Africa Past & Present » Podcast Feed

Narissa Ramdhani (Ifa Lethu CEO) South African historian, archivist, and cultural heritage specialist discusses her studies in exile in the USA and how she coordinated the return of 7 million documents from African National Congress offices in 33 countries to Johannesburg. The collection is now housed at the University of Fort Hare. Ramdhani then describes Ifa Lethus repatriation of South[…]

Historian Luise White (U. of Florida) has published extensively on women's history, medical history, political and military history, from East Africa to Central and Southern Africa. She reveals the genealogy of her work on renegade white independence and describes the strange history of the African franchise in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe. White concludes with her thoughts about where the field of[…]

New Media and Southern African Studies in the 21st century: What are the politics and ethics of digital knowledge production? How can podcasts enhance teaching, research, and international networking? Listen to this stimulating discussion held at the recent NEWSA meeting featuring yours truly, Elizabeth Green Musselman (Southwestern University), and questions from the audience (Download:[…]

Mac Maharaj (South African activist and intellectual) explains why the model of South Africa's transition to democracy cannot be replicated in powersharing agreements in Kenya and Zimbabwe. In the second part of this episode, recorded at the NEWSA meeting in Burlington, VT, Alex Beresford (PhD candidate, University of Edinburgh) tells us about his research on union workers views of Tripar[…]

Kiki Edozie (James Madison College at MSU) compares recent corruption scandals in Nigeria, South Africa, and Kenya. She argues that democratic crises are closely tied to economic crises. At the end, the implications of these processes for African politics are considered.[…]

Concerned Africa Scholars co-chair Sean Jacobs discusses the goals of this organization, its new blog and web site, and upcoming panels at the ASA meeting in Chicago. The second part of this episode features a conversation about African women's sport with Martha Saavedra (African Studies, UC-Berkeley) and Anisa Adem (Founder, Future Generation African Girls Association).[…]

Bill Derman (Anthropology, MSU) talks about his recent volume on Conflicts Over Land and Water in Africa (2007). He examines the role of government policies, local farmers, and chiefs in land reform in Zimbabwe and South Africa. Derman then shares his observations of refugee flows, and points to the sensitive position of researchers working in the changing political context of southern Af[…]

Walter Hawthorne (History, MSU) is an expert on Africa and the Atlantic World in the era of the slave trade. We talk with him (and Joseph Lauer) about the history of rice farmers on the Upper Guinea Coast and the vigorous debate over Judith Carney's Black Rice thesis. Hawthorne closes by describing his forthcoming book Forging a Creole Atlantic: Africans on the Upper Guinea Coast, in Por[…]

Solomon Addis Getahun (Central Michigan University) discusses the history of Ethiopian immigrants and refugees in the USA. He describes the diversity of Ethiopians in the diaspora and their community organizations. For example, to overcome isolation and carve out an autonomous space within US society, in 1984 Ethiopians established the Ethiopian Sports Federation in North America. Its ann[…]

Peter Alegi discusses his book manuscript in process African Soccerscapes: Sport, Race, Nation, and Capitalism (Ohio University Press, forthcoming in 2009). Guest host Solomon Getahun and Peter Limb talk with Alegi about football and anti-colonial nationalism in Nigeria, Algeria, and South Africa; the history of migration of African players to Europe; and South Africa's hosting of the 201[…]

Rita El-Khayat (University of Chieti, Italy) is an anthropologist, psychiatrist, novelist and poet from Morocco. Guest host is Professor Safoi Babana-Hampton (MSU). El-Khayat describes her work on North African women; the study and practice of psychiatry; and the importance of breaking down barriers through cultural mixing (métissage). The interview took place during the conference Musli[…]

Social historian Ibrahima Thioub (Université Cheikh Anta Diop, Dakar) reflects on history from below, French colonial prisons, African resistance, and ongoing digitization projects at UCAD. Guest co-host is Ibra Sene, a former student of Thioub's, who is finishing a dissertation at MSU on Crime, Punishment, and Colonization: A History of the Prison of Saint-Louis and the Development of t[…]

Historian Robert Edgar (Howard University) discusses his project on African Americans and South Africa, showing how black communities in different parts of the world engage, interact and influence each other. Edgar talks about the history of representations of the Zulu in America, and reflects on how he rescued the Prophetess Nonthetha Nkwenkwe and the African Communist Edwin Thabo Mofuts[…]

Patrick Bond (Director of the Centre for Civil Society, University of KwaZulu-Natal) talks to us about his new book Climate Change, Carbon Trading and Civil Society: Negative Returns on South African Investments (co-edited with Rehana Dada and Graham Erion, 2007). Bond discusses carbon trading's effects on global warming, critiques free market approaches to climate change, and charts the […]

Bush's recent Presidential visit to Africa invites deeper analysis. In this episode, MSU Professor David Wiley examines the militarization of US foreign policy in Africa and its potential impact on Africa and Africans. We also discuss why African Studies scholars (e.g. ACAS) and African Studies Centers rejected funding from US military and intelligence agencies in defense of free speech, […]

Professor Folu Ogundimu (MSU, Journalism) joins Peter Limb and Olabode Ibironke, an MSU graduate student in Comparative Literature, to discuss how the transformation of mass media in contemporary Africa has revitalized democracy and strengthened freedom of expression. Later in the episode, Alegi reports on the Media, Communication, and Sports in Africa conference, and speaks with Simon Ak[…]

In this episode's first segment, Peter Alegi reports on the exciting conclusion of the 2008 African Nations Cup in Ghana. In the second segment, South African media scholar Sean Jacobs (University of Michigan) discusses his blog Leo Africanus, and shares his insights on the relationship between media, popular culture, and democracy in Africa.[…]

This episode focuses on African football (soccer), cinema, and literature. In the first segment, Peter Alegi reports on the first round of the African Nations Cup in Ghana. In the second segment, MSU Professors Ken Harrow and Safoi Babana-Hampton join us in a discussion centered around Harrow's new book Postcolonial African Cinema: From Political Engagement to Postmodernism (Indiana Unive[…]

The inaugural episode of Africa Past and Present introduces the podcast and features an interview with University of Pennsylvania Professor Cheikh Anta Babou (MSU PhD 2002). Africa matters, says co-host Peter Alegi in the first segment. It matters to America since about one in seven Americans trace their origins to the African continent. Africa also has global implications: economic, pol[…]