Whether or not all this came to pass in an East African ditch, I wouldn't like to say. Perhaps it happened in North Africa or further west, but Africa was definitely the place.

Whether or not all this came to pass in an East African ditch, I wouldn't like to say. Perhaps it happened in North Africa or further west, but Africa was definitely the place.

The land is not in the least bit fertile and yet the cattle herds grow larger and larger. A cow represents capital investment here.

We are concerned that, in a few years time, this place of discovery, with its wealth of human fossils, the like of which can be found nowhere else in the world, could be completely destroyed.

To investigate the history of man's development, the most important finds are, of course, hominid fossils.

We think that groups of between 30 and 40 early men would have settled in an area measuring a hundred square kilometers.

The problem is that during the 1980s, a decade of heavy poaching, the elephants retreated to safer areas. And now people have moved into the corridors once used by the elephants.

A number of scientists with greatly different backgrounds can come up with completely different assessments. The discussions or controversies are endless. Once a year, we try to bring the most important discoverers together to exchange their experiences and knowledge.

I, too, am convinced that our ancestors came from Africa.

The elephants were being slaughtered in masses. Some were even killed in the vicinity of big tourist hotels.

It is virtually impossible to control Northern Kenya, which is populated chiefly by migrant nomads.

We hope to find more pieces of the puzzle which will shed light on the connection between this upright, walking ape, our early ancestor, and modern man.

Paleoanthropology is not a science that ends with the discovery of a bone. One has to have the original to work with. It is a life-long task.

Primates need good nutrition, to begin with. Not only fruits and plants, but insects as well.

Sadly, I am not able to take part in the fieldwork myself so much anymore, as both of my legs were amputated following an airplane crash twelve years ago.

Earlier, 100,000 elephants lived in Kenya and we didn't have any noteworthy problem with it. The problem that we have is not that there are now more elephants.

For fossils to thrive, certain favorable circumstances are required. First of all, of course, remnants of life have to be there. These then need to be washed over with water as soon as possible, so that the bones are covered with a layer of sediment.

One should not forget that there are very few surviving items from this period, often just single, small bones, a tooth, a sliver of the skull. Categorizing these pieces can be very difficult.

I would hazard a guess that we have found fossilized human remains of at least a thousand different specimens in South and East Africa, more or less complete at that. I think this is where the prelude to human history was primarily played out.

Elephants can live to an age of up to 70 or 80 years and they have a good memory. It could be they come across an area that is experiencing a drought. Then they continue on their path and run into people.

Along the borders to Ethiopia and Somalia, anarchy reigns, the police and military have retreated quite some distance.

Scientific innovations continually provide us with new means of analyzing the finds.

I can't think of any other region in the world which is such a vast source of fossils.

To be a slaveholder meant one had to regard the African American as inferior in every way.

There is no way that we know what is going on between the African American and the Asian American. We don't understand what an Indigenous American is. We don't understand what a Latino American is.

Without Social Security, poverty rates for African American seniors would more than double.

It's a pity one can't imagine what one can't compare to anything. Genius is an African who dreams up snow.

It is up to African leaders to show their will and political courage in order to assure that this new pan-African institution becomes an efficient instrument and not a place for endless discussions.

Because I don't play guitar any more, African harmonies and rhythms have been an inspiration to me. I love the raw origin of the sound. It complements my voice and words naturally.

I say that I represent this movement because my intellectual allegiances are clearly European, not African.

I have a very personal interest. I am a Miami-Dade voter. One of the issues is that my vote and so many other votes of women and African Americans in Florida are being discounted or discarded. I want my vote to count.

Historically Black Colleges and Universities, or HBCUs, have played an important role in enriching the lives of not just African Americans, but our entire country.

When I became a director, I wanted to convince a very reluctant Sidney into allowing me to go on the journey of his life. Sidney had gone ahead of every other African American actor.

I think one of the political problems we have in this country is the perspective that all soccer moms think alike, all African-Americans think alike.

The adoring crowds and overwhelming Democratic support in the 2008 election was based largely on joy at jettisoning Bush and the appeal of electing a superbly qualified charismatic African American leader.

My parents shared not only an improbable love, they shared an abiding faith in the possibilities of this nation. They would give me an African name, Barack, or blessed, believing that in a tolerant America your name is no barrier to success.

Since 1957, black people have experienced double-digit unemployment - in good times and bad times. Look at the population of African Americans in prison. They represent more than half the population of prisoners in the country, 55 percent of those on death row.

Eight generations of African-Americans are still waiting to achieve their rights - compensation and restitution for the hundreds of years during which they were bought and sold on the market.

An important aspect of the current situation is the strong social reaction against suggestions that the home language of African American children be used in the first steps of learning to read and write.

A genocide in Africa has not received the same attention that genocide in Europe or genocide in Turkey or genocide in other part of the world. There is still this kind of basic discrimination against the African people and the African problems.

Whether or not all this came to pass in an East African ditch, I wouldn't like to say. Perhaps it happened in North Africa or further west, but Africa was definitely the place.

I don't think people have been able to deal with the fact that African American filmmakers can make movies about life and relationships.

In the final analysis, the whole cause of world revolution hinges on the revolutionary struggles of the Asian, African and Latin American people who make up the overwhelming majority of the world's population.

What we call soul has been around a long time. It comes out of a particular culture that is African in origin, but influenced by 250 years of slavery, as well as other forms of racial oppression.

From the time of independences until the end of the Cold War, in spite of the participation of a considerable number of African states in the non-aligned movement, everyone in fact chose to align with one or another of the two major blocks.

Sports and entertainment have always been windows of opportunity for African Americans, when other doors were closed.

Nowadays, people always say, how come he's doing such young shows? But they never mention The Mod Squad. I was very proud of that show. It's the first time an African-American guy kissed a white girl.

My son Wesley has just turned 13. He was 12 during the recording of this record and he is quite a drummer already and has been studying drums since he was four, but he's also very interested in African percussion and studies percussion.

At the same, we need to remain sensitive to the reality that we are still an African society in which the majority of the people and communities live under severe deprivations and afflictions that are no fault of theirs.