African History Commons^™

Caravanserai, Trade Routes, And Dark Mothers, Eahr Joan

Re-Genesis Encyclopedia

The caravanserai (or Turkish kervansaray) was a roadside area, structure or inn for pilgrims, traveling tradespeople, and their animals providing lodging, substance, trade and marketing opportunities. In addition to providing food and temporary lodgings, many caravanserais also included a black madonna temple, shrine room, holy of holies, sacred cave or adjacent rock shelter. Tethered to the advancement of the caravanserai, was also the spread of African rites and rituals, black madonna temples, and dark goddesses. This was especially apparent with the Phoenicians.

Devotion to the great goddess of the Levant was prolonged by the Phoenicians who lived along the …

Dark Mother Tan-Tan Of Morocco, Eahr Joan

Re-Genesis Encyclopedia

The dark African Palaeoart figure known as Tan-Tan from Morocco appears to be the earliest of the Afrocentric (dark mother) figures. Surrounding sediments indicate that the timeline is c. 500,000 to 300,000 BCE. In Bednarik’s archaeological report, “A Figurine From the African Acheulian 1,” the Tan-Tan female icon is c. 400,000 BCE * and represents the oldest known figure, therefore predating the Late-Acheulian Berekhat Ram. Even though both Tan-Tan and the Berekhat Ram show evidence of ocher (or ochre), the Tan-Tan figure is the first “known instance of pigment application, although older indirect evidence of such a practice does exist.” …

The Origin And Development Of Tigrinya Language Publications (1886 - 1991) Volume One, Abraham Negash

Staff publications, research, and presentations

Tigrinya is a Semitic language spoken in Eritrea and in the Tigray Region of Northern Ethiopia. Tigrinya is one of the nine languages in Eritrea. It was one of Eritrea's official languages (along with Arabic) during the short-lived federation with Ethiopia (1952-1962). When Ethiopia officially annexed Eritrea in 1962, Amharic also formally replaced Tigrinya and Arabic; and was established as an official language by the imperial government of Ethiopia. In 1993, when Eritrea officially declared its independence through referendum. Tigrinya regained its status as a working language.

Tigrinya has its own alphabet of 32 letters adopted from Ge'ez, a language …

The Royal Navy's Employment Of Black Mariners And Maritime Workers, 1754-1783, Charles Foy

Faculty Research & Creative Activity

The Royal Navy has been portrayed as an institution that embodied liberty, regularlyemploying and relying upon blacks to keep its vessels afloat and to implement Britain'sblue water policy. Despite the critical role black naval seamen played, their employmentwas shaped more by regional practices than by Admiralty edicts. The result was that blackswere often treated inequitably. Black seamen had less access to pension benefits andwere not promoted in the same numbers as working-class white seamen. In England andNew York, blacks were largely kept out of royal dockyards and received less favourablecompensation than whites. In contrast, while blacks were employed in great …

A Good Measure Of Sacrifice: Aspects Of Zambia’S Contribution To The Liberation Wars In Southern Africa, 1964-1975, Clarence Chongo

Zambia Social Science Journal

From the early 1960s, and throughout the 1970s, southern African liberation movements successfully waged wars of national liberation, forcing white minority regimes to negotiate independence under black majority rule. This success partly stemmed from extensive diplomatic, military, and material support extended to various liberation movements by regional alliances such as the frontline states and transnational state actors and solidarity movements. This article examines salient aspects of Zambia’s contribution as a prominent regional actor to the liberation wars in southern Africa. In doing so, it underlines the nature and significance of Zambia’s support for the liberation movements. I argue that Zambia’s …

The Student Researcher 2016 (Title Page, Preface, Table Of Contents), Selena Sanderfer Faculty Advisor

The Student Researcher: A Phi Alpha Theta Publication

No abstract provided.

Universalizing Primary Education In Sierra Leone: Promises And Pitfalls On The Path To Equity, Grace Pai

Publications and Research

What barriers remain in the progress towards achieving Universal Primary Education (UPE), and how does the UPE agenda affect out-of-school children? Through a mixture of historical, quantitative and qualitative methods of analysis, this study examines these questions using the developing context of Sierra Leone as a case study.

Findings from over 100 interviews show that first of all, the most salient barrier that prevents children from participating in primary school is the fact that school is not free de facto in spite of the national abolishment of primary school fees in 2004. Rather than commonly cited constraints such as a …

Lasting Legacies: Contemporary Struggles And Historical Dispossession In South Africa, Robin L. Turner

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

Contemporary postapartheid South African land struggles are haunted by the long shadow of historical dispossession. While apartheid-era forced removals are justifiably infamous, these traumatic events were moments in the more extended, less frequently referenced, and more expansive process that fundamentally shaped the South African terrain well before 1948. The South African Republic's mid-nineteenth-century assertion of ownership of all land north of the Vaal River and south of the Limpopo marked the start of a long process of racialized dispossession that rendered black people's residence in putatively white areas highly contingent and insecure throughout the former Transvaal. This article analyzes the …

Hashtag Activism And Why #Blacklivesmatter In (And To) The Classroom, Prudence Cumberbatch, Nicole Trujillo-Pagán

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Freedom From Want: Famine Relief In The Horn Of Africa, Christian T. Ruth

Theses and Dissertations--History

The United States, during both the Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan administrations, pursued humanitarian relief in the Horn of Africa and East Africa with an eye towards Cold War politics. During the Carter administration the focus was on Ethiopia and the regime of Mengistu Haile Mariam, while during the Reagan administration the United States’ efforts were mainly targeted towards Sudan and the regime of Gaffar Nimeiry. In both instances, the United States was concerned with the politics of the Cold War, trying to create a more positive image of the U.S. abroad by relieving world hunger, while also propping up …

The Color Of Memory: Reimagining The Antebellum South In Works By James Mcbride Through The Use Of Free Indirect Discourse, Janel L. Holmes

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the use of interior narrative techniques such as free indirect discourse and internal monologue in two of James McBride’s neo-slave narratives, Song Yet Sung (2008) and The Good Lord Bird (2013). Very limited critical attention has been given to these neo-slave narratives that illustrate McBrides attention to characterization and focalized narration. In these narratives McBride builds upon the revelations he explores in his bestselling memoir, The Color of Water (1996, 2006), where he learns to disassociate race and character. What he discovers about not only his mother, but also himself, inspires his re-imagination of the people who …

Marriage By Force? Contestation Over Consent And Coercion In Africa, Annie Bunting, Benjamin N. Lawrance, Richard L. Roberts

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

With forced marriage, as with so many human rights issues, the sensationalized hides the mundane, and oversimplified popular discourses miss the range of experiences. In sub-Saharan Africa, the relationship between coercion and consent in marriage is a complex one that has changed over time and place, rendering impossible any single interpretation or explanation.

The legal experts, anthropologists, historians, and development workers contributing to Marriage by Force? focus on the role that marriage plays in the mobilization of labor, the accumulation of wealth, and domination versus dependency. They also address the crucial slippage between marriages and other forms of gendered violence, …

Citizenship, Belonging, And Political Community In Africa: Dialogues Between Past And Present, Emma Hunter

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

Africa, it is often said, is suffering from a crisis of citizenship. At the heart of the contemporary debates this apparent crisis has provoked lie dynamic relations between the present and the past, between political theory and political practice, and between legal categories and lived experience. Yet studies of citizenship in Africa have often tended to foreshorten historical time and privilege the present at the expense of the deeper past.

Citizenship, Belonging, and Political Community in Africa provides a critical reflection on citizenship in Africa by bringing together scholars working with very different case studies and with very different understandings …

Exploring Ghana's Strategies For Stability:Lessons For Postwar Reconstruction, Wilmot Nah Adekoya

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Between 1990 and 2005, the state of affairs in parts of Sub-Saharan Africa, including Liberia, remained fragile due to continuous civil unrest and war. Although peace initiatives were initiated, progress toward peace has remained minimal. Ghana, one of the nations in Sub-Saharan Africa, has continued to demonstrate significant stability and progress in the midst of civil and political conflicts in the sub-region. Currently, little research exists on how Ghanaians managed to remain stable, while countries in the sub-region continued to experience civil unrests and wars. Using Eisenstadt's theory of sociological modernization as the theoretical foundation, the purpose of this holistic …

The Tunisian Revolution: Empire And The Power Of The Multitude, Caroline A. Burns

Master's Theses

The self-immolation of Mohammed Bouazizi ignited the revolution that would oust Tunisian dictator Ben Ali in 2011. The momentum of the revolution in Tunisia spread ideas, tactics, and revolutionary chants across borders to various parts of the globe. The speed and intensity of the revolution dominated the attention of the unsuspecting global community. In order to understand the conditions under which this revolution transpired, I use Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri's theory of Empire to show how the contemporary global system functions. Through the historical development of Tunisia and concurrent rise of Empire emerges "the multitude," the heterogeneous manifestation of …

Genocide In German South West Africa & The Herero Reparations Movement, Melanie Bracht

Senior Theses

During my spring 2015 Semester at Sea voyage, the ship docked in Walvis Bay, Namibia for five days. Prior to the voyage, I knew nothing about Namibia’s history. I was surprised to learn of its treacherous past and the role Germany played in shaping its political and economic condition. I took a tour of the Himba settlement, driving hours across the barren, dry land to a small circle of huts. Women cover their skin with red clay and continue the tradition of sauna bathes, never bathing in water in their entire lives. The Himba culture was captivating and it was …

The Legal Framework Of Contracting: Gender Equality, The Provision Of Services, And European Public Procurement Law, E.K. Sarter

Wagadu: A Journal of Transnational Women's & Gender Studies

The article examines the legal framework of public contracting in the EU. It argues that while European public procurement law explicitly allows for measures to foster gender equality be taken into account in public tendering, European legislation and jurisdiction also impose limits to the range of these measures.

The Decolonization Of Christianity In Colonial Kenya, Amanda Ruth Ford

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Kenya was an unusual case within the larger narrative of decolonization in the British Empire. The presence of white settlers, the relative newness of the colony, and the particular way in which the British pursued the civilizing mission all combined to make the end of empire particularly violent for all parties involved. Independence in Kenya was precipitated by a bloody civil war, known as Mau Mau, and the imposition of martial law by the government for almost a decade. In the midst of this chaos, the Church of England’s missionary body, the Church Missionary Society worked to protect their converts …

Groundings Volume Two, Issue Two

Groundings

This is the full issue of Groundings Vol. 2, Iss. 2. It includes a wrap of both the 12th Annual Walter Rodney Symposium and the 3rd Annual Walter Rodney Speakers Series; a piece by Jesus Chucho Garcia that honors the late Norman Girvan; the official Save the Date for the 13th Annual Walter Rodney Symposium; information on the republication of The Groundings with My Brothers; a photo-narrative by Julian Plowden on the student protests at the Atlanta CNN Center; we then have 3 pieces surrounding the Walter Rodney Commission of Inquiry by Wazir Mohamed, Anne Braithwaite, and Rohit Kanhai, …

Authentically African : Arts And The Transnational Politics Of Congolese Culture, Sarah Van Beurden

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

Together, the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren, Belgium, and the Institut des Musées Nationaux du Zaire (IMNZ) in the Congo have defined and marketed Congolese art and culture. In Authentically African, Sarah Van Beurden traces the relationship between the possession, definition, and display of art and the construction of cultural authenticity and political legitimacy from the late colonial until the postcolonial era. Her study of the interconnected histories of these two institutions is the first history of an art museum in Africa, and the only work of its kind in English.
Drawing on Flemish-language sources other scholars have …

Crossing The Color Line : Race, Sex, And The Contested Politics Of Colonialism In Ghana, Carina E. Ray

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

Interracial sex mattered to the British colonial state in West Africa. In Crossing the Color Line, Carina E. Ray goes beyond this fact to reveal how Ghanaians shaped and defined these powerfully charged relations. The interplay between African and European perspectives and practices, argues Ray, transformed these relationships into key sites for consolidating colonial rule and for contesting its hierarchies of power. With rigorous methodology and innovative analyses, Ray brings Ghana and Britain into a single analytic frame to show how intimate relations between black men and white women in the metropole became deeply entangled with those between black women …

'Grounding' Walter Rodney In Critical Pedagogy: Toward Praxis In African History, Seneca Vaught

South

This essay attempts to address the dilemma of theory and praxis, what Freire referred to as “mere verbalism,” by examining one historical instance of critical pedagogy in history education. This essay argues that Walter Rodney’s curriculum, as detailed in his syllabi on “Historians and Revolutions” and "Groundings," helps educators better understand how to more effectively bridge the gap between a critical pedagogical theory and praxis in African history. Using Rodney as an example of a critical pedagogy theorist and practitioner, this essay explores how concerned historians (and those who use history as a basis for teaching) can traverse traditional disciplinary …

Guide To Resources On Africa, Ida E. Jones

Moorland Spingarn Research Center Publications

No abstract provided.

Diamonds In The Rough : Corporate Paternalism And African Professionalism On The Mines Of Colonial Angola, 1917–1975, Todd Cleveland

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

Diamonds in the Rough explores the lives of African laborers on Angola’s diamond mines from the commencement of operations in 1917 to the colony’s independence from Portugal in 1975. The mines were owned and operated by the Diamond Company of Angola, or Diamang, which enjoyed exclusive mining and labor concessions granted by the colonial government. Through these monopolies, the company became the most profitable enterprise in Portugal’s African empire. After a tumultuous initial period, the company’s mines and mining encampments experienced a remarkable degree of stability, in striking contrast to the labor unrest and ethnic conflicts that flared in other …

A Light In Darkness, Oscar Micheaux: Entrepreneur Intellectual Agitator, Airic Hughes

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Oscar Micheaux was a luminary who served as an agent of racial uplift, with a unique message to share with the world on behalf of the culturally marginalized African Americans. He produced projects that conveyed the complexity of the true black experience with passion and creative courage. His films empowered black audiences and challenged conventional stereotypes of black culture and potential. The legacy of Oscar Micheaux is historically unparalleled among his contemporaries. He transcended traditionally held perspectives about what black people could accomplish. The consciousness within his work still heavily influences black entertainment today. This study seeks to add to …

The Emergence Of The Gullah: Thriving Through ‘Them Dark Days’, Brian Coxe

Masters Essays

No abstract provided.

Science And Charity: Rival Catholic Visions For Humanitarian Practice At The End Of French Rule In Cameroon, Charlotte Walker-Said

Publications and Research

This paper explores the conflict between local expressions of Christian charity and new theories of scientific humanitarianism in the final years of French rule in Africa. Compassionate phenomena inspired by Catholic social organizing had transformed everyday life throughout French Cameroon’s cities and villages in the interwar and postwar years, and yet, in 1950, poverty, crime, poor public health, and social tensions remained prevalent. Seeking a more deeply transformative approach to social rehabilitation, ecclesiastical leaders in the Catholic Church in Europe and French foreign missionary societies in Africa partnered with international medical and scientific organizations in order to invigorate charity with …

‘Be Nice To People’ – Grandmother’S Advice Could Fix Many Of World’S Problems, Anthony Major

UCF Forum

As I began to write this column, my ears were ringing with the news story of another senseless shooting. This time it’s of nine people at the historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C.

“Ain’T No Real Pimps Out There No More”: Street-Involved Women’S Characterizations Of Men Who Facilitate Street-Based Sex Work, Susan Dewey, Rhett Epler

Wagadu: A Journal of Transnational Women's & Gender Studies

Drawing upon five years of ethnographic research with over 100 Denver, Colorado women involved in street­‐based sex work and drug use, this paper explores what the women's discursive framings of men who facilitate women's sex work activities reveal about the exclusionary social and criminal justice practices that shape their lives.

Traitor Or Pioneer: John Brown Russwurm And The African Colonization Movement, Brian J. Barker

Graduate Masters Theses

The end of the Revolutionary War proved to be a significant moment in United States history. Not only did it signal the birth of a new nation, but it also affected the institution of slavery. Wartime rhetoric such as "All men are created equal," left the future of American slavery in doubt. Northern and mid-Atlantic states began to implement emancipation plans, and the question of what to do with free blacks became a pressing one. It soon became apparent that free blacks would not be given the same rights as white Americans, and the desire to have blacks removed from …