what were the major features of African society and culture prior to contact with European traders?

1) To what extent did trade shape the rise of west African kingdoms?How?What were other factors influenced the emergence of such kingdoms as those in Ghana,Mali,and Songhai?

2)What were the major features of African society and culture prior to contact with European traders?

3)what strategies and resources did enslaved African draw on to endure the traumas of capture,the “middle passage”across the Atlantic, and sale in New World European colonies?

4) How would you characterize the first encounter between colonizing Spaniards and enslaved Africans taken to their colonies?What were some of the possibilities and limits within which African Americans negotiated the terms of their bondage?

Please a minimun of 3 paragraphs per question.