|
Books > Humanities > History > African history > General
Liberia has a strong connection to the United States in that it was
founded by former slaves in 1822. Although Liberia had existed as
an independent African nation and a symbol of hope to the African
peoples under the rule of various colonial powers, its recent
history has been bedeviled by a prolonged upheaval following a
military coup d'etat in 1980. In this context, the narrative
highlights the distinctiveness of Liberians in their negotiation of
traditional indigenous and modern practices, and the changes
wrought by Christianity and Western influences.
Now combined into a single volume, these three brief history texts
provide a concise and eye-opening overview of the history of the
Middle East. Each is written by a leading expert, and all have been
hailed as outstanding introductions for the general reader. These
texts have been widely translated and adopted at universities in
Turkey, Norway, Italy, and Germany, as well as throughout North
America.
I am an African American male who has had to deal with the racism
and prejudice in this country, so the history that we were deprived
of as children is where my expertise lies. There are hundreds of
facts and events that are very important to the enrichment and
growth of the black nation. We've come very far without knowing our
history; imagine, if we were grounded in our roots, how far we'd
be. You can handcuff my wrists, you can shackle my feet, you can
bind me in your chains, you can throw me in your deepest darkest
dungeon ...but you can't enslave my thinking, for it is free like
the wind. Jaye Swift has sold over 40,000 CDs on the streets by
himself. His music is the epitome of hip hop, and his name has been
recognized by some of the greatest in music. His credibility in
music is flawless, and he has refused to record with mindless
artists who have no substance or integrity. It is only to his
credit that But You Can't Enslave My Thinking ...has been written
with the same impeccable consistency and wisdom. It's designed to
enlighten the minds of non-African Americans and enrich the lives
of all African Americans.
In 1894 Jesus appeared in a dream to Rainisoalambo during a period
of intense national crisis shortly before the French colonial
invasion of Madagascar. An educated member of the southern
highlands aristocracy, Rainisoalambo was also a traditional
medicine man who had fallen into grave difficulty. Being stricken
with a case of then-rampant leprosy, his business had vanished and
he and his family were starving. In this vision, Jesus told
Rainisoalambo to put away his sampy, the small idols and charms he
used for his traditional divining and healing. When he awoke, he
found that he was healed. He quickly got rid of his charms and
began a new life of fervent prayer, witnessing to his neighbors
about what had happened, and reading the gospels with new eyes, as
current reality rather than ancient reports of the far-away
dealings of the white man's god. A group of believers soon gathered
around him. Within a year of intense activity they had formally
organized themselves at Soatanna into what we would now call a base
community, the Disciples of the Lord. Their simple rules called
them to lives of economic sharing and self-sufficiency, cleanliness
and orderliness in their persons, houses, and lands, learning to
read the Bible, daily communal prayers and study, and sending out
apostles and evangelists to establish other such households and
communities. This was the beginning of what is now called the
Fifohazana, or Awakening. More than a century later the movement
comprises several tobys, or base communities, following the
appearance of several more prophets, female and male, and their
miracle-working. The members of the movement, or mpiandry, live
throughout the island, some in the tobys butmost in the cities and
villages as members of a variety of churches. The Fifohazana
continues to stress spiritual healings, exorcisms, personal service
to the poor and sick, cleanliness, prayer, Bible study, and
witnessing. This volume provides the reader with a very clear
understanding of what the Fifohazanamovement is all about
historically, theologically, in terms of the main characters
involved, its tremendous contributions to what a Christian healing
ministry might ideally be, and as it relates to the larger world of
church and society. The book is strengthened by the contributions
of a diverse international group of scholars and participants in
the movement. This has fostered the creation of an authentic piece
of research, which combines the actual voices of participants
within the movement itself along with the perspectives of scholars,
who analyze the movement from the external periphery. This is the
first book-length treatment of the Fifohazana in English. Editor
Cynthia Holder Rich has gathered contributions from authors from
five countries, including several members of the movement, to offer
several perspectives onto the history and current life of the
movement. Articles include analysis of major movement leaders, the
place of healing in the movement, history of the conflict between
the missions and the movement, the significance of oral expression
in proclamation and as a means of revival, the role of women as
leaders in the movement, and theological issues. The Fifohazana is
one of the most intriguing current instances of indigenous
Christianity in the world. While the movement has greatly evolved
and changed in over a century, Jesus continues to appear and raise
up newleaders. Various branches of the movement have developed a
variety of institutions, but the movement has not lost its power of
transformation and change. The Fifohazana: Madagascar's Indigenous
Christian Movement is an important volume for research libraries,
universities, African studies institutions and theological schools.
A century ago, one of the five most recognizable names in the world
was arguably that of Paul Kruger, president of the Transvaal
Republic-a small Southern African country inhabited by a white
tribe-who took on the overwhelming superiority of the mighty
British Empire in defense of his people's sovereign independence.
It was a David and Goliath story. As most of the world-including
the US-cheered the Boers on, they fought a desperate war to the
bitter end (1899-1902) against colonialism, until their country lay
smoldering in ruins and an estimated 27, 929 Boer women and
children, as well as an untold number of blacks, had died in
British concentration camps.Yet within little more than half a
century, those same Afrikaners had squandered their political
capital and gone from being the world's favorite underdog to one of
the most reviled names in history. Their subsequent social
engineering project known as apartheid became an abhorrent concept
in the eyes of the international community. Bernard Botes Kruger is
a fifth-generation descendant of the wartime president, Paul
Kruger. He is an Afrikaner who lived most of his life in the
turmoil and conflict that has dominated his country's history. His
new historical novel, A Battlement of Spears, tells the remarkable
story of how not only the Afrikaners, but also the many other
former sovereign nations within the redrawn borders of the postwar
South Africa struggled to come to terms with a common identity,
often with devastating consequences. "What cruel twist of tectonic
irony caused the deepest scar on the earth's surface across the
face of that continent that would also suffer the most appalling of
human tragedies?" the author asks. Set against the backdrop of the
timeless mountain called in Zulu uKhahlamba (Barrier of Spears), a
dramatic geographic boundary that divided nations throughout
history, A Battlement of Spears is an epic story spanning
twenty-four years and two continents, of two young men with similar
interests but vastly different cultural backgrounds who become
unlikely friends. In a tragic series of events they will discover
what sacrifices are exacted from those who would dwell in the
symbolic no man's land of the summit, where fog often obscures the
vision and deprivation dulls the senses, until it becomes all too
easy to drift into hostile territory or stumble into the jaws of
the precipice. In the process they will become separated, spending
a lifetime before finding each other again a world away, on a
different continent. But in the course of their respective
journeys, they will also learn that barriers are not always what
they seem, and that choices are sometimes inevitable, with
far-reaching consequences. In that hauntingly beautiful land it is
never merely about survival, but about the things that make it
truly worthwhile, such as loyalty, friendship and honor, regardless
of the price. Written in a style that endeavors to entertain while
enlightening the uninformed about South Africa's long road to
democracy, the book provides extensive background explanations
(yes, footnotes) to those interested in the historical,
anthropological or linguistic aspects of a 'rainbow nation, ' which
today recognizes eleven official languages and several royal
families, besides a multitude of unofficial languages and dialects.
And while A Battlement of Spears is a work of fiction, based,
according to the author, on "countless true stories," it becomes
evident within the first few pages that many of the events
portrayed are too detailed and specific not to have been
experienced by someone. Some elements of the story are unmistakably
autobiographical, but much of it simply represents the collective
consciousness of a people struggling to find solutions.
In the global context of the Cold War, the relationship between
liberation movements and Eastern European states obviously changed
and transformed. Similarly, forms of (material) aid and
(ideological) encouragement underwent changes over time. The
articles assembled in this volume argue that the traditional Cold
War geography of bi-polar competition with the United States is not
sufficient to fully grasp these transformations. The question of
which side of the ideological divide was more successful (or lucky)
in impacting actors and societies in the global south is still
relevant, yet the Cold War perspective falls short in unfolding the
complex geographies of connections and the multipolarity of actions
and transactions that exists until today. Acknowledging the
complexities of liberation movements in globalization processes,
the papers thus argue that activities need to be understood in
their local context, including personal agendas and internal
conflicts, rather than relying primarily on the traditional frame
of Cold War competition. They point to the agency of individual
activists in both "Africa" and "Eastern Europe" and the lessons,
practices and languages that were derived from their often
contradictory encounters. In Southern African Liberation Movements,
authors from South Africa, Portugal, Austria and Germany ask: What
role did actors in both Southern Africa and Eastern Europe play?
What can we learn by looking at biographies in a time of increasing
racial and international conflict? And which "creative solutions"
need to be found, to combine efforts of actors from various
ideological camps? Building on archival sources from various
regions in different languages, case studies presented in the
edition try to encounter the lack of a coherent state of the art.
They aim at combining the sometimes scarce sources with qualitative
interviews to give answers to the many open questions regarding
Southern African liberation movements and their connections to the
"East".
 |
A History of Egypt ..; 5
(Hardcover)
W. M. Flinders (William Matthew Petrie, J P (John Pentland) 1839- Mahaffy, J G (Joseph Grafton) 1867-1 Milne
|
R939
Discovery Miles 9 390
|
Ships in 12 - 19 working days
|
|
Selena Axelrod Winsnes has been engaged, since 1982, in the
translation into English, and editing of Danish language sources to
West African history, sources published from 1697 to 1822, the
period during which Denmark-Norway was an actor in the
Transatlantic Slave Trade. It comprises five major books written
for the Scandinavian public. They describe all aspects of life on
the Gold Coast Ghana], the Middle Passage and the Danish Caribbean
islands US Virgin Islands], as seen by five different men. Each had
his own agenda and mind-set, and the books, both singly and
combined, hold a wealth of information - of interest both to
scholars and lay readers. They provide important insights into the
cultural baggage the enslaved Africans carried with them to the
America's. One of the books, L.F.Rmer's A Reliable Account of the
Coast of Guinea was runner-up for the prestigious international
texts prize awarded by the U.S. African Studies Association. Selena
Winsnes lived in Ghana for five years and studied at the University
of Ghana, Legon. Her mother tongue is English; and, working
free-lance, she resides premanently in Norway with her husband,
four children and eight grandchildren. In 2008, she was awarded an
Honorary Doctor of Letters for distinguished scholarship by the
University of Ghana, Legon
South Africa came late to television; when it finally arrived in the late 1970s the rest of the world had already begun to shun the country because of apartheid. While the ruling National Party feared the integrative effects of television, they did not foresee how exclusion from globally unifying broadcasts would gradually erode their power.
Throughout the apartheid-era, South Africa was barred from participating in some of television’s greatest global attractions, including sporting events such as the Olympics and contests such as Miss World. After apartheid, and with the release of Nelson Mandela from prison – itself one of the world’s most memorable media events, came a proliferation of large-scale live broadcasts that attracted the admiration of the rest of the world. At the same time, the country was permitted to return to international competition. These events were pivotal in shaping and consolidating the country’s emerging post-apartheid national identity.
Broadcasting the End of Apartheid assesses the socio-political effect of live broadcasting on South Africa’s transition to democracy. Martha Evans argues that just as print media had a powerful influence on the development of Afrikaner nationalism, so the “liveness” of television helped to consolidate the “newness” of the post-apartheid South African national identity.
Based on a series of detailed case studies, this book presents the
history of genocide in Africa within the specific context of
African history, examining conflicts in countries such as Burundi,
Democratic Republic of Congo, Namibia, Rwanda, and Sudan. Why has
Africa been the subject of so many accusations related to genocide?
Indeed, the number of such allegations related to Africa has
increased dramatically over the past 15 years. Popular racist
mythology might suggest that Africans belong to "tribes" that are
inherently antagonistic towards each other and therefore engage in
"tribal warfare" which cannot be rationally explained. This concept
is wrong, as Timothy J. Stapleton explains in A History of Genocide
in Africa: the many conflicts that have plagued post-colonial
Africa have had very logical explanations, and very few of these
instances of African warring can be said to have resulted in
genocide. Authored by an expert historian of Africa, this book
examines the history of six African countries-Namibia, Rwanda,
Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan, and Nigeria-in which
the language of genocide has been mobilized to describe episodes of
tragic mass violence. It seeks to place genocide within the context
of African history, acknowledging the few instances where the
international legal term genocide has been applied appropriately to
episodes of mass violence in African history and identifying the
many other cases where it has not and instead the term has been
used in a cynical manipulation to gain some political advantage.
Readers will come to understand how, to a large extent, genocide
accusations related to post-colonial Africa have often served to
prolong wars and cause greater loss of life. The book also
clarifies how in areas of Africa where genocides have actually
occurred, there appears to have been a common history of the
imposition of racial ideologies and hierarchies during the colonial
era-which when combined with other factors such as the local
geography, demography, religion, and/or economics, resulted in
tragic and appalling outcomes. Provides an unprecedented
comprehensive history of genocide in Africa that will serve
students of history, war and society, and genocide as well as
general readers Covers Africa's most infamous genocides as well as
lesser-known cases of large scale atrocities Addresses events that
are contested as genocides in Africa in recent history, including
the Nigerian Civil War as well as events in Ethiopia and the
Democratic Republic of the Congo Examines the historical context
for each of these events to clearly explain how they occurred
Churchill's personal account of the first five months of the Second
Boer War; including the Relief of Ladysmith, and Churchill's
capture and dramatic escape from the Boers.
A recent wave of research has explored the link between wh- syntax
and prosody, breaking with the traditional generative conception of
a unidirectional syntax-phonology relationship. In this book, Jason
Kandybowicz develops Anti-contiguity Theory as a compelling
alternative to Richards' Contiguity Theory to explain the
interaction between the distribution of interrogative expressions
and the prosodic system of a language. Through original and highly
detailed fieldwork on several under-studied West African languages
(Krachi, Bono, Wasa, Asante Twi, and Nupe), Kandybowicz presents
empirically and theoretically rich analyses bearing directly on a
number of important theories of the syntax-prosody interface. His
observations and analyses stem from original fieldwork on all five
languages and represent some of the first prosodic descriptions of
the languages. The book also considers data from thirteen
additional typologically diverse languages to demonstrate the
theory's reach and extendibility. Against the backdrop of data from
eighteen languages, Anti-contiguity offers a new lens on the
empirical and theoretical study of wh- prosody.
|
|