The possibility of thought
A Black South African academic in the United States on breaking the silence on Israeli apartheid in US classrooms and on campuses.
Academy
Another essentializing moment?
Since Stuart Hall wrote critically about race as an analytical category in the 1980s, naturalized accounts of race are back with a vengeance.
What is decolonization for?
Scholars Archie Mafeje and Cedric Robinson challenged Eurocentrism. Their ideas are becoming more widely known. They're the focus of AIAC Talk this week.
Pioneers in Black Studies
Kwame Nkrumah’s ideas about pan-Africanism and African liberation inspired many young scholars to explore global linkages around race and power, to uncover historical connections and forge new ones.
History class
What might Black Lives Matter learn from Africanist scholars who have studied inequality outside the US, especially in Africa?
Academic reparation and stepping aside
Reflections from a former President of the African Studies Association (ASA), the largest African Studies association globally, on the future of the discipline.
Refugee debates have an African history problem
Despite increased global debate over refugee issues, few discuss these issues in terms of refugee histories, especially histories of Africans seeking refuge in and beyond the continent.
The academic game
African Studies scholars write for the gate-keepers, to prove our own legitimacy, for the stimulation of conferences and the relief of rising recognition by algorithms.
The politics of influence
Influence exhilarates. It also makes people nervous. Writers, artists, scholars, researchers—we all seem to want to be “influential.” Less often do we want to admit to being “influenced.”
The university of patriarchy
Tanzanian universities are beginning to tackle “sextortion.” Will new policies and attention to sexual harassment on campuses make a difference?
David Graeber, Africanist
David Graeber (1961-2020) started his career as a scholar studying Madagascar and that informed what became his popular ideas about anarchism, debt, and globalization.
African literature is a country
What if you survey African literature professors to find out which works and writers are most regularly taught? Only a few canonical ones continue to dominate curricula.
Ernest Wamba dia Wamba, a healer from within
We should honor Professor Ernest Wamba dia Wamba by carrying on his life's work.
Ernest Wamba dia Wamba, un guérisseur de l’esprit
Il sied d’honorer le professeur Ernest Wamba dia Wamba en continuant l’œuvre de sa vie.
Ernest Wamba dia Wamba mponyaji kutoka ndani
Tunapaswa kumheshimu Profesa Ernest Wamba dia Wamba kwa kuendelea na kazi ya maisha yake.
Ghana’s retrogressive Public Universities Bill
Ghana’s ruling party has proposed a new law to control the country’s public universities. The country’s academics are fighting it.
What does it mean to be African in a post-apartheid academy?
The Nigerian scholar and poet, Harry Garuba, who died in February 2020, was a key figure in African Studies and teaching literature in South Africa.
How African is the ‘African Studies Review’?
The journal’s editor acknowledges that it has a long way to go before most Africa-based scholars recognize it as an especially African journal.
Reenchanting Teju Olaniyan
Among the many legacies of Teju Olaniyan’s teaching and writing would be a project to not only speak in the ideological name of Africa, but to redistribute the power of speaking in that name.
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.”