Ikenga: Symbolism, Spirituality, And Sociocultural Importance In Igbo Traditional Belief Systems,
2026
Yaba College of Technology
Ikenga: Symbolism, Spirituality, And Sociocultural Importance In Igbo Traditional Belief Systems, Chinyere Ndubuisi
Global Africa: Journal of African and African Diaspora Studies
The Ikenga, a noteworthy relic of the Igbo people of southern Nigeria, is examined in this paper as a major art object for a better understanding of African traditional religions and belief systems. Ikenga is a wooden sculpture traditionally made to represent an individual's power, achievements, and spiritual essence among the Igbo. Ikenga is ascribed the embodiment of the relationship between personal action, ancestral respect, and divinity within Igbo mythology. Within the framework of Igbo traditional religion, this paper examines the ontological significance, spiritual purposes, and social consequences of the Ikenga. The symbolic relevance of Ikenga as both a personal …
Language And Culture: Exploring The Links Between Africans And African Americans,
2026
University of British Columbia
Language And Culture: Exploring The Links Between Africans And African Americans, Joash J. Gambarage
Global Africa: Journal of African and African Diaspora Studies
Due to the generational distance between contemporary African Americans and the earliest generations of enslaved Africans, the deep cultural connection between these two groups has not been sufficiently explored. Moreover, much of the existing literature on African culture in the Americas primarily focuses on retentions related to religion, music, food, and language, often missing other critical aspects of cultural continuity within the African diaspora, such as African American Vernacular English (AAVE) and Niger-Congo linguistic ties, naming practices, and African epistemologies. This exclusion limits our understanding of how the historical movement of Africans and the persistence of African cultural legacies, have …
Situating Everybody Hates Chris (Ehc): The Appeal Of The Show,
2026
Tennessee State University
Situating Everybody Hates Chris (Ehc): The Appeal Of The Show, Elizabeth Johnson, Donald Culverson
Global Africa: Journal of African and African Diaspora Studies
"Everybody Hates Chris" (EHC) achieved critical success by employing comedy to address significant social issues, distinguishing itself in early-2000s television. Unlike earlier and contemporary series such as "Moesha," "The Hughleys," and "The Cosby Show," EHC offered a nuanced portrayal of Black family life, engaging an audience often overlooked or misrepresented by mainstream media. This article examines shifts in the television industry from the late 1990s to the early 2000s that facilitated EHC's innovative approach. The series departed from traditional family sitcoms, functioning not merely as entertainment but as a social commentary on the complexities of the family as a societal …
Christian Missions’ Medical Work In The Colonial Ilorin Province, 1900 To 1960,
2026
University of Ilorin
Christian Missions’ Medical Work In The Colonial Ilorin Province, 1900 To 1960, Rasheed Onagun
Global Africa: Journal of African and African Diaspora Studies
A scarcity of labor and the pursuit of optimal profit maximization led to the colonial government's collaboration with Christian missions to disseminate and expand Western healthcare to the populace. In Ilorin Province and Nigeria as a whole, missions undertook the majority of colonial medical work and public health initiatives. For the first time in the history of Ilorin Province, missionary endeavors introduced Western medicine as an alternative healthcare source to many, necessitating a historical examination. This paper explores existing literature, oral testimonies, and extensive archival documents to analyze the impacts of missionary medical work on the well-being of the people …
Editors’ Note: Introducing The Inaugural Edition,
2026
Tennessee State University
Editors’ Note: Introducing The Inaugural Edition
Global Africa: Journal of African and African Diaspora Studies
No abstract provided.
Women’S Peace Agency: Reading Africae Munus In The Framework Of Emilie Townes’ Womanist Ethics And The Cultural Production Of Evil,
2026
Duquesne University
Women’S Peace Agency: Reading Africae Munus In The Framework Of Emilie Townes’ Womanist Ethics And The Cultural Production Of Evil, Leonard N. Zifac
Graduate Student Research Symposium
This paper employs Emilie M. Townes's womanist ethical framework—particularly her concept of the "cultural production of evil"—to critically examine Pope Benedict XVI's post-synodal exhortation Africae Munus (2011) and its treatment of African women's agency in peacebuilding. While Africae Munus calls the Church in Africa to serve reconciliation, justice, and peace, and acknowledges women's dignity and contributions to family and community life, the document largely confines women's roles to maternal, supportive, and domestic spheres without adequately challenging the patriarchal structures that systematically marginalize women from strategic leadership and formal peace processes. Drawing on Townes's analysis of how cultural narratives, religious discourse, …
Our Children Are Sacred: Faith, Disability Justice, And Educational Hope,
2026
New Mexico State University
Our Children Are Sacred: Faith, Disability Justice, And Educational Hope, Charles E. Becknell Jr., Pricella Morris, Monique Matute-Chavarria, Deirdre A. Williams
The Journal of Faith, Education, and Community
This manuscript examines how Black families interpret dis/ability through faith, caregiving, and communal life using Sacred Narrative Inquiry (SNI), a collaborative approach that treats family stories as sources of sacred and cultural knowledge. Grounded in disability theology and informed by Black liberation theology and Womanist epistemology, the study explores how families understand dis/ability as sacred and embodied, shaped by struggle, endurance, and hope. Through shared storytelling and collective interpretation, the analysis identifies recurring patterns of early moral formation, embodied knowledge that precedes institutional recognition, faith as a sustaining practice under constraint, and moments of recognition that affirm dignity and interrupt …
Hindu Poetry And The Project Of An Inter-Spiritual Catholic Theology,
2026
Harvard University
Hindu Poetry And The Project Of An Inter-Spiritual Catholic Theology, Francis X. Clooney
Journal of Global Catholicism
This article engages the work of the Indian south Indian Tamil-language Vaiṣṇava poet saints known as the Alvārs. The article specifically focuses the First HundredHoly Linked verses of Poykai Ālvār to argue for inter-spiritual learning between Catholics and Hindus. The article concludes with personal reflections on this encounter within the context of the global Catholic Church
Front Matter Volume 2 No. 2,
2026
University of Dar es Salaam
Front Matter Volume 2 No. 2, Editors Note
Zamani: A Journal of African Historical Studies
This is yet another issue of the Zamani journal which takes on varied debates and discussions of historical importance through the contributions to the issue. As we embark on volume three of the new journal’s series, this volume carries six articles, varied in scope but interesting in terms of contribution and relevance to historical synthesis. As editors, we hope that the articles contained here will be of interest to a wider audience of not only historians but also of allied disciplines, practitioners and the general readership. As we publish this volume, we also note the advantage of expanding the scope …
Crises In The Nigerian Defence Sector In The Post-Civil War Period,
2026
Nigerian Defence Academy
Crises In The Nigerian Defence Sector In The Post-Civil War Period, Hussaini Jibrin
Zamani: A Journal of African Historical Studies
History has it that post-war period in any country in the world appeared to be with many challenges of re-planning the defence system. It involves the reconstruction of pre-war institutions that are destroyed during the war for onward growth and development. Contrary to this tradition, this article explores that, in 1970 while Nigerians were celebrating about the end of the Nigerian civil war, fresh crises emerged in the country’s defence sector. Thus, General Yakubu Gowon’s government redirected its focus on addressing the crises. The crises are numerous, however, this article dwells on four only. These are demobilization exercise in the …
Performance Of Buffer Zones In Tanzania: A Case Of Maswa Game Reserve, 1950s-2010s,
2026
University of Dar es salaam
Performance Of Buffer Zones In Tanzania: A Case Of Maswa Game Reserve, 1950s-2010s, James Benedict Kuboja
Zamani: A Journal of African Historical Studies
National parks as core protected areas are universally regarded as the most important wildlife conservancies as they are protecting pristine nature or untouched wilderness. For this reason, global conservationists, with the assistance of colonial governments, introduced buffer zones in a bid to protect important protected areas from poaching and habitat destruction. Despite the promulgation of these buffer zones from the 1950s, scholars have not exhaustively evaluated their effectiveness in the conservation of wildlife resources within core protected areas and wildlife ecosystems at large. Using the case of Maswa Game Reserve in the Serengeti Mara Ecosystem, this article argues that internal …
Historicising Nyerere’S Presidency In The Nyakyusa Mythical Narratives,
2026
University of Dar es Salaam
Historicising Nyerere’S Presidency In The Nyakyusa Mythical Narratives, Ignas Fedeo
Zamani: A Journal of African Historical Studies
Julius K Nyerere, the founding President of Tanzania, held office from 1962 to 1985. Much has been written about Nyerere's presidency, with the literature generally falling into two categories: strong advocacy for his decisions, actions, and ideas, and pointed criticism against him. Using narrative and new historicism theories, this article examines the recreation of the history of Nyerere’s presidency in local narratives, specifically Nyakyusa myths. The myths were collected using the oral history interviews from Kyela and Busokelo districts in Tanzania. The Nyakyusa believe that Nyerere was endowed with immense mystical powers, some of which embedded in his stick and …
Śaṅkha-Dvīpa And The Swahili Littoral: Reconstructing India–East Africa Contacts Before The Common Era,
2026
Rezorce Research Foundation
Śaṅkha-Dvīpa And The Swahili Littoral: Reconstructing India–East Africa Contacts Before The Common Era, Narendra Vijayasimha
Zamani: A Journal of African Historical Studies
This article is the first focused attempt to explore India–East Africa relationships in the Bronze Age and early Iron Age, approximately two to three millennia before the Common Era (3000–300 BCE) from a puranic perspective. While extensive scholarship exists on medieval and later Indo–African exchanges, the pre-Common Era period has remained underexplored. Drawing on Purāṇic cosmographies, Greco-Roman geographical accounts, African archaeology, and Indian Ocean trade studies, this research reconstructs possible networks of contact facilitated by monsoon navigation and long-distance exchange. Methodologically, the article integrates textual exegesis, comparative cosmography, and archaeological correlation. The findings suggest that Indian conceptions of Śaṅkha-dvīpa reflect …
Labour Migrancy And Ethnic Stereotypes: Experiences From Mufindi Tea Plantation, Ca. 1920s To 2000s,
2026
University of Dar es salaam
Labour Migrancy And Ethnic Stereotypes: Experiences From Mufindi Tea Plantation, Ca. 1920s To 2000s, Hezron R. Kangalawe
Zamani: A Journal of African Historical Studies
While tea plantations brought good fortunes to some parts of Southern Highlands in Tanzania such as Mufindi and Rungwe during the British mandate, its production sites became centres of ethnic contestations in relation to work discipline. The colonial and post-colonial enterprises labelled some ethnic groups as “reliable labourers” and others “unreliable”. This article, uses the tea plantations in Mufindi district, Iringa, to debate the labour question and ethnic identity in tea plantations between 1920s and 2000s. It argues that tea plantations were practical point of colonial stereotyping whose architects were anthropologists. Interviews in Mufindi tea plantations and factories, archival and …
Collaboration In The Spread Of Missionary Christianity In Africa: The Case Of The Apostolic Church Of Nigeria,
2026
National Open University of Nigeria
Collaboration In The Spread Of Missionary Christianity In Africa: The Case Of The Apostolic Church Of Nigeria, Caleb Abiodun Adeleye, Oluwasegun Peter Aluko
Zamani: A Journal of African Historical Studies
This article explores the significance of collaboration in the spread of missionary Christianity in Africa through a historical study of The Apostolic Church of Nigeria (TACN). It examines how the partnership between British missionaries and Nigerian leaders produced a hybrid mission model that combined Western ecclesiastical structure with African spirituality. Drawing on historical records, church documents, and existing scholarship, the article adopts a narrative–analytical method to trace how figures such as Pastors George Perfect, Idris J Vaughan and DO Odubanjo negotiated issues of theology, finance and cultural identity. The study finds that collaboration initially fostered institutional growth and doctrinal development …
The Reclamation,
2026
University of New Mexico
The Reclamation, Peter Njagi Mwangi, Charles E. Becknell Jr
Journal of Multicultural Affairs
This poem stages a classroom conversation about language, knowledge, and the study of Black history and thought. Through dialogue between a professor and a student, the conversation reflects on a central question within Africana Studies: why are indigenous African languages rarely included in how the field teaches, writes, and shares knowledge? While colonial languages such as English, French, Spanish, and Portuguese function as practical tools in the modern university, the poem raises the question of what may be missing when African languages remain largely absent. Drawing on ideas like Ubuntu and Sankofa, the poem imagines Africana Studies as a living …
Reframing Kabyle Resistance In Marc Garanger's Femmes Algériennes 1960,
2026
Claremont Colleges
Reframing Kabyle Resistance In Marc Garanger's Femmes Algériennes 1960, Lea Wong
Journal of Amazigh Studies
This article examines the identity photographs taken by Marc Garanger as a site of Kabyle women’s resistance in the Algerian War. Over the course of 1960, Garanger moved between various wartime displacement camps across Kabylia, photographing indigenous people for the production of identity cards––a crucial from of colonial population control. Since its publication, Garanger’s Femmes algériennes has become an ambiguous symbol of resistance in the Algerian War, largely due to the subjects’ perceived antagonistic posture and gaze. This article takes a forensic approach to analyzing Kabyle women’s wartime adornment, uncovering a new framework for conceptualizing Algerian women’s agency grounded in …
Singing As Liberation: Spiritual Imagination And An Embodied Practice Of Hope Through Spirituals And Songs Of The Uhadi,
2026
Portland State University
Singing As Liberation: Spiritual Imagination And An Embodied Practice Of Hope Through Spirituals And Songs Of The Uhadi, Matisse Geselle
University Honors Theses
An exploration of the spirituality and the sacredness of music—and especially singing—through recording my own interpretations of spirituals and songs of the uHadi. It is also a poetic inquiry into how imagery of the river is used in spirituals as a pathway to freedom and liberation, and how the singing of spirituals is hope embodied. And it is a reflection of how my experience of the uHadi and my friends of the Ibuyambo ensemble changed me. The process of working on this project also feels like I am connecting to myself—and others—more deeply through singing. And ultimately, I hope for …
The Unexpected Gift: Using Hip-Hop And Autoethnographic Methods To Challenge The “Symbolic Death” Discourse Of A Child’S Autism Diagnosis,
2026
University of Waterloo
The Unexpected Gift: Using Hip-Hop And Autoethnographic Methods To Challenge The “Symbolic Death” Discourse Of A Child’S Autism Diagnosis, Adam Ellis
Ought: The Journal of Autistic Culture
This article explores the social construction of autism through an autoethnographic account of parenting an autistic child in Canada. Drawing on Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s grief model, neurodiversity scholarship, and post-traumatic growth theory, the paper examines how parents may experience grief, uncertainty, and the collapse of imagined futures following an autism diagnosis, while also arguing that much of this distress is produced by ableist and deficit-oriented social systems rather than autism itself. Using arts-based research, including a rap song and music video, the article explores: (1) what it is like to receive an autism diagnosis as a parent; (2) the grieving process …
Revolutionary Petunias In The Hallways: Adultification, Identity, And Black Girls’ High School Experiences,
2026
CUNY Graduate Center
Revolutionary Petunias In The Hallways: Adultification, Identity, And Black Girls’ High School Experiences, Renee Niles
Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects
This thesis examines how adultification, the racialized misperception of Black girls as more mature, responsible, and self-sufficient, shapes high school experiences and identity development. Using Constructivist Grounded Theory and Black feminist epistemology, the study draws on interviews with eight Black women to explore how these experiences are interpreted over time. The study conceptualizes adultification as a form of developmental governance, an ongoing structural process that regulates perception, behavior, and identity from adolescence into adulthood.
