Yosef Ben-Jochannan
| Yosef Alfredo Antonio Ben-Jochannan | |
|---|---|
Ben-Jochannan lecturing in Brooklyn circa 1990s.
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| Born | December 31, 1918 |
| Died | March 19, 2015 (aged 96) Bay Park Nursing Home, Bronx, New York |
| Pen name | Dr. Ben |
| Occupation | Writer, Historian, Activist |
| Nationality | America |
| Citizenship | America |
| Subject | Egyptology |
| Literary movement | Afrocentrism |
| Notable works | '"Black Man of the Nile and His Family" |
| Children | Maria, Selvin, Alfredo, Ruth, Naomi, Collete, Wanda, Dawn, Kwame, Dorathia, Ozema, Eleanor (deceased), Nnandi (deceased) |
Yosef Alfredo Antonio Ben-Jochannan (/ˈbɛn ˈjoʊkənən/; December 31, 1918 – March 19, 2015), referred to by his admirers as "Dr. Ben", was an African-American writer and historian. He was considered to be one of the more prominent Afrocentric scholars by some in Black Nationalist community while most mainstream scholars have dismissed him because of the basic historical inaccuracies in his work as well as disputes about the authenticity of his educational degrees and academic credentials.
Ben-Jochannan claimed that he was born in Ethiopia to a Puerto Rican Jewish mother and an Ethiopian Jewish father. Other sources say that he "was probably Puerto Rican but claimed to be of Ethiopian Jewish extraction." Colleagues and family members have presented evidence which contradicts most of his account of his origins.
According to different sources, Ben-Jochannan has a disputed educational record and was educated variously in Puerto Rico, Brazil, Cuba, or Spain, earning degrees in either engineering and/or anthropology. In 1938, he is said to have earned a BS in Civil Engineering at the University of Puerto Rico; this is disputed as the University of Puerto Rico registrar has no record of his attendance. He stated that in 1939 he earned a master's degree in Architectural Engineering from the University of Havana, Cuba. He also claimed to have earned doctoral degrees in Cultural Anthropology and Moorish History from the University of Havana and the University of Barcelona, Spain, respectively, and advanced degrees from Cambridge University in England. Both the University of Barcelona and Cambridge University say that he has never received a degree from either university and, furthermore, Cambridge University said it had no record of Ben-Jochannan ever attending any classes there.
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