Michael Zeuske moves away from the presentism of current identity debates to approach this history from a global perspective, centering on enslaved individuals and their descendants in colonial and imperial societies. As Cuban poet Nancy Morejón describes, Afro-America is “the America where Africans brought as slaves and their descendants endure.” These millions of men, women, and children are the core of the concept of "Afro."
Enslaved people lived primarily under the conditions imposed by European colonial empires such as Portugal, Spain, England, France, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Baltic territories. They were present in the colonies of these empires, including parts of Africa like Angola, Guinea-Bissau, and Mozambique; the Americas, including Spanish America, Brazil, and the Caribbean; and even in Europe and Asia's peripheries. Remnants of these colonial systems persist today in territories linked to the UK (Commonwealth), the Netherlands (e.g., Curaçao, Bonaire, Aruba), and France, forming what some consider "postcolonial" colonies within the European Union.
The term "Afro," used to frame the history of African enslaved peoples in the Americas and the Atlantic slave trade, emerged as a deductive and active concept, especially from the Global North, around the early 21st century. This modern "Afro" often contrasts with the self-identifications of enslaved and formerly enslaved people and their descendants in Iberian America. The author notes their early use of the term "Afro" in 1993 during fieldwork on former slaves in Cienfuegos, Cuba, as detailed in the appendix of this work.