African Languages and Societies Commons^™

1960 English Golliwogg Doll

Eva Freeman-Lewis Doll Collection

English Golliwogg Doll. Series I, Box 1

16” high 6½” wide

1960

Europe

Cloth

The Golliwogg doll comes from the book, "The Adventures of Two Dutch Dolls and a Golliwogg". A product of the blackface and minstrel tradition, the Golliwog has jet-black skin, a tall thin build, bright red lips, bulging eyes and wild woolly hair. He wears clothes that are common for the minstrel singer, a short red coat and long red and white striped pants. The Golliwogg has been seen as a negative stereotype of peoples of the African Diaspora in Europe since the 1890’s. This particular doll …

Femme Nue, Femme Noire : Tribulations D’Une Vénus

Présence Francophone: Revue internationale de langue et de littérature

This article examines the return, in two contemporary novels, of the figure of the “naked black woman” as an emblematic site of difference. Two women of African origin take back this twice-appropriated figure and use it to question the ways in which the materiality of the body is again being written into contemporary postcolonial society. The aim of the essay is to underline the means and meaning deployed in these new appropriations of African icons, while pointing to some possible limits to the symbolic passage from the colonial imagination to a postcolonial one.

The Impact Of The Second World War On The Decolonization Of Africa, Erin Myrice

Africana Studies Student Research Conference

This project discusses the Second World War as a catalyst for African political freedom and independence. The war helped build strong African nationalism, which resulted in a common goal for all Africans to fight for their freedom. World War II led to decolonization of Africa by affecting both Europe and Africa militarily, psychologically, politically, and economically. The Second World War was instrumental in arming Africans with the military knowledge and leadership skills they would utilize when fighting for their own independence. One of these skills included the ability to communicate and work together, which had previously been an issue among …

The Story Of Swahili

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

Swahili was once an obscure dialect of an East African Bantu language. Today more than one hundred million people use it: Swahili is to eastern and central Africa what English is to the world. From its embrace in the 1960s by the black freedom movement in the United States to its adoption in 2004 as the African Union’s official language, Swahili has become a truly international language. How this came about and why, of all African languages, it happened only to Swahili is the story that John M. Mugane sets out to explore.

The remarkable adaptability of Swahili has allowed …

Maasai Dictionary

Archives & Reprint Series (imprint)

This dictionary of English-to-Maa (the language of Maasai peoples of Kenya and Tanzania) was written and compiled by Charles Richmond. It is one of the earliest Maasai dictionaries. The dictionary was developed from 1935 until 1951 while Charles lived in the back country of Kenya colony, East Africa as a subject of the King of England. His stay there began as a Captain in the King’s African Rifles, in which position he fought alongside tribal chiefs in northern Kenya and Ethiopia against the Italian dictator, Mussolini during WWII. Subsequent to his military service, he returned to England to study theology …

Socio-Cultural Status Of Albinism In Africa: Challenging Myths, Concepts, And Stereotypes, Raita Steyn

Journal of Global Awareness

This article analyses the socio-cultural status of Albinism in Africa and the role unchallenged stereotypes, irrational concepts, and unfounded beliefs play in the lives of persons with albinism. Following some beliefs, persons with albinism” do not die but vanish” to later “return as ghosts to haunt the living.” The author discusses this paradox about persons with albinism identified as hunted victims and simultaneously haunting perpetrators. The research examines the concept of albinism being a curse from dead ancestors or theodicy and its association with supernatural powers. By a comparative and diachronic approach, the study challenges unsubstantiated stereotypes. This study aims …

1940'S Marionette Doll

Eva Freeman-Lewis Doll Collection

1940's Marionette Doll Series XI. Box 11

14” high and 4½” wide

1940

Multinational

Wood, porcelain, cloth, Papier-Mache, and mixed medium

This doll is one of two puppets or Marionettes. The dolls follow the traditions of the black-face entertainers. The dolls have dark skin, bulging eyes, and exaggerated nose and lip size. The dolls wear bright colored clothes that are long trousers and a short coat. This is a stereotypical outfit of the blackface minstrel. The dolls are made of wood, plastic, and Papier-Mache. The Marionette is a toy and play form of what a person may expect to see …

"In My Heart I Had A Feeling Of Doing It": A Case Study Of The Lost Boys Of Sudan And Christianity, Kathryn Snyder

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

While members of the southern Sudanese Dinka tribe converted to Christianity in large numbers in the early 1990s, the Lost Boys, a largely Dinka group of young men who were separated from their families during the Sudanese civil war in the late 1980s, had a distinct conversion experience in refugees camps. Using first-person interviews and participant observation with a group of Lost Boys resettled in Denver, and historical and ethnographic data, this research seeks to explain why the Lost Boys converted to Christianity and the role that it played in their identity in refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya, and …

In A State Of Nervous Conditions: Gender Relations In Tsitsi Dangarembga’S Groundbreaking Novel, Evan Garcia

Montserrat Annual Writing Prize

This paper is analysis of Tsitsi Dangarembga's novel Nervous Conditions. It examines the oppressive system of colonial patriarchy in Southern Rhodesia and the suffocating conflicts faced by African women living under the legacy of colonial rule.

Aunt Jemima Cast Iron Bank

Eva Freeman-Lewis Doll Collection

Aunt Jemima is a brand of pancake mix, syrup, and other breakfast foods owned by the Quaker Oats Company of Chicago. The trademark dates back to 1893, although Aunt Jemima pancake mix debuted in 1889. The Quaker Oats Company first registered the Aunt Jemima trademark in April 1937.Aunt Jemima originally came from a minstrel show as one of their pantheon of stereotypical black characters. The character appears to have been a Reconstruction era addition to that cast.

The inspiration for Aunt Jemima was Billy Kersands' American-style minstrelsy/vaudeville song "Old Aunt Jemima", written in 1875. The …