Showing papers on "African studies published in 1995"

The culture of politics in modern Kenya

Abstract: Introduction 1. Staging politics in Kenya 2. Shattered silences: political culture and 'democracy' in the early 1990s 3. Open secrets: everyday forms of domination before 1990 4. Moral economy and the quest for wealth in central Kenya since the late nineteenth century 5. The dove and the castor nut: Embu household economy in the 1980s 6. Conclusions: 'the showpiece of an hour'.

Effective Coping Strategies of African Americans

Abstract: What are the coping strategies that have enabled African Americans not only to survive but also to achieve against all odds? Are they shaped, at least in part, by cultural patterns and characteristics that have survived from life on the African continent to the present? If so, what does this suggest for social work practice and social welfare policies and services? This article discerns successful coping styles among African Americans that reflect the transmission of African belief systems and cultural values. This article identifies several studies that explored the Africentric orientation to coping and resolving problems. These coping mechanisms are reviewed across system levels: individual, family, community, and organization. Implications for social work practice with African Americans are discussed and future research efforts are suggested. Traditional African Cultural Patterns Despite their unique experience during and after slavery, African Americans have been viewed and judged by most social scientists with the same worldview applied to the dominant culture. Differences from established dominant norms have been interpreted negatively or, at best, neutralized. Herskovits (1935) was among the few American scholars in the first half of the 20th century who described the highly developed political and legal systems, literature and art, and arrangements of interpersonal and family relations on the West African coast, the major area from which slaves were brought to America. Possibly among the first American theorists to discuss distinct worldviews and values of African Americans were Kluckhorn and Strodtbeck (1961) and Parsons and Shils (1967). More recently, Houston (1990) pointed to the structure, content, and practice of religion in African American churches as evidence that African culture survived the African diaspora. He described the large number of African priests who were among slaves brought to America as providing some of the means through which this cultural adaptation took place. These priests provided a degree of stability, affective experience, and group cohesiveness through which some of the coping strategies, based on their cultural past, could emerge. Houston stated, "Because of the many covert, subliminal, nonverbal, and otherwise seemingly innocuous means of culturally transmitting and conditioning personality from parent to offspring, it is possible that personality represents the most profound and intense of all African survivals" (p. 119). Nobles (1972, 1980), Ak'bar (1984), Baldwin (1985), and Asante (1988) are among contemporary scholars who have identified an Africentric approach to philosophy and human behavior and contributed to the development of what has come to be known as the Africentric paradigm. This paradigm proposes that in African culture humanity is viewed as a collective rather than as individuals and that this collective view is expressed as shared concern and responsibility for the well-being of others (Ak'bar, 1984; Ho, 1987; Houston, 1990; Schiele, 1990). In fact, most African languages did not have words for "alone" and "ownership" at the time of initial contact with Europeans. The Africentric paradigm acknowledges feelings and emotions as well as rational and logical ways of thinking equally. Materialism and competition are supplanted by spiritual awareness and by cooperation with others (Ak'bar, 1984; Baldwin, 1985; Ho, 1987; Turner, 1991). A belief system that recognizes and appreciates the rich heritage and experiences of African Americans, including the devastating impact of oppression as manifested by racism and discrimination, emerges from this perspective (Everett, Chipungu, & Leashore, 1991). Scholarship using this perspective identifies positive aspects of African American life richly embedded in spirituality and a worldview that incorporates African traits and commitment to common causes (Grier & Cobb, 1968; Hill, 1971; Houston, 1990; Nobles, 1972, 1980; Miller, 1993). …

Africa South of the Sahara: A Geographical Interpretation

Abstract: Introduction: New Beginnings? Part I: Overview. The Map of Africa. Imagining Africa: Roots of Western Perceptions of the Continent. Thinking about Development: Development Theory and Practice in the African Context. Part II: Culture and Society. African Culture: Diversity and Creativity. Societal Diversity: Language, Ethnicity, and Religion. Gender Dynamics: Men and Women in African Societies. Part III: The Physical Environment. Geology and Geomorphology of Africa. Africa's Climate: Regions, Dynamics, and Change. Biogeography and Ecology. Part IV: Africa in Historical Perspective. The African Past. The Colonial Legacy. Independent Africa: Politics and Development. Part V: Dynamics of Population. Population Distribution. Population Growth. Population Mobility. Part VI: African Economies. Africa in the World Economy. National Economies: Strategies for Growth and Development. Prospects for Economic Integration. Part VII: Rural Economies. Indigenous Food Production Systems. Agrarian Development and Change. Food Security. Part VIII: Urban Economies and Societies. The Evolution of Urban Structure. Urban Economies. Urban Living Environments. Part IX: Resources. Mineral and Energy Resources. Water Resources. Flora and Fauna as Economic Resources. Part X: Social Geography. Living in Poverty. Social Policy: The Health Sector. Children in Africa: Prospects for the Next Generation. Conclusion: Which Future? Glossary.

Africa and Africans in the making of the Atlantic world, 1400-1680

Abstract: This book shows how important the African role was in shaping the Atlantic world that developed after the navigational breakthroughs of the fifteenth century. The degree of African initiative displayed in this period is stressed, both by African elites in dealing with the new visitors and trading partners and, even by African slaves in the New World. Evenly divided into sections on Africa and Africans in the New World, this study stresses cultural and institutional backgrounds to Africa and African slaves. Although the book is intended to help Africanists understand how Africans fared in the Americas, its main purpose is to give readers familiar with Afro-American history a fuller and more dynamic vision of Africa, so they can see the African slave as an African and not just as a laborer.

Segregation and Apartheid in Twentieth Century South Africa

Abstract: Introduction: The Historiography of Segregation and Apartheid 1. The Sanitation Syndrome: Subonic Plague and Urban native Policy in the Cape Colony 1900-1909 2. British Hegemonyh and the Origins of Segregation in South Africa 1901-1914 3. Capitalism and Cheap Labour Power in South Africa 1901-1914 3. Capitalism and Cheap Labour Power in South Africa: from Segregation to Apartheid 4. natal, the Zulu Royal Family and the Ideology of Segregation 5. Marxism, Feminism and South African Studies 6. The Elaboration of Segregationalist ideology 7. Chieftaincy and the Concept of Articulation: South Africa c. 1900-1950 8. The Growth of Afrikaner Identity 9. the Meaning of Apartheid before 1948: Conflicting Interests and Forces within the Afrikaner Nationalist Alliance 10. Displaced-Urbanization: South Africa's Rural Slums 11. Ethnicity in the Ciskei

Leisure and society in colonial Brazzaville

Abstract: Introduction 1. An African crossroads, a frontier post and a colonial town, c.1880-1915 2. Taking hold of the town, c.1915-1960 3. The emergence of leisure 4. Football is king 5. About the town 6. Dressing well 7. High society 8. Conclusion.

Sankofa: African Thought and Education

Abstract: Elleni Tedla, Sankofa: African Thought and Education. New York: Peter Lang, 1995. 236 pp. $29.95, paper. Reviewed by L. Kay Walker and Dickson A. Mungazi, Northern Arizona University. In the four decades since the process of decolonization and political independence began in Africa, African scholars have attempted to evaluate the direction that the continent of Africa has taken in its developmental efforts. Among the questions these scholars have asked as a way of determining that development are: What theory guides African nations as they struggle for development? What are some of the more pressing problems nations of Africa face today? What must African nations do to bring about new institutions that are truly vested in the interests of the people? What kind of governments should these nations have in order to represent the genuine interests of the people? What kind of education do they need in order to influence the formation of new national identities and the emergence of a fresh continental character that will give meaning to the traditions of the past and greater impact to endeavors in the future? This last question is the subject of Elleni Tedla's Sankofa: African Thought and Education. The book is divided into three parts, each with distinctive, integrated features. Part one discusses the interaction between African and Western thought processes and explains how that interaction affects African education and society today. Part two defines some essential concepts and components of both the indigenous and modern African educational systems. In part three, having laid this foundation, Tedla presents her arguments for returning to traditional African values and thought processes as the basis for education in contemporary African society. To understand Tedla's line of argument, one needs to trace both its title and its theme to their beginnings. "Sankofa" is an Akan (Ghanaian) word that means "return to the source and fetch (learn)." Following this, Tedla first urges African educators and policymakers to reach back into the past to rediscover traditions that have been lost to them. Second, she challenges them to renew and refine these traditions so that they will have new meaning for all Africans, not just the wealthy and powerful, in both the present and the future. In Tedla's view, a rejection of colonialism is ultimately a rejection of Western thought process and Western education. This rejection necessitates a redefinition of education to reflect the needs of Africa today and tomorrow. The first step toward this objective is to evaluate the continent's present educational systems within the spirit of Sankofa. The source of this renewal is indigenous African culture, history, and identity-elements that to her suggest the power within African people to shape new directions. By utilizing what is positive in these elements, she maintains, Africans can build a foundation for future development. As such, she proposes that the experiences of contemporary Africans in and out of school reflect a philosophy that is enshrined in its indigenous symbols, including the ritual, music, dance, art, proverbs, poetry, drama, technology, and architecture of precolonial Africa. That these critical features of African culture were neglected by the colonial educational system suggests to Tedla their vitality to the future of Africa. Yet, as she sees it, the challenge before the people of modem Africa is to revive the old ways so that they renew modern institutions for the benefit of all Africans, educated and uneducated, and not simply the wealthy and powerful elites. The acquisition of critical knowledge of African traditions will also require an educational system that is consistent with the contemporary needs of the continent. To fully appreciate this book, readers also must come to terms with the author's understanding of the African concept of spirituality and its role in education. …

African Feminism: Toward a New Politics of Representation

Abstract: I am convinced that I am observing the birth of feminism on the African continent-a feminism that is political, pragmatic, reflexive, and group oriented.' These observations have grown out of my work in various parts of West Africa, in the 1970s and 1980s, and in South Africa, in 1992; out of my dialogues with women from Kenya and other parts of the continent; and most recently out of workshops on women and legal change that I conducted in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Nigeria during May 1994. My research and involvement with Africa goes back to the early 1970s, when the charismatic energy of nationalist leaders like Kwame Nkrumah and Julius Nyerere had faded, the disillusionment with modernization and the capitalist economy was strong, and a rash of military coups marked the emergence of a new crisis orientation. In the nationalist phase, women had played crucial roles, but their importance in politics had waned by 1971 when I began research on cocoa farmers in Ghana and visited many West African countries. I have watched the episodic rise of women's movements during the United Nations Decade of Women (1975-1985) and during the difficult economic crises and structural adjustment program experiments of the 1980s, but I see the peaking of a new feminism now as African states reinvent themselves in the 1990s. This recognition of an emerging African feminism has been met with unanticipated enthusiasm by some of my Japanese, female, African studies colleagues who pursue autonomy within their own unique cultural environment, with ambivalence by some colleagues who work in Africa, and with amused tolerance on the part of many Western feminists who saw it as a

Civil Society and Democratisation in Francophone Africa

Abstract: When analysing the implosion of political space and the rupture of social stability which has characterised the course of African history in recent years, there has too often been a tendency to focus attention on institutions, structures, and politicans. Whilst these are obviously important, such an approach tends to obscure the groundswell of new and yet barely understood social changes. Yet given that the ‘politicians’ seem unable to advance the process in which so many people have invested so much, many observers feel the need to explore alternative sources of dynamism. This is largely the reason for the current interest in the notion of ‘civil society’ which has recently become fashionable in the often cloistered world of African studies.

The Civil Society Debate in Africa

Abstract: 'Civil society' is suddenly all the rage in social science and comparative politics circles. Seminars, books, special issues of journals, even institutes have expounded the idea of civil society in developing countries. 'Civil societies' have been sought and apparently found in 'nascent,' 'incipient,' or 'emerging' (in some cases re-emerging) forms in places, such as the Middle East and China, where Western social science had long denied their presence even their possibility. Academics are not the only ones employing the concept. Political movements and lately even non-governmental organizations (ngos) have used it, although how much in both cases seems to vary from country to country and to reflect local conditions and intellectual traditions. The recent revival of the concept follows on the democratic revolutions in eastern Europe, Latin America, and Africa, and even earlier on the rise of social movements in the West; it is at once the product of an attempt by political actors to conceptualize the nature of their struggles and by scholars to provide a key to understanding global political developments. Indeed the term has come to be virtually synonymous with 'democracy.' The growth of the concept in African studies has been particularly rapid.1 As recently as 1989 Michael Bratton

The Surreptitious speech : Présence africaine and the politics of otherness, 1947-1987

Abstract: Distinguished scholar V. Y. Mudimbe assembles a lively tribute to "Presence Africaine," the landmark African studies journal begun in 1947 Paris. While it celebrates the project's forty-year history, "The Surreptitious Speech" does not naively canonize the journal but rather offers a vibrant discussion and critical reading of its context, characteristics, and significance.

Political economy, the Agrarian question and the comparative method

Abstract: This is the text of an Inaugural Lecture, given at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, on 28 October, 1994. In it the case for classical political economy, and especially its Marxist variant, as a means of analysing the problems of economic development, is argued. Three major preoccupations of classical political economy are identified: accumulation, class and the state. The agrarian question is considered, and the significance of these in its analysis is posited. With the agrarian question in mind, the importance of the comparative method is urged. Some problems associated with the comparative method are considered, and, in the political economy context, the strength of the case‐oriented rather than the variable‐oriented variant of the comparative approach is stressed.

Breaking and making the state: The dynamics of ethnic democracy in Ethiopia

Abstract: (1995). Breaking and making the state: The dynamics of ethnic democracy in Ethiopia. Journal of Contemporary African Studies: Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 149-163.

Christianity and african culture

Abstract: As we African Christian intellectuals continue to meet to discuss Christianity and African culture, other African Christians are in the process daily of shaping a Christianity that will be at home in Africa and in which Africans will be at home. Very few African Christian theologians have found a way of being part of what I would like to name "the making of an African Christianity." One African Christian scholar, the late Prof. Bolaji Idowu, began such a process in the Methodist Church of Nigeria (see his Selfhood in the Church). In spite of the problems created by his personal style, the fact remains that the move he made to try to make Nigerian Methodists at home in their Christian life by an intensification of the element of celebration and popular participation in liturgy had overwhelming positive approval. It was seen as reviving the process that resulted in the creation of Christian versions of the rites of naming, marriage and burial. While we discuss methodology of Christian theology in Africa and how to name what is happening or should happen to Christianity in Africa, others are instituting forms of Christian churches in which the religious find a sustenance for their spirituality. Very early in the Christian enterprise those in Africa who instituted churches parallel to the western churches and missions reckoned that attempts to Africanize western Christianity would be futile. It was better to start afresh, letting the gospel speak in and to Africa and to create space for Africa to shape moulds to hold the essentials of the "Religion of Jesus Christ." We have no name for this two-way process.(1) Meanwhile, it seems to me that for some Africans both Christianity and African culture are irrelevant to the contemporary challenges that Africans face. The University of Ibadan was once in the late '70s the venue for an epoch-making conference on "Women and Development." Papers were solicited on every aspect of life except religion. Is religion irrelevant in the discussion of "Women and Development" in Africa? In a pre-meeting of the 1977 Festival of African Arts and Culture, a symposium was held to highlight the intellectual heritage. I offered a paper on "The Value of African Beliefs and Practices for Christianity in Africa." I had no response from the organizers. Was Christianity the stumbling block or was the problem deeper, because Prof. E. Mveng gave a paper on "Black African Art as Cosmic Liturgy and Religious Language"? Was the mention "African Beliefs and Practices" itself an offence, or was it my suggestion that there is something that these can offer to make Christianity a truly African religion? I decided to test the hypothesis on a group of African Christians. The opportunity came with the meeting of Ecumenical Association of Third World Theologians (EATWOT) in Ghana. Extracts summarizing the thesis were published in African Theology en Route.(2) I had no idea that this was going to earn me the image of the woman who advocates syncretism. In 1986 I was invited to speak at an American college on "The Role of African Traditional Religion in the Development of Christian Theology." The paper bore that title, but when later the speech found its way into the International Christian Digest, it bore the title "Ways to Confront Africa's Primal Religions." I wrote a protest, which was published, suggesting that it was clarifying my position. For me it was clear enough, but then it continued my fear, that whereas it was acceptable to have Christianity transform Africa and Africans, it was difficult to allow the possibility of Africans having something to offer to transform Christianity in Africa, not to speak of world Christianity. To make this presentation I read carefully 472 pages containing forty-seven contributions by Africans and beating the title "Culture, Religion and Liberation."(3) The focus of these papers was the liberation-domination parameter. The contributors argued the use and misuse of religion and culture in the struggle for human liberation. …

Africa's Agenda: The Legacy of Liberalism and Colonialism in the Crisis of African Values

Abstract: Preface Introduction Africa's Biography Liberalism and African Culture The Struggle for Authenticity African Socialism African Concepts of the World, Life and Person Christianity and African Values Community of Life: A Framework for Transformation Christianity and Social Change Bibliography Index

Introduction: urban change and urban studies in Southern Africa

Abstract: (1995). Introduction: urban change and urban studies in Southern Africa. Journal of Southern African Studies: Vol. 21, Urban studies and urban change in Southern Africa, pp. 3-17.

The Christian Executioner: Christianity and Chieftaincy as Rivals

Abstract: La christianisation de l'Akuapem, un petit royaume du sud du Ghana a commence il y a 150 ans. Depuis, cette tentative d'evangelisation suscite le debat et l'incertitude de la part de la population locale. Pour comprendre l'experience de christianisation dans l'Afrique d'aujourd'hui, il est necessaire de posseder une connaissance detaillee des contextes historique et social. L'A. analyse les traditions de ce royaume, s'attache aux discours indigenes ainsi qu'aux facteurs qui conduisent la population a rester incertaine et indeterminee. Le christianisme n'est pas une categorie indifferenciee non soumise a la competition

From slave trade to ‘legitimate’ commerce: Between abolition and Jihad : the Asante response to the ending of the Atlantic slave trade, 1807–1896

Abstract: This edited collection, written by leading specialists, deals with nineteenth-century commercial transition in West Africa: the ending of the Atlantic slave trade and development of alternative forms of "legitimate" trade. Approaching the subject from an African perspective, the case studies consider the effects of transition on the African societies involved, and provide new insights into the history of precolonial Africa and the slave trade, origins of European imperialism, and longer term issues of economic development in Africa.

The Decline of the Africanists' Africa and the Rise of New Africas

Abstract: Our thesis may be simply stated: There is a specter hanging over African studies: the specter of irrelevance both within and outside the academy. Indeed, African studies, as constructed in the North American academy over the past four decades, is dying. Everywhere the signs abound that the world of "Africanist" scholars,' if not exactly being turned upside down, is at least falling apart around them, whether or not they realize it. From the strong potential for a reduction in public, private and institutional funding inherent in the current era of restructuring; through the collapse of the postwar paradigms on which it was founded; to the emergence of critical perspectives posing new questions, definitions, and interpretations: African studies is under siege from all sides.

Some Observations about Philosophy, Postmodernism and Art in Contemporary African Studies

Abstract: Within African studies, one of the few generalizations that may be hazarded-without qualification-is that no area has been more deliberately, consistently, indeed agonizingly self-critical than African philosophy. "Western" academic philosophy is supposedly well-known for identifying, evaluating and defending the presuppositions upon which it grounds itself. With respect to African philosophy, however, a clear consensus has yet to be reached-after more than twenty years of intensive discussion-about what its presuppositions should be, much less whether they are plausible. The wrangling has been incessant and, at some points, counter-productive.What is meant by "presuppositions"? Let us take, as one example, the cultural data-base in Africa from which such philosophy might be expected to arise, or with reference to which it might orient itself. There is still serious controversy within the ranks of African philosophers over the intellectual status, and therefore philosophical potential, of that amorphous corpus of oral literature: divination verses, lyrics, myths, maxims, tales, proverbs-indeed virtually everything in traditional African culture that can be classified as verbalized knowledge or belief-that came to be characterized as African Traditional Thought. From the epistemological standpoint of philosophy in Africa, if ever there has been an unknown known, its perimeters are defined by this corpus. Initially most Anglophone African philosophers were predisposed (by their own overseas university training) to treat things that had already been labelled proverbs and myths-literature generally2 -as un-reasoned, non-critical raw data better fit for the maws of religious studies or cultural anthropology than philosophy. A supposedly "scientific" ideology of modernization dictated that knowledge that was in any sense non-critical and therefore unreasoned had to be rigorously expunged from academia before anything that would receive credibility as African philosophy could emerge (Bodunrin 1981). At the other extreme were those "rebels" who rejected

Christianity in Northern Malaŵi: Donald Fraser's Missionary Methods and Ngoni Culture

Abstract: The first book-length study in sixty years of the missionary methods of Donald Fraser, this book also examines how the Ngoni of northern Malawi adapted Christianity to their own world-view, and how Fraser's empathy for African culture facilitated this process.

Occidentalism, Human Rights, and the Obligations of Western Scholars

Abstract: It is with great pleasure that the Canadian Journal of African Studies / La Revue canadienne des etudes africaines presents a special commentary by Rhoda Howard. Professor Howard served as Editor-in-Chief of CJAS/RCEA from 1987 to i99i period, with articles she edited appearing through to early 1993. During her years of service to this publication, Professor Howard continued her academic writings, and in 1992 the importance of her work was recognized by her election as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. Dr. Howard is Professor of Sociology and an associate member of the Department of Political Science at McMaster University. She originated and is Director of its undergraduate minor Theme School on International Justice and Human Rights. Among her publications are Colonialism and Underdevelopment in Ghana (1978), Human Rights in Commonwealth Africa (1986), and Human Rights and the Search for Community (I995). We hope that the following article, originally a seminar presentation at Harvard University, will elicit debate among the widespread community of scholars working on topics related to Africa.

Commercial law in the Middle East

Abstract: This text documents a conference on commercial law in the Middle East, which was jointly organized by the School of Oriental and African Studies, and the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies in London. It was an occasion which brought together contributors from the principal countries in the Middle East as well as United Kingdom lawyers. The conference provided an opportunity to compare how different Islamic legal systems were learning to accommodate the demands of contemporary commerce with Islamic traditions. This collection of papers aims to provide a multi-faceted insight into commercial law and practice in the Middle East.

The other anthropology: a response to Gordon and Spiegel's review of Southern African anthropology

Abstract: (1995). The other anthropology: a response to Gordon and Spiegel's review of Southern African anthropology. African Studies: Vol. 54, No. 1, pp. 128-131.

State capacity and the politics of economic reform in Sierra Leone

Abstract: (1995). State capacity and the politics of economic reform in Sierra Leone. Journal of Contemporary African Studies: Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 165-192.

Ingessana: The Religious Institutions of a People of the Sudan-Ethiopia Borderland

Abstract: This work presents the results of field research carried out in the Ingessana Hills area of Sudan, between the White and the Blue Niles, among a people who maintain a proud tradition of cultural independence. The book examines the religious institutions of the Ingessana people, attempting to understand how their history and development has been affected by interaction with neighbours such as the Islamic Sudanese, Nilotics and Ethiopian groups. The Ingessana have always sought to define this engagement in their own terms and in such a way as to preserve their distinctive identity. This analysis shows how the Ingessana have created a unique religious tradition as part of a wider culture of resistance.

Liberalization, Democratization and Democracy in Africa: Comparative Perspectives

Abstract: Dr Edmond J Keller, Director of the James S Coleman African Studies Center, University of California, and a Research Fellow of the Africa Institute of South Africa, suggests an empirically based model for use as a framework for analysis in studying contemporary political transitions in Africa.

Reason, Identity, and the African Quest: The Problems of Self-Definition in African Philosophy

Abstract: The focus of this essay is on one of the issues that have served as a significant force in the development of modern African thought. This is the issue of self-definition in Africa, that is the issue of how best we can achieve freedom and development without compromising our identity. This issue has its provenance in colonial and postcolonial attempts by African nationalist scholars, writers, and philosophers to defend African culture against its underestimation by some European scholars. It is one of the issues which defines "the struggle for identity in Africa by means of the definition of reason, its nature, and its functions."' Two questions are involved in this issue: the question of how best to respond to the colonial denigration or underestimation of African cultures and traditions, and the question, which is still very relevant, of how best to achieve development in Africa without compromising our identity. In addressing these issues I not only intend to identify and explain certain positions in modern African thought on the "problems of African self-definition in the contemporary world,"2 but also to elaborate one attitude to these problems which I consider very promising.