette, a newspaper that was used to resist racist and class segregation and also to expose colonialism in Africa and the Caribbean. She also rallied behind South Africa and used the West Indian Gazette to expose mistreatments of Blacks during apartheid. Claudia Jones is known to have influenced Pan-Africanists such as Kwame Nkrumah. Pan-Africanism