Africa Today articles from March 2008

Africa Today archives from March 2008

Birmingham, David. 2006. Empire in Africa: Angola and its Neighbors.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Birmingham, David. 2006. EMPIRE IN AFRICA: ANGOLA AND ITS NEIGHBORS. Athens: Ohio University Press. 190 pp. $22. In Empire in Africa: Angola and its Neighbors, David Birmingham offers a compendium of eleven chapters aversions of seven have...

Cooper, Barbara M. 2006. Evangelical Christians in the Muslim Sahel.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Cooper, Barbara M. 2006. EVANGELICAL CHRISTIANS IN THE MUSLIM SAHEL. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. Research on African Pentecostalism is thriving, adding to the corpus of literature on Christian European missions...

Englund, Harri. 2006. Prisoners of Freedom: Human Rights and the African Poor.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Englund, Harri. 2006. PRISONERS OF FREEDOM: HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE AFRICAN POOR. Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: University of California Press. 247 pp. $55.00 (cloth); $21.95 (paper). A wave of democratization is popularly acknowledged to...

Idris, Amir H. 2005. Conflict and Politics of Identity in Sudan.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Idris, Amir H. 2005. CONFLICT AND POLITICS OF IDENTITY IN SUDAN. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. 141 pp. $59.95 (cloth) The centrality of the clash of identities to the analysis of the problems of Sudan has been cited since the 1970s, notably...

Ikuenobe, Polycarp. 2006. Philosophical Perspectives on Communalism and Morality in African Traditions.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Ikuenobe, Polycarp. 2006. PHILOSOPHICAL PERSPECTIVES ON COMMUNALISM AND MORALITY IN AFRICAN TRADITIONS. Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield. 329 pp. $80.00 (cloth); $27.95 (paper). Polycarp Ikuenobe declares: "I see myself as a research...

MacDonald, Michael. 2006. Why Race Matters in South Africa.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... MacDonald, Michael. 2006. WHY RACE MATTERS IN SOUTH AFRICA. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 245 pp. $45.00. Historians have used apartheid South Africa as a useful case study for analyzing the etiology of race and racism. Among such...

Murithi, Timothy. 2005. The African Union: Pan-Africanism, Peacebuilding And Development.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Murithi, Timothy. 2005. THE AFRICAN UNION: PAN-AFRICANISM, PEACEBUILDING AND DEVELOPMENT. Hampshire: Ashgate Publishing. 174 pp. $99.95 (cloth) Timothy Murithi offers an interesting insight into the formation and workings of the African...

Nampala, Lovisa T., and Vilho Shigwedha. 2006. Aawambo Kingdoms, History and Cultural Change: Perspectives from Northern Namibia.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Nampala, Lovisa T., and Vilho Shigwedha. 2006. AAWAMBO KINGDOMS, HISTORY AND CULTURAL CHANGE: PERSPECTIVES FROM NORTHERN NAMIBIA. Basel: P. Schlettwein Publishing. 274 pp. 28.99 [pounds sterling]. The Basel Namibia Series is an important...

Nuttall, Sarah (ed.). 2006. Beautiful Ugly: African and Diaspora Aesthetics.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Nuttall, Sarah (ed.). 2006. BEAUTIFUL UGLY: AFRICAN AND DIASPORA AESTHETICS. Durham and London: Duke University Press, pp. 416 $27.95 (paper) In 1999, Elaine Scarry published On Beauty and Being Just Princeton University Press) as a...

Primorac, Ranka. 2006. The Place of Tears: The Novel and Politics in Modern Zimbabwe.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Primorac, Ranka. 2006. THE PLACE OF TEARS: THE NOVEL AND POLITICS IN MODERN ZIMBABWE. International Library of African Studies, 17. London and New York: I. B. Tauris. viii + 241pp. $72.50 (cloth) A Place of Tears is an important...

Ruzibiza, Abdul Joshua. 2005. Rwanda: L'Histoire Secrete.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Ruzibiza, Abdul Joshua. 2005. RWANDA: L'HISTOIRE SECRETE. Paris: Editions du Panama. 494 pp. 22.00 [pounds sterling] In July 1994, when the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) won the war ending the genocide in Rwanda, its victory was portrayed as...

Turton, David, ed. 2006. Ethnic Federalism: The Ethiopian Experience in a Comparative Perspective.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Turton, David, ed. 2006. ETHNIC FEDERALISM: THE ETHIOPIAN EXPERIENCE IN A COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE. Oxford: James Curry. 246 pp. $49.95 (cloth); $24.95 (paper). This book is quite interesting, and a rather welcome addition to the literature...

Villalon, Leonardo A., and Peter VonDoepp. 2005. The Fate of Africa's Democratic Experiments: Elites and Institutions.(Book review)
March 22, 2008... Villalon, Leonardo A., and Peter VonDoepp. 2005. THE FATE OF AFRICA'S DEMOCRATIC EXPERIMENTS: ELITES AND INSTITUTIONS. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 336 pp. $24.95 Edited volumes often start out with strident promises of...

Books received.
March 22, 2008... Alagoa, Ebiegberi Joe. 2006. The Practice of History in Africa: A History of African Historiography. Port Harcourt, Nigeria: Onyoma Research Publications. Apter, Andrew. 2007. Beyond Words: Discourse and Critical Agency in Africa. Chicago:...

Transnational Islamic NGOs in Chad: Islamic solidarity in the age of neoliberalism.(nongovernmental organizations)
March 22, 2008... In the current era of neoliberalism, there is not only an expansion of Western influence in many parts of Africa, but also increased influence from the Arab world. Transnational Islamic nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) are a vehicle of this...

Women, religion, and the discourses of legal ideology in Niger Republic.(Quota Bill of 2001)
March 22, 2008... There is an international movement that advocates the establishment of quotas for women, especially in political and governmental positions. Partly as a result of its initiatives and efforts, countries have introduced legislation that endorses...

When spirits start veiling: the case of the Veiled She-Devil in a Muslim town of Niger.(Report)
March 22, 2008... In Niger, women have long been seen as embodiments of virtue (or wickedness). Of late, with the rise of reformist Islam, their role as upholders of purity has become key to the definition of moral community. Debates over the control of female...

"Marginal Muslims": politics and the perceptual bounds of Islamic authenticity in Northern Nigeria.(Report)
March 22, 2008... In 1999 and 2000, twelve states in northern Nigeria declared Islamic law (Shari'ah) the state criminal law for all Muslims, redefining the boundaries of identity, civility, and criminality. In the city of Kano, the implementation of Shari'ah...

The Association des Etudiants Musulmans de l'Universite de Dakar (1) (AEMUD) between the local and the global: an analysis of discourse.(Organization overview)(Report)
March 22, 2008... This article analyzes the political, social, and religious discourse of the Association des Etudiants Musulmans de l'Universite de Dakar (AEMUD), and does so by analyzing its newspaper, L'Etudiant Musulman. It explores the image of Muslim...

Introduction to special issue: Muslim West Africa in the age of neoliberalism.(Report)
March 22, 2008... Since the 1980s, Africa has experienced dramatic social, political, and economic changes. The impact of structural-adjustment programs, the political liberalization following the end of the Cold War, stepped-up economic liberalization, changing...