Gangster Fashion
Hosni Mubarak, former Life President of Egypt, liked himself so much, his name became the stripes in his pinstripe suit.
Via Doll’s Factory
Further Reading
Ben Turok’s commitment to liberation, non-racialism and equality
Turok, who died at 92, was committed to fighting for the ideals of the left in South Africa. It is worth reviewing what his contribution to these ideals were in the final chapter of his life.
Detritus of revolution
Nthikeng Mohlele’s novel Small Things (2013) provides a rejoinder to J. M. Coetzee’s Disgrace (1999), depicting a black man’s perspective on the failures of South Africa’s transition.
Lagos in its filthy glory
Filmmaker Akin Omotoso shows the Lagos that pushes the sane to insanity, the meek to thuggery and the lawful to anarchy.
At the edge of sight
Ambivalent: Photography and Visibility in African History is one of very few books to have come out of the continent about photography where the majority of contributors are African scholars.
Pan-Africanism and the African artist
Meleko Mokgosi’s multimedia works offer complex views of history and powerful critiques of pan-Africanism and the postcolonial moment we are currently living.
#Metoo in Nigeria
In Nigeria, survivors of sexual violence and workplace sexual harassment know that facts are not enough.
Women’s political consciousness in Senegal
A British literature scholar on literary activism in French. This post is part of our series, African Feminisms, edited by Rama Salla Dieng.
The agrarian question in Egypt and Tunisia
It is time discuss food sovereignty in the Middle East and North Africa, again.
Music is the weapon
During Christmas 1980, Hugh Masekela and Miriam Makeba performed at a concert in Lesotho that deeply challenged and disturbed South Africa’s apartheid regime. The record of that concert is being reissued.
Difference and belonging
No child should choose between having food, love, and a roof over their head or being their full self.
An injury to one is an injury to all
Historian Peter Cole’s book on dockworkers in apartheid South Africa and San Francisco gets beyond slogans to vital historical truths.
Carceral colonialism
On the United Kingdom’s attempts to finance the construction of large-scale prison facilities in former colonies, to where it wants to deport undocumented migrants.
Greening the Sahel isn’t enough
A UN film pushes an ambitious plan to mitigate the impact of climate change on the Sahel by planting trees across it. But, averting disaster requires even bigger thinking.
Our women on the ground
A new book of essays offers a nuanced glimpse into the complexities of reporting on the Arab world, including North Africa.
Bottom-up hustling in Nairobi’s slums
Prevailing thoughts on slums stress their transitory character, but the complexity of everyday life in slums, including how people manage survival, is lost in the way they are understood from the outside.
Mauritania’s past doesn’t want to go away
The so-called “peaceful transition” in Mauritania, from colonialism to political independence, isn’t unanimously understood as such inside the country, and it reflects older rivalries.
Lungu’s Livingstone
Where does the idea that Zambia is a Christian nation come from?
Fanon’s mission
The works of Frantz Fanon can be read as architectural renderings of rights, futures, and generations toward a “very different Afro-futurism.”
The politics of Thanksgiving in Ethiopia
Irreecha, an annual ritual celebrated at the end of Ethiopia’s rainy season, offers a window into contemporary socio-political issues.
History time
The historical novel is in vogue across the continent, challenging how we conceive of the nation, and how we write its histories.