Africa Past & Present

Hikabwa Decius Chipande (PhD 2015 Michigan State) on the political and social history of football (soccer) in Zambia. He discusses becoming an historian; the game’s relationship with British colonizers, the copper mines, and postcolonial governments; and the archival research and oral interviewing process. Chipande concludes with insights from his extensive experience with sport development in Africa.

Peter Cole (Western Illinois, SWOP [Wits]) compares Durban and San Francisco, maritime union solidarities, the anti-apartheid movement, and technological change in the two ports. Cole concludes with reflections on researching and teaching comparative history.

Menán Du Plessis (Stellenbosch University and U. of Kentucky) on her literary work, research on the Kora! language, and the significance of Khoesan linguistics to southern African studies. Du Plessis also considers digitization efforts and the impact of mass media and the Internet on endangered African languages.

Laura Seay (Government, Colby College) on becoming a Congo scholar; the genealogy and impact of her “Texas in Africa” blog; using Twitter for academic purposes and public discourse; and her book project titled “Substituting for the State” about non-state actors and governance in eastern DR Congo. Follow Laura on Twitter: @texasinafrica

Keith Breckenridge (WISER) on the current state of digital Southern African Studies; the politics, funding, and ethics of international partnerships in digital projects; and his new book Biometric State: The Global Politics of Identification and Surveillance in South Africa, 1850 to the Present. Follow Keith on Twitter: @BreckenridgeKD Part I of a series on digital African studies.

Chitja Twala (History, Univ. of Free State) on the history of black politics and the African National Congress in the Free State province; oral history; cultural resistance; the field of History in South Africa; lessons of the Marikana Massacre; and “transformation” in South African higher education.

Tebogo Motswetla, a leading African cartoonist from Botswana, on his journey of becoming a cartoonist; the 25th anniversary of his character “Mabijo”; applied aspects of his work; seTswana language dialogue; the creative process, censorship, and freedom of expression.

Abdilatif Abdalla is the best-known Swahili poet and independent Kenya’s first political prisoner. He discusses poetry as a political instrument and as an academic field; publication prospects for African poets; and how poetry enabled him to survive three years of solitary confinement, after which he spent 22 years in exile. The interview ends with Abdalla […]

Pius Adesanmi (Carleton University) on African literatures, public intellectuals, Sahara Reporters blog, social media and postcolonial writing, Yoruba and Anglophone literatures, ‘imposed transnationalism’ in the African literature classroom and ‘What is Africa to me’? With guest host Ann Biersteker. Photo courtesy of Pius Adesanmi

Brett O’Bannon (Political Science, Director of Conflict Studies, De Pauw University) on the causes and consequences of civil war in Côte d’Ivoire; the “Responsibility to Protect” as applied to conflict in Africa ; and monitoring herder-farmer relations in Senegal to anticipate the onset of wider-scale warfare.

Denis Goldberg reflects on his activism, hardships in prison, and the highs and lows of the antiapartheid movement. He was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1963 in South Africa’s Rivonia trial with Mandela and other leaders. He served 22 years in an apartheid prison. Goldberg’s autobiography is titled The Mission: A Life for Freedom in […]

Dr. Chima Korieh (History, Marquette) on Nigerian experiences on the African homefront during World War II, agriculture and social change in the colonial era, the Biafran War and the politics of memory, and Igbo identity.  The interview closes with a discussion of endangered archives in postcolonial Nigeria.

David Eltis, Robert W. Woodruff Professor of History at Emory University, on the making of the Transatlantic Slave Trade database,  a landmark collaborative digital project he has co-edited for two decades. Eltis discusses the research process, online dissemination, and new directions for the initiative. This is the second part of a two-part series recorded at […]

David Gordon (Bowdoin, History) on his recent book Invisible Agents: Spirits in a Central African History. Gordon explores how and why spirits and discourses about spirits inspired social movements and influenced historical change, from precolonial Bemba chieftaincies and 1930s Watchtower millenarianism to the postcolonial state’s humanism and Pentecostalism under Kaunda and Chiluba, respectively. Gordon closes […]

Barry Gilder, South African folk singer and ex-ANC intelligence operative, is the author of Songs and Secrets: South Africa from Liberation to Governance. In the interview, he reflects on freedom songs, exile, and armed struggle. Gilder performs his “Matola Song,” about a friend killed by an apartheid death squad.  He ends with thoughts on democratic […]

David Killingray (Emeritus, Goldsmiths College, U. of London) on the often-neglected role of African travelers and intermediaries in 19th-century Africa; black writers and activists in Victorian Britain; and the significance of documenting lived experiences of Africans to better understand processes of historical change.    

Sekibakiba Peter Lekgoathi (U. Witwatersrand/Michigan) on radio, ethnicity and knowledge production in South Africa, both apartheid’s Bantu Radio and the liberation movement’s Radio Freedom, including broadcasts and audiences, idioms, songs and slogans. Also discusses formation of Ndebele ethnicity and role of popular radio in forging a strong ethnic consciousness, and histories of African interpreters and […]

Geographer Abdi Samatar (U. Minnesota; President of the U.S. African Studies Association) on pirates and piracy off the Somali coast; the complexities and inequalities between “fish pirates” and other kinds of pirates; the inadequacy of “clans” in explaining Somali society; and thoughts on “Africa’s First Democrats” and the future of Somalia.  

Dag Henrichsen (Basler Afrika Bibliographien, Basel) on protest and prophecy among Herero intellectuals in 1940s Namibia. Also discussed are the 1904-5 German genocide, construction of Herero modernity, private archives, popular culture, Namibian historiography, and how Namibians conceptualized a “South African Empire.”

Vicki Huddleston (former U.S. Ambassador to Mali) and anthropologist Bruce Whitehouse (Lehigh Univ.) discuss the ongoing political and military conflict in Mali. Focus is on the complex origins of the Tuareg and Islamist insurgencies in the north, French intervention and U.S. policy, and how to chart the way to peace and stability in a wounded […]