Research Africa News: July 2nd, 2022

Research Africa News: July 2nd, 2022

An Eternal Symbol of Black Resistance

Larry Rohter Gayl Jones’s novel Palmares sees the legendary Brazilian slave haven as a story to which all descendants of Africans brought forcibly to the Americas can lay claim.

June 23, 2022

Read the research article here.

Soro Soke: The Young Disruptors of an African Megacity

| 5 questions to Trish Lorenz 18 May 2022 Trish Lorenz Judith Weik

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Google offers virtual tours of Sudan’s Pyramids of Meroe Historic locations in the Middle East and North Africa are increasingly being featured on virtual platforms

Alvin R Cabral, May 17, 2022

Google on Tuesday unveiled a new digital experience on its Arts & Culture platform that features Sudan’s Pyramids of Meroe, using the interactive technologies of the world’s largest internet company. The tour features a virtual walk through the pyramids — designated as a World Heritage Site by Unesco. It also allows viewers to zoom in on their inscriptions using Google’s Street View panoramic imagery, the California-based company said.

Read the research article here.

Mali has become another front in the Russia vs. NATO war in Ukraine

Middle East Monitorو May 13, 2022

The distance between Ukraine and Mali is measured in thousands of kilometres, but the geopolitical distance is much closer. So close, in fact, that it appears as if the ongoing conflicts in both countries are the direct outcomes of the same geopolitical currents and transformation underway around the world. After the Malian government accused French troops of carrying out a massacre in the West African country, on 23 April the Russian Foreign Ministry declared its support for Malian efforts, pushing for an international investigation into French abuses and massacres in the country. “We hope that those responsible will be identified and justly punished,” said the ministry.

Read the research article here.

Inside Kehinde Wiley’s Opulent Artist Residency—and the New African Renaissance

BY Alice Kemp-habib June 1, 2022

Walking through the wooden doors at Black Rock—Kehinde Wiley’s Senegal-based artist residency—is an incongruous experience. The courtyard is dense with greenery and the towering black walls that surround it are slick and modern. But just outside, the dusty roads of Dakar are lined with bare, half-built housing blocks. The city feels unfinished, and I say as much to Wiley when we meet. “This is what a developing country looks like when it’s coming into its own,” he says, motioning toward the scaffolding outside. “It’s a really exciting time to be here, to be able to say that you bore witness to the development of a nation.”

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Senegal’s highly prized ladoum rams – in pictures

All photographs by Sylvain Cherkaoui/Panos Pictures Wed 15 Jun 2022.

Sheep are an important commodity in Senegal, where more than half the population lives in the countryside and many city dwellers retain a close connection to their native villages.

Sylvain Cherkaoui took his mobile studio to meet some of the proud owners who posed with their animals Exhibited as part of Dak’Art 2022 Biennale Off at Pieds Tanqués in Dakar, Senegal.

Read the rest of the article here.

NEW BOOKS ‫كتب جديدة

38 Reflections on Mwalimu Nyerere

[تأملات وحكم حول الرئيس مواليمو نيريري38]

Author: Mark J. Mwandosya, J.V. Mwapachu

The novelty of this book is in the choice of individuals selected to be interviewed, the kinds of probing questions asked, and the quality of the conversations held. These led to the disclosure by the interviewees of details that would not normally have been known about Mwalimu. The individuals selected had each worked closely or lived with Mwalimu and, we believed, had unique insights and perspectives to share about him. It was an approach that we think evoked candid anecdotes that constitute the chapters of this book.

Publisher: Mkuki na Nyota Publishers, Tanzania, 2022.

Dust and Rain: Chipo and Chibwe save the Green Valley

[بين الغبار والمطر: كيف أنقذ شيبو وشيبوي الوادي الأخضر]

Author: Ruth Hartley

Two children make a perilous journey through the heart of modern and magical Africa to save their parents’ farm in the Green Valley from drought and climate change. Kambili and the drought arrive in a whirlwind of dust into the lives of CHIPO, an eleven-year-old girl with a special gift, and her brother, CHIBWE. Without rain, the family can’t grow food. so the children run away to find Makemba, the Wise Woman in the Evergreen Forest who can teach them how to keep their valley green. They are kidnapped by criminals but escape and have extraordinary adventures as they journey to find Makemba and then take her magical river water to save the Valley and end the drought.
Publisher: Gadsden Publishers, Zambia, 2022.

When the Sahara Was Green: How Our Greatest Desert Came to Be

[عندما كانت الصحراء الكبرى خضراء: كيف تحولت الصحراء إلى ما هي عليه اليوم]

Author: Martin Williams.

The Sahara is the largest hot desert in the world, equal in size to China or the United States. Yet, this arid expanse was once a verdant, pleasant land, fed by rivers and lakes. The Sahara sustained abundant plant and animal life, such as Nile perch, turtles, crocodiles, and hippos, and attracted prehistoric hunters and herders. What transformed this land of lakes into a sea of sands? When the Sahara Was Green describes the remarkable history of Earth’s greatest desert–including why its climate changed, the impact this had on human populations, and how scientists uncovered the evidence for these extraordinary events. Martin Williams takes us on a vivid journey through time. Along the way, he addresses many questions: Why was the Sahara previously much wetter, and will it be so again? Did humans contribute to its desertification? What was the impact of extreme climatic episodes–such as prolonged droughts–upon the Sahara’s geology, ecology, and inhabitants?

Publisher: Priceton University Press, 2021.

Bury me Naked

[لأكن عاريا حينما تدفنني]

Author: Teamhw SbonguJesu

Bury Me Naked is driven by its hard-hitting language, accessible images, and depth of feeling. The poems are set in the poet’s home village of KwaGezubuso, and show the tough life of young people in South Africa’s neglected rural areas. Many poems are religious, with a respectful but irreverent attitude to God.

Publisher: TNG Publishing, South Africa, 2022.

Histoire de l’esclavage et des luttes anti-esclavagistes en Mauritanie [French book]

[تاريخ الرق والنضال ضد الاسترقاق في موريتانيا]

Author: Saidou Kane (Author), Milena Rampoldi (Editor)

Professor Saïdou Kane (Tékane 1947 – Dakar 2006) was a Mauritanian anti-slavery activist, still little known in Europe, that’s why ProMosaik LAPH decided to publish his book History of slavery and anti-slavel struggles in Mauritania. Kane was of Fulani community and was committed to cultural diversity and justice in Mauritania. He fought against racial discrimination and slavery that to these days still persist in Mauritania, despite official prohibitions during the colonial era and after the country’s independence. As echoed in this book, his socio-political and pedagogical objective was to create a multicultural and multi-ethnic national community in Mauritania, in which different ethnic groups would live together peacefully and with equal rights and which is only possible by eliminating slavery.

Publisher: ‎Neopubli GmbH, 2021.

Shari’a, Inshallah: Finding God in Somali Legal Politics.

[الشريعة إن شاء الله: تجليات الشريعة في تاريخ السياسة القانونية الصومالية]

Author: Mark Fathi Massoud

Western analysts have long denigrated Islamic states as antagonistic, even antithetical, to the rule of law. Mark Fathi Massoud tells a different story: for nearly 150 years, the Somali people have embraced shari’a, commonly translated as Islamic law, in the struggle for national identity and human rights. Lawyers, community leaders, and activists throughout the Horn of Africa have invoked God to oppose colonialism, resist dictators, expel warlords, and to fight for gender equality – all critical steps on the path to the rule of law. Shari’a, Inshallah traces the most dramatic moments of legal change, political collapse, and reconstruction in Somalia and Somaliland.

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 2021.

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