Do Chinese schools teach African history?
I’ve been diving deep into pre-colonial African history lately, and it’s made me look closer at how global history is taught across different school systems.
Most of us know how Eurocentric Western history curriculums can be, often reducing the entire continent's history to the slave trade and colonization. But I’m really curious about the perspective from the other side of the world. With China's massive, multi-decade economic and diplomatic footprint in Africa (the "Belt and Road" initiatives, etc.), I’m wondering if their national education system actually covers the continent's history prior to modern geopolitics.
Specifically, do standard Chinese history textbooks mention the major pre-colonial empires? For example:
The Mali and Songhai Empires: The sophisticated urban centers, trade networks, and intellectual hubs like Timbuktu, where scholars from all over the Mediterranean came to study law, astronomy, and literature.
The Kingdom of Aksum (ancient Nubia/Ethiopia): A massive maritime trading power that was minting its own coins, developing its own script (Ge'ez), and interacting directly with the Roman and Byzantine empires.
The Kingdom of Benin: Known for its incredible engineering, massive earthworks, and complex urban planning long before European contact.
Is any of this covered in world history classes over there, or is the curriculum mostly focused on Chinese dynasties, European history, and modern revolutionary history? If anyone grew up in the Chinese school system or has looked through the Gao Kao (college entrance exam) history syllabus, I’d love to know what the standard narrative looks like!