Throughout his career as a scholar andย author, Ivan Van Sertima worked to transform the way people viewed andย taughtย Africanย history. Van Sertima was born on January 26, 1935, in Kitty Village,ย Guyana when it was still aย Britishย colony. After completing high school, he worked as a Press and Broadcasting Officer for Guyana Information Services. In the late 1960s, Van Sertima did weekly broadcasts toย Africa and theย Caribbeanย as aย journalist.
In 1964, Van Sertima married Maria Nagy and together they adopted two boys. He then attended the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) at the University of London, graduating in 1969 as an honor student with a Bachelor of Arts in African languages and literature. In 1970, Van Sertima began his graduate work at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. After his divorce from Maria, he married Jacqueline Pattern in 1984 and gained two stepdaughters.
Van Sertima began publishing before he came to the United States. In 1967, he published a dictionary of Swahili legal terms. While earning his graduate degree, he published his most famous work,ย They Came Before Columbus, in 1976. The book introduced his argument that people of African origin came to Central and South America long before Christopher Columbus arrived in 1492. The book achieved widespread attention in the African American community and gave a different insight into African history.
In 1977, Van Sertima received his masterโs degree and became an Associate Professor of African Studies at Rutgers in 1979. In the same year he founded the Journal of African Civilizations,ย editing and publishingย the journal for decades. Theย Journal of African Civilizationsย help transform how African history was viewed and taught. Its articles described early African advances in agriculture, mathematics, arts, engineering, architecture, writing, medicine, astronomy, and navigation.
Van Sertima also discussed many of these topics in his several published books includingย Blacks in Science: Ancient and Modernย (1983),ย Black Women in Antiquityย (1984),ย The African Presence in Early Asiaย (1985),ย Great Black Leaders, Ancient and Modernย (1988), andย Egypt: The Child of Africaย (1994).ย His research also discussed the early African civilizations which had disappeared from history. In 1999, Van Sertima republished, in theย African Renaissance, earlier essays which discussed the scientific contributions of Africans. He also published critical essays questioning the work of previous historians and authors about the African continent.
In 1974 Van Sertima was asked to join UNESCOโs International Commission for Rewriting the Scientific and Cultural History of Mankind. Furthermore, from 1976 to 1980 he was asked by the Nobel Committee of theย Swedishย Academy to nominate candidates for the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Ivan Van Sertima passed away on May 25, 2009, in Highland Park, New Jersey; he was 74. He was survived by his wife, Jacqueline, and his four children.
