On this day two years ago, Nelson Mandela passed. Madiba and his legacy has been covered widely on this site already, so for this weekend’s music break we’re going to jump into the archives and feature a collection of favorites we’ve already dedicated to him, as well as some new new new… If you have some reading time as well this weekend, check out our Mandela archive here.
A letter from a Naira Marley fan explains how the artist inadvertently teaches young Nigerians an important lesson about politics: that it will take more than counter-cultural popularity to effect any tangible change in our society.
Burundian refugees in Nakivale Refugee Settlement in Uganda are enacting grassroots responses to COVID-19.
Western media coverage of Ethiopia’s political crisis turns a blind eye to the grassroots movement behind the protests.
In Sudan’s capital, security forces arbitrarily enforce a haphazard lockdown.
Local traditions of crisis management—especially those resistant to predatory capitalism—have largely been forcibly shed along the path to “development.” The age of COVID-19 is the time to recover them.
We’re back with another playlist of songs for your weekend!
Regular Kenyans try to survive the economic fallout from the coronavirus.
Eko Atlantic in Lagos, like Tatu City in Nairobi, Kenya; Hope City in Accra, Ghana; and Cité le Fleuve in Kinshasa, DRC, point to the rise of private cities. What does it mean for the rest of us?
Three activists from the Assembly of the Unemployed talk to us about the challenges facing working-class communities in South Africa.
Rather than addressing food scarcity, genetically modified crops may render African farmers and scientists more, not less, reliant on global markets.
Plutôt que de pallier l’insécurité alimentaire, les cultures génétiquement modifiées risquent de rendre les agriculteurs et les scientifiques africains plus, et non moins, dépendants des marchés mondiaux.
The exhibition, ‘Men Lebsa Neber,’ features a staggering collection of the clothes and stories of rape survivors across Ethiopia.
Chambi Chachage’s tribute to Annar Cassam, assistant to late President Julius Nyerere of Tanzania, and a key figure in anti-colonial movements.
The blitz on monuments signifies not the abandonment of history, but rather the rejection of a narrative of modernity created by the heirs of global plunder.
The task is to recapture progressive thought and policies from post-independence Africa for our times.
Pressure on African writers to avoid the criticism of poverty porn limits the imagination of the writer and the ability to speak truth to power.
Political solutions to confront Boko Haram’s violence around Lake Chad, need to include regional integration; solving the problem of colonial borders.
How do we deal with the unfinished business of the past? Cape Town has a surprisingly poetic answer.
COVID-19 re-affirmed journalism is a public good, yet as newsrooms collapse, journalism is in danger.
Drummer Asher Gamedze’s new album is a groundbreaking body of work in the musical trajectory of South African jazz.