Since the publication of the first edition in 1977, Africa has established itself as a leading resource for teaching, business, and scholarship. This fourth edition has been completely revised and focuses on the dynamism and diversity of contemporary Africa. The volume emphasizes contemporary culture civil and social issues, art, religion, and the political scene and provides an overview of significant themes that bear on Africa's place in the world. Historically grounded, Africa provides a comprehensive view of the ways that African women and men have constructed their lives and engaged in collective activities at the local, national, and global levels."

In these lively life stories, women market traders from Ghana comment on changing social and economic times and on reasons for their prosperity or decline in fortunes. Gracia Clark shows that market women are intimately connected with economic policy on a global scale. Many work at the intersection of sophisticated networks of transnational commerce and migration. They have dramatic memories of independence and the growth of their new nation, including political rivalries, price controls, and violent raids on the market. The experiences of these women give substance to their reflections on globalization, capital accumulation, colonialism, technological change, environmental degradation, teenage pregnancy, marriage, children, changing gender roles, and spirituality. Clark's commentary illuminates the complex historical and cultural setting of these deeply revealing lives.

This book focuses on the economic, political, social, and cultural dynamics of street economies across the urban Global South. Although contestations over public space have a long history, Street Economies in the Urban Global South presents the argument that the recent conjuncture of neoliberal economic policies and unprecedented urban growth in the Global South has changed the equation. The detailed ethnographic accounts from postsocialist Vietnam to a struggling democracy in the Philippines, from the former command economies in Africa to previously authoritarian regimes in Latin America, focus on the experiences of often marginalised street workers who describe their projects and plans. The contributors to Street Economies in the Urban Global South highlight individual and collective resistance by street vendors to overcome numerous processes that exacerbate the marginality and disempowerment of street economy work.