Africa Today articles from June 1999

Africa Today archives from June 1999

Introduction to the special issue of Africa Today.(From the Editor)
June 22, 1999... The articles which appear ill this special, double issue of Africa Today focus on African Muslims. Some of the articles highlight African participation in key institutional features of Islamic cultural life, such as the hajj (pilgrimage to...

Pilgrimage, power, and identity: the role of the hajj in the lives of Nigerian Hausa bori adepts.
June 22, 1999... This article explores the paradoxical popularity of "non-Islamic" healing practices and spirit mediumship in the Muslim heartland of Saudi Arabia by examining the role of the hajj in the lives of contemporary bori practitioners in northern...

The development of women's authority in the Kano Tijaniyya, 1894-1963.
June 22, 1999... This article acknowledges Kano Muslim women's contributions to their faith through their activities within the Kano Tijaniyya. It discusses two women from the first generation of Kano Tijani muqaddamat, Hajiya Iya and Umma Makaranta, who were...

Female circles and male lines: gender dynamics along the Swahili coast.
June 22, 1999... This article explores transformations in gender relations along the Swahili Coast of East Africa through an historical examination of four domains of social life: politics, kinship, economics, and musical performance. By examining data about...

France as a Muslim power in West Africa.
June 22, 1999... France became a "Muslim power," in the sense of an imperial nation with Muslim subjects, over the course of the nineteenth century. This practice and policy first emerged in Algeria, and from the mid-nineteenth century it was also deployed in...

Generational changes, political stagnation, and the evolving dynamics of religion and politics in Senegal.
June 22, 1999... Religious institutions, in the form of Muslim Sufi orders, have been an integral feature of Senegal's stable and relatively democratic socio-political system. Over the course of the 1990s, this system has experienced strains due to two factors:...

Imperialism, independence, and Islam in Senegal and Mali.
June 22, 1999... A long-term perspective is essential for understanding the complex processes of cooperation and pragmatism pursued and developed by Senegalese and Malian religious and secular authorities from early colonial times to the present. Comparing...

Urban woes and pious remedies: Sufism in nineteenth-century Benaadir (Somalia).
June 22, 1999... In the Benaadiri region of southern Somalia, saint stories contained within locally compiled hagiographies provide valuable insights into aspects of social history that would otherwise remain unrecoverable. In this article I draw upon these...

A theology of modernity: Hasan al-Turabi and Islamic renewal in Sudan.
June 22, 1999... Biographers of Hasan al-Turabi, the leader of the Islamic revival in Sudan, are inclined to see his "fundamentalism" as an expression of the religious traditions of the al-Turabi's, a lineage of sufis, Mahdis, jurists, and clerics that came...

Bauer, Gretchen. 1998. Labor and Democracy in Namibia, 1971-1996.
June 22, 1999... Bauer, Gretchen. 1998. LABOR AND DEMOCRACY IN NAMIBIA, 1971-1996. Athens: Ohio University Press. In 1995, Leys and Saul (1995) published an assessment of the new Namibian government's first twenty months in office. They surprised many by...

Black, David R. and John Nauright. 1998. Rugby and the South African Nation.
June 22, 1999... Black, David R. and John Nauright. 1998. RUGBY AND THE SOUTH AFRICAN NATION. New York: Manchester University Press. Much of the work devoted to analyzing the processes by which South Africa's apartheid state was dismantled evinces a near...

Butler, Anthony. 1998. Democracy and Apartheid: Political Theory, Comparative Politics and the Modern South African State.
June 22, 1999... Butler, Anthony. 1998. DEMOCRACY AND APARTHEID: Political Theory, Comparative Politics and the Modern South African State. New York: St. Martin's Press. This ambitious volume is both provocative and frustrating. It sets twin, lofty goals...

Gifford, Paul. 1998. African Christianity: Its Public Role.
June 22, 1999... Gifford, Paul. 1998. AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY: ITS PUBLIC ROLE. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. In the 1970s and the 1990s, British Africanist scholars produced two groups of outstanding studies on Christianity in Africa funded by the...

Guimaraes, Fernando Andresen. 1998. The Origins of the Angolan Civil War: Foreign Intervention and Domestic Conflict.
June 22, 1999... Guimaraes, Fernando Andresen. 1998. THE ORIGINS OF THE ANGOLAN CIVIL WAR: FOREIGN INTERVENTION AND DOMESTIC CONFLICT. Basingstoke: Macmillan; and New York: St. Martin's Press. When the United Nations Security Council decided to end the...

Hare, Paul. 1998. Angola's Last Best Chance for Peace: An Insider's Account of the Peace Process.
June 22, 1999... Hare, Paul. 1998. ANGOLA'S LAST BEST CHANCE FOR PEACE: AN INSIDER'S ACCOUNT OF THE PEACE PROCESS. Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace. Angola is living through its fourth decade of war. From 1961 to 1974, three nationalist...

Howarth, David R. and Aletta J. Norval, eds. 1998. South Africa in Transition: New Theoretical Perspectives.
June 22, 1999... Howarth, David R. and Aletta J. Norval, eds. 1998. SOUTH AFRICA IN TRANSITION: NEW THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES. New York: St. Martin's Press. Radical transitions in economy, society, and politics warrant new approaches. In the transition from...

Naldi, Gino J. 1995. Constitutional Rights in Namibia: A Comparative Analysis With International Human Rights.
June 22, 1999... Naldi, Gino J. 1995. CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS IN NAMIBIA: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS WITH INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS. Ndabeni, South Africa: Juta and Co. Dobell, Lauren. 1998. SWAPO'S STRUGGLE FOR NAMIBIA, 1960-1991: WAR BY OTHER MEANS. Basel...

Rubert, Steven C. 1998. A Most Promising Weed: A History of Tobacco Farming and Labor in Colonial Zimbabwe, 1890-1945.
June 22, 1999... Rubert, Steven C. 1998. A MOST PROMISING WEED: A HISTORY OF TOBACCO FARMING AND LABOR IN COLONIAL ZIMBABWE, 1890-1945. Athens: Ohio University Press. In his ground-breaking study, Steven Rubert argues that the lives of tobacco laborers...

Stiansen, Endre and Michael Kevane, eds. 1998. Kordofan Invaded: Peripheral Incorporation and Social Transformation in Islamic Africa.
June 22, 1999... Stiansen, Endre and Michael Kevane, eds. 1998. KORDOFAN INVADED: PERIPHERAL INCORPORATION AND SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION IN ISLAMIC AFRICA. Leiden: Brill. This volume consists of twelve essays (one introductory) about the history of Kordofan in...

Takougang, Joseph and Milton Krieger. 1998. African State and Society in the 1990s: Cameroon's Political Crossroads.
June 22, 1999... Takougang, Joseph and Milton Krieger. 1998. AFRICAN STATE AND SOCIETY IN THE 1990s: CAMEROON'S POLITICAL CROSSROADS. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press. The political shifts in Africa in the 1990s have been well noted. It seems that every...

Books received.
June 22, 1999... Ajayi, J.F. Ade, ed. 1998. General History of Africa, VI: Africa in the Nineteenth Century until the 1880s. Oxford: James Currey. Asmal, Kader, Louise Asmal, and Ronald Suresh Roberts. 1997. Reconciliation through Truth: A Reckoning of...