Classical civilization - where lies its roots? Does it originate in northern Europe transmitted to the Greeks via Indo-European invaders, with only slight influences from Africans and Phoenicians? Or does the basis of Western civilization flowing from ancient Greece have its foundations in Egypt and the Near East, with peripheral influences from the north? These are some of the questions posed in Black Athena. This program is an introduction to the debate surrounding the controversial theories espoused in Martin Bernal's 1987 publication, Black Athena: Afroasiatic Roots of Classical Civilization.

According to Bernal, ancient Greek civilization had its origin in Africa and the Near East. This proposition has fueled a great debate involving classicists, archaeologists, historians, Egyptologists, linguists, Afrocentrists, multiculturalists, and others. Many classicists dismiss out-of-hand Bernal's conclusions while others find merit in some of his arguments. Afrocentrists, most notably the controversial Dr. Leonard Jeffries of City College of New York, have seized upon Bernal's book as proof of what they have been contending all along: Western civilization owes a great deal to Egyptian civilization and thus to Africa.

It seems that racism is at the root of much of this debate. According to Bernal, the "ancient model" that took hold 1,000 years before the "Golden Age" of Greece records that the Greeks were conquered and colonized in the second millennium B.C. by Egyptians and Phoenicians, who were a Semitic people. This theory held sway until the late 18th century, when the "Aryan model" replaced this earlier understanding with one that purports that classical Greek civilization was significantly formed by Indo-European invaders from the north. The latter hypothesis, which remains the dominant one, arose out of the Romantic movement, was spurred on by geographic determinism, and was based on racism and a need to justify the enslavement of African peoples.