Proceedings of a conference held to mark the 36th anniversary of the founding of the OAU. Includes the keynote address from Hage Geingob, and contributions from Malegapuru Makgoba and Kwesi Prah. 208pp, NAMIBIA.

2000 9991602089 Paperback

Focusing on all areas of sub-Saharan Africa, the essays here reflect the range of engagement that represents the state of the art of African history writing. Notes, bib, index, vi, 322pp, USA. INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRESS.

This volume of forty six essays spans four decades of active scholarship by Professor Bethwell Allan Ogot. These papers reflect his concerns in the methodology of African history, education, the oral traditions, and the uses and misuses of post-modern theory. Index, bib, lxvi, 684pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS, 1592210058

Compiles key archival documents chronologically and by so doing provides focused insights into African history. Notes, x, 369pp, USA. MARKUS WIENER PUBLICATIONS INC, 1558762892

A vast amount of literature, both scholarly and popular, now exists on the subject of historical memory, but there is remarkably little available that is written from an African perspective. This volume explores the inner dynamics of memory in all its variations, from its most destructive and divisive impact to its remarkable potential to heal and reconcile. It addresses issues on both the conceptual and the pragmatic level and its theoretical observations and reflections are informed by first-hand experiences and comparative reflections from a German, Indian, and Korean perspective. 248pp, UK. BERGHAHN BOOKS.

Ten papers by young fieldworkers which reveal the particular challenges faced by recent history researchers in Africa. The accounts cover a range of issues, from practical questions of where to live and what to cook, to methodological concerns about what is true, and true for whom? Many experiences are described: having a newly laid roof stolen in the night, being shadowed by security police, being initiated into a secret society, and being tried for witchcraft. 'The individual contributions are nearly all original, vibrant, and alive...the volume as a whole is very appealing...' Joseph C. Miller, University of Virginia. Notes, bib, index, 147pp, UK. JAMES CURREY PUBLISHERS.

A critical account of narratives which have selectively interpreted and misinterpreted the continent's deep past. Writers have created alluring images of lost cities, vast prehistoric migrations and golden ages of past civilisations. Debates continue on the African origins of humankind, the contributions of ancient Egypt to the world and Africa's importance to global history. Images of 'Africa', simplifying a complex and diverse continent, have existed from ancient Mediterranean worlds, slave trading nations and colonial powers to today's political elites, ecotourists and aid-givers. Robin Derricourt draws on his background as publisher and practitioner in archaeology and history to explore the limits and the dangers of simplifications, arguing - as with Said's concept of 'Orientalism' - that ambitious ideas can delude or oppress as well as inform. 256pp, UK. PLUTO PRESS.

A highly praised account of how oral history is produced. Notes, bibliography, index, 258pp, UK . JAMES CURREY PUBLISHERS.

Argues that the invention of Africa is not merely a residue of Africa’s encounter with Europe but a project in continuity in contemporary history of Africa, where history has become a location of struggle and meaning, a location of power and domination. Eze contends that postcolonial African studies that thrive by way of unanimity, analogy, or homogenenity are merely advancing a defeatist historicism. It attempts to gain essence by inverting the terms of colonial discourse and is decisively implicated in the very logic of coloniality. This method of historiography not only stifles the overall socio-political imagination of contemporary Africa but offers a dogmatic blueprint for politics of domination. Eze argues that a chance for an African Renaissance is dependent on review mechanisms of African historiography. 238pp, UK. PALGRAVE.

Offers a history of African historiography from an African perspective. It attempts to answer some of the questions concerning the practice of history from the civilizations of ancient Egypt, through the varied cultures and regions of the continent to contemporary times. The book presents the philosophy of the oral tradition as it co-existed and co-exists with the written traditions of ancient Egypt, the Islamic tradition, and the western European tradition of historiography. 312pp, NIGERIA. ONYOMA RESEARCH PUBLICATIONS.

A collection that takes its place alongside a small but growing literature that highlights how, in autobiographies, historical writing, fiction, and other literary genres, African writers intervened creatively in their political world. African brokers - pastors, journalists, kingmakers, religious dissidents, politicians, entrepreneurs all - have been doing research, conducting interviews, reading archives, and presenting their results to critical audiences. 280pp, USA. OHIO U P.

Essays that argue that through African histories it is possible to reconnect to all the histories of those who have been disconnected: the poor, Haïtis, Abahlalis, shack-dwellers, the dispos-sessed. Depelchin explores how peoples have been railroaded into looking at their own histories through a shattered looking-glass, deliberately and forcefully crushed so as to render the exercise impossible. 96pp, UK. PAMBAZUKA.

A collection of papers first presented at the international seminar held in Switzerland in 1995, celebrating the centenary of the publication of C.C. Reindorf's History of the Gold Coast and Asante. The contributors reflect on the forgotten quality of the dialogue achieved in the second half of the nineteenth century by scholars such as Reindorf and Samuel Johnson and the practitioners of local and regional traditions. Maps, b/w photos, notes, refs, bib, 212pp, SWITZERLAND. BASLER AFRIKA BIBLIOGRAPHIEN, 3905141701

A study of how Africa was seen and understood in Britain between the years 1890 1918, during the early years of ethnography and anthropological research. As many artefacts were brought to Britain racist stereotypes developed with profound repercussions for the construction of national identity. In the epilogue, the author also discusses the modern impact of museum exhibits on the creation of the post colonial. Index, bib, notes, 280pp, USA. YALE UNIVERSITY PRES.

A collection of essays and articles which explores both Davidson's own development and that of African historiography. 373 pages, index, notes. UK. JAMES CURREY PUBLISHERS.

Depelchin critiques "silences" in historical analyses of the continent - some of omission, others self-imposed. He argues that acknowleding what is left out and why is crucial, but so is taking historical knowledge back into the hands of those formerly dispossessed, allowing a measure of collective freedom as "silences" are exposed and expressed.

Examples include country studies of Rwanda, South Africa and Congo, and range from analyses of slavery and economic development to oral traditions and fiction from the continent. Bib, endnotes, xix, 256pp, TANZANIA. MKUKI NA NYOTA PUBLISHING.

This volume describes current academic methods used to understand African history. The five sections look at archaeological contributions to historical research, the slave trade, documentary sources, oral traditions, and innovative sources and methods for historical research. Each section is introduced by a distinguished Africanist scholar. BNS, 356pp, USA. UNIVERSITY OF ROCHESTER PRESS

Provides a revisionist perspective on the way twentieth-century Africa is viewed and analysed among scholars. Employing literary, historical, and anthropological techniques, the author attempts to generate a new understanding of issues that permeate discussions of Africa by disrupting the centrality of postcolonial texts and focusing instead on the cultural and intellectual production of colonial Africans. In particular, Desai calls for a re-evaluation of the 'colonial library'- that set of repre-sentations and texts that have collectively 'invented' Africa as a locus of difference and alterity. Bib, index, xii, 197pp, USA. DUKE UNIVERSITY PRESS.

Second Edition. An investigation into the politics of knowledge and the construction of history looking at traditional accounts of world history that treat the Third World as peripheral to the narrative of the West. The author goes on to consider questionings of the limits of Western knowledge in the work of Said, Spivak and Bhabha and discusses the decolonisation of history and the deconstruction of the West. The author also reflects upon developments in the debates on postcolonialism since the publication of the first edition in 1990. Index, bib, notes, xv, 287pp, UK. ROUTLEDGE.