The people want to breathe
In Tunisia’s coastal city of Gabès, residents live in the shadow of the phosphate industry. As pollution deepens and repression returns, a new generation revives the struggle for life itself.
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On the pitch
This year, instead of taking a publishing break, we will be covering the African Cup of Nations. To transition, we consider why football still matters in an era of enclosure, mediated presence, and thinning publics.
Dutch elites and blackface
Most elites in the Netherlands are no different than racists when it comes to defending #ZwartePiet.
The Search for Amilcar Cabral
Juan Orrantia, a Colombian photographer who lives in South Africa, interviewed on his project on the Guinea-Bissauan liberation hero.
The World Cup Senegal can’t attend
Between the visa bond, the digital surveillance requirements, and the 74 percent rejection rate, the Trump administration has made it nearly impossible for Senegalese fans and journalists to attend the World Cup.
Kenya’s goon economy
Across the country’s urban centers, young men are being recruited into political militias that offer quick cash, fleeting power, and little chance of escape.
Moral clarity is not enough
Gustavo Petro’s “economy for life” speaks to real crises. But without a rigorous political economy behind it, progressive movements risk mistaking the symptoms for the disease.
How to read postcolonial writing
The Granta controversy surrounding a Commonwealth Prize-winning story tells us less about AI than about the enduring metropolitan expectation that writing from the South should sound opaque, excessive, and primitive.
Branches without roots
Across Africa, governments are elevating STEM education while sidelining the humanities. But science and technology are never neutral, and technical expertise alone cannot transform society.
The most important African country to the U.S.
What came across as recognition of Africa Is a Country from a US State Department official, was more a case of speaking too fast.
Too big to regulate
Dangote’s refinery ended Nigeria’s dependence on imported fuel and became Africa’s most important energy asset overnight when Iran shut the Strait of Hormuz. But it also became the country’s most powerful monopoly.
Mos Def and the Battle of Algiers
What is that sample of Arabic during Slick Rick’s verse on Mos Def's "The Auditorium"?
Wole Soyinka Loves Bean Pies
Africa's first Nobel literature laureate is accused of Islamophobia. It is not his first time.
All About Nicholas Kristof
Nicholas Kristof's journalism, which is largely focused on Africans, is exhausting to watch. And it is always about himself.
Madlib’s Radio Freedom
Madlib's "Medicine Show No. 3: Beat Konducta in Africa" is about African liberation in the 1970s, especially south of the Limpopo.
The Final Countdown
For those doubting South African can host a successful World Cup, the country has a long history of successfully hosting big tournaments.
Boers and Bantus
Vintage clips, from 1961, of Nelson Mandela, ZK Matthews, Helen Joseph, among others, on a Dutch TV program talking liberation from white supremacy.