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Books > Social sciences > Politics & government
Slavery in the United States continues to loom large in our
national consciousness and is a major curricular focus in African
American studies, during Black History Month, and for slavery
units. This is the first encyclopedia to focus on the typical
experiences and roles and material life of female slaves in the
United States from Colonial times to Emancipation. More than 150
essay entries written by a host of experts offer a unique
perspective on the material life, events, typical experiences, and
roles of enslaved women and girls in both their interactions with
their owners and the little private time they could manage. This
groundbreaking volume is an exciting focus for research and general
browsing and belongs in all American History, Women's Studies, and
African American Studies collections.
The coverage includes entries illuminating women's work, on the
plantation, from the big house to the field and slave cabin as well
as individual entrepeneurialship. Aspects of daily life such as
food procurement and meals, folk medicine and healing, and hygiene
are revealed. Material life is uncovered through entries such as
Auction Block, Clothing and Adornments, and Living Quarters. Life
cycle events from pregnancy and birthing to childcare to holidays
and death and funeral customs are discussed. The resistance to
slavery and its horrors are enumerated in many entries such as
Abolition, Sexual Violence, and the Underground Railroad. A wider
understanding of the different ways that slavery played out for
various enslaved women can be seen in entries regarding African
origins and that depict regions in the North and South such as Low
Country and groups such as Maroon Communities. Profiles of noted
female slaves and their works are also included. Accompanying the
entries are suggestions for further reading. Further scholarly
value is added with a chronology and selected bibliography.
Numerous photos and sidebars complement the essays, with quotations
from oral history and literature plus document excerpts.
Addressing the unprecedented challenges facing public leaders
brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic, this comprehensive Research
Handbook reframes the public leadership debate by offering new ways
of thinking about leadership practices. Bringing together
contributions from leading scholars across the world, this
insightful Research Handbook illustrates how the decisions made by
global leaders today will have widespread consequences for future
generations. Chapters evaluate innovative leadership models
including cooperative leadership and spiritual leadership, analyse
international perspectives on leadership in response to the
Covid-19 pandemic, and discuss the role of public leadership in
practice. Exploring important contemporary case studies including
the issues of county lines in the UK and public leadership in the
Small Island States of the Anglophone Caribbean (SIDS), it
concludes by advocating for a new post-pandemic paradigm of public
leadership. Focusing on learning from the practices and experiences
of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Research Handbook will be essential
reading for students and scholars in business management,
economics, public leadership, and public policy and politics. It
will also be beneficial for civil servants, politicians, and
leadership practitioners in healthcare, education, and non-public
sectors.
When a country experiences a civil war, media reports are mainly
brought to the attention of the outside world by those who can only
report on the surface impressions obtained during a short visit or
from the comfort of a studio thousands of miles away. My
experiences, living and working at the grass roots level, during
and after the crisis in Nigeria in the 1960s has a different
perspective. As a young Scotswoman married to a Nigerian from the
breakaway republic of Biafra we lived as refugees with our young
family, forced to leave our home seven times in the 30 months of
the civil war as the war raged around us. Cut off from the outside
world, in a situation the British High Commissioner in Nigeria had
predicted at the onset, would be over in two weeks, we lived a life
full of experiences which gave me a `qualification in survival' no
university could have imparted. Without electricity, gas, petrol or
phones, and often without money, medicine or safe drinking water we
learned to appreciate the basic necessities of life. I was 18 years
old, living in Dunfermline, Scotland when the man I was to marry
asked me for a dance at the Kinema Ballroom. Two years later my
career plan to qualify as a nurse was over and I was married to Len
Ofoegbu, with a baby daughter and we were on our way to a new and
very different life. Our first home was in the capital, Lagos, and
was a big culture shock to Len and I. The newly independent West
African country was already experiencing political and civil
unrest, leading to violence, massacres, coups, and the inability of
the central government to control the situation. Hundreds of
thousands of Easterners who had settled throughout the whole of the
country now `went home' as they had become the targets of
slaughtering mobs. The secession of the Eastern Region, calling
itself Biafra, followed and a David and Goliath bitter conflict
ensued. The word `kwashiorkor' and pictures of starving children
and adults appeared in the Western press for the first time. I was
one of around a dozen, mainly British, foreign wives of Biafrans
who remained with their husband throughout the civil war. I worked
voluntarily with relief agencies in feeding centres, clinics, an
orphanage and, after Biafra surrendered in January 1970, in a
children's hospital in return for food for my growing family. In
May 1970 we moved back to live in Lagos where we went through more
crises as a family. I became an early member of Nigerwives, an
organisation for foreign wives and partners of Nigerians which
became like an extended family as we gave mutual support and strove
to resolve anomalies in Nigerian laws which put unnecessary
restrictions affecting our particular circumstances. By the 1980s I
accepted that my husband and I had grown so far apart that I could
no longer remain with him. My legal reason to remain in Nigeria was
`to accompany him' and he could withdraw his immigration
responsibility for me at any time. I needed a security which he
could not give me and I left him and Nigeria to begin a new life
and career in Britain in 1985. I was advised when I completed the
original manuscript in the 1970s not have it published as Nigeria
was extremely sensitive about any account which was sympathetic to
the Biafran side of the civil war. In 1986 a much shorter version
of Together in Biafra, titled Blow The Fire, telling the story up
to 1970 was printed by Tana Press in Nigeria. I retain the
copyright. It was published under my married name Leslie Jean
Ofoegbu. It has been cited in academic papers. An example is A
Lingering Nightmare: Achebe, Ofoegbu and Adichie on Biafra,
Francoise Ugochukwu 2011.
When a country experiences a civil war, media reports are mainly
brought to the attention of the outside world by those who can only
report on the surface impressions obtained during a short visit or
from the comfort of a studio thousands of miles away. My
experiences, living and working at the grass roots level, during
and after the crisis in Nigeria in the 1960s has a different
perspective. As a young Scotswoman married to a Nigerian from the
breakaway republic of Biafra we lived as refugees with our young
family, forced to leave our home seven times in the 30 months of
the civil war as the war raged around us. Cut off from the outside
world, in a situation the British High Commissioner in Nigeria had
predicted at the onset, would be over in two weeks, we lived a life
full of experiences which gave me a `qualification in survival' no
university could have imparted. Without electricity, gas, petrol or
phones, and often without money, medicine or safe drinking water we
learned to appreciate the basic necessities of life. I was 18 years
old, living in Dunfermline, Scotland when the man I was to marry
asked me for a dance at the Kinema Ballroom. Two years later my
career plan to qualify as a nurse was over and I was married to Len
Ofoegbu, with a baby daughter and we were on our way to a new and
very different life. Our first home was in the capital, Lagos, and
was a big culture shock to Len and I. The newly independent West
African country was already experiencing political and civil
unrest, leading to violence, massacres, coups, and the inability of
the central government to control the situation. Hundreds of
thousands of Easterners who had settled throughout the whole of the
country now `went home' as they had become the targets of
slaughtering mobs. The secession of the Eastern Region, calling
itself Biafra, followed and a David and Goliath bitter conflict
ensued. The word `kwashiorkor' and pictures of starving children
and adults appeared in the Western press for the first time. I was
one of around a dozen, mainly British, foreign wives of Biafrans
who remained with their husband throughout the civil war. I worked
voluntarily with relief agencies in feeding centres, clinics, an
orphanage and, after Biafra surrendered in January 1970, in a
children's hospital in return for food for my growing family. In
May 1970 we moved back to live in Lagos where we went through more
crises as a family. I became an early member of Nigerwives, an
organisation for foreign wives and partners of Nigerians which
became like an extended family as we gave mutual support and strove
to resolve anomalies in Nigerian laws which put unnecessary
restrictions affecting our particular circumstances. By the 1980s I
accepted that my husband and I had grown so far apart that I could
no longer remain with him. My legal reason to remain in Nigeria was
`to accompany him' and he could withdraw his immigration
responsibility for me at any time. I needed a security which he
could not give me and I left him and Nigeria to begin a new life
and career in Britain in 1985. I was advised when I completed the
original manuscript in the 1970s not have it published as Nigeria
was extremely sensitive about any account which was sympathetic to
the Biafran side of the civil war. In 1986 a much shorter version
of Together in Biafra, titled Blow The Fire, telling the story up
to 1970 was printed by Tana Press in Nigeria. I retain the
copyright. It was published under my married name Leslie Jean
Ofoegbu. It has been cited in academic papers. An example is A
Lingering Nightmare: Achebe, Ofoegbu and Adichie on Biafra,
Francoise Ugochukwu 2011.
This book asks why socially innovative initiatives, including
attempts to rejuvenate democracy by introducing new modes of
participation, are not leading to a democratization of the State or
overcoming the gap between political leaders and people. It offers
a vivid and thought-provoking conversation on why we are at such an
impasse and explores concrete possibilities for change. Offering
insights on the failures of modern democracies from three leading
voices of contemporary social science, the book interrogates the
possibilities of progressive socio-political agendas, strategies,
and movements seeking to overcome these failures. It highlights
examples of bottom-linked forms of governance that provide signs of
positive change and focuses on the essential role that progressive
institutions play in enabling socio-political transformation. It
also analyses how processes of self-emancipation driven by social
innovation and political mobilization movements represent the most
promising form of political engagement today. Students and scholars
of social innovation and governance will find this to be an
invigorating read. It will also be helpful to politicians and
government officials seeking to understand, respond to, and explore
efforts towards democratizing political change.
Comparing the structures and challenges of democratic
constitutionalism in India and the European Union, this book
explores how democracy is possible within vastly diverse societies
of continental scale, and why a constitutional framework is best
able to secure the ideals of collective autonomy and individual
dignity. It contributes to an emerging comparative discussion on
structures of power, separation of powers and a comparative law of
democracy, which has been long neglected in comparative
constitutional studies. This timely and invigorating book showcases
a novel comparative approach termed "slow comparison" counters the
conceptual focus on nation-states in comparative studies and
develops a broader understanding of democratic constitutionalism.
In the context of the contemporary crisis of constitutional
democracy, triggered by populism, majoritarianism and
authoritarianism, chapters continue older ongoing debates about
multiculturalism, identity politics and democratic equality that
hold important insights for both India and the EU to deal with
contemporary challenges. This book will be an important read for
scholars of comparative constitutional law and theory. It will also
benefit those studying EU law and Indian constitutional law.
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