Africa

A hapless attempt at swimming': Representations of Eric Moussambani

by John Nauright

published in Critical Arts 17:1/2 (2003), 106-122, co-authored with Tara Magdalinski

One of the most powerful images to emerge from the pool at the Sydney 2000 Olympics was that of Eric Moussambani from... more One of the most powerful images to emerge from the pool at the Sydney 2000 Olympics was that of Eric Moussambani from Equatorial Guinea who swam his heat of the 100-meter freestyle alone after the other two swimmers in his heat were disqualified. Moussambani completed the distance over one minute slower than eventual gold medallist Pieter van den Hoogenband. The media coverage of Moussambani's performance illustrates that the discourses of colonialism, paternalism, and racial stereotyping remain central in the modern Olympic movement. This paper analyses media reports of Moussambani and identifies three main frames used to contextualize his performance at the Olympics. We situate Moussambani's swim within a broader framework that reveals the mechanisms used to display African bodies for the European gaze as well as the paternalist Olympic discourse that seeks to universalize Western sporting practices within a global culture that privileges Western cultural and economic practices.

Finding Civil Society in Darfur

by Hagar Taha

Think Africa Press, 11 May 2012

Understood differently by international actors, the state and locals, Darfur's civil society is in a state of... more Understood differently by international actors, the state and locals, Darfur's civil society is in a state of continuous re-invention.

UN LINGUAGGIO POLITICO DELL’ISLAM IN AFRICA OCCIDENTALE: RESISTENZA, CONTROCULTURA, RIVOLUZIONE

by Alessandra Turchetti

China-Africa Relations in the 21st Century: Engagement, Compromise and Controversy

by Uluslararası İlişkiler

Kieran E. Uchehara, " China-Africa Relations in the 21st Century: Engagement, Compromise and Controversy ", Uluslararası İlişkiler, Cilt 6, Sayı 23 (Güz), 2009

Çin’in Afrika ile ilgili dış politika gündemi, gelişmekte olan ülkeler arasındaki işbirliğini artırma ve yükselen bir... more Çin’in Afrika ile ilgili dış politika gündemi, gelişmekte olan ülkeler arasındaki işbirliğini artırma ve yükselen bir süper güç olarak statüsünü gösterme hamlesinin bir parçasını oluşturmaktadır. 2000 Pekin Deklarasyonu ve Çin-Afrika Ekonomik ve Siyasi İşbirliği Programı yenilenen ilişkilerin temelini oluşturmaktadır. Çin, Afrika ile tüm karşılıklı ilişki alanlarında Afrika ile farklı ve çeşitli ilişkiler geliştirmiştir. Ancak Çin’in büyüyen sanayisinin ihtiyaç duyduŞu Afrika’nın maden ve enerji kaynakları, 21. yüzyılda Çin’in Afrika ile iyi ilişkiler kurmasının ana sebebidir. Çin’in Afrika’daki ticaret ve yatırımındaki hızlı artış, kıtanın kalkınması ile ilgili fırsatlar ve zorlukların yapısına ilişkin ve Batı ile olduŞu gibi yeni-sömürgeci tarzı ilişkilerin gelişme ihtimalinin olup olmadığı konusunda akademisyenler ve siyasiler arasındaki uyuşmazlıkları açıŞa çıkarmıştır. Kısmen ekonomik asimetrilerden kaynaklanan ticari ve yatırım ilişkilerindeki dengesizlik, Çin’in Afrikalı baskıcı yönetimleri kınamaması ve iyi yönetilmeyen ekonomiler; kendisine hizmet eden ve kısa dönem kazanımlardan etkilenen bir dış ekonomik politikayı işaret etmektedir.

Dockside Prostitution in South African Ports

by Henry Trotter

History Compass 6/3 (2008): 673-690

Prostitution has been a staple of dockside social life for centuries. In South Africa, it dates from the Dutch East... more Prostitution has been a staple of dockside social life for centuries. In South Africa, it dates from the Dutch East India Company's establishment of a refreshment station at the Cape of Good Hope. But unlike other prostitution sectors—streets, brothels, agencies—the women of the dockside sex trade in Cape Town and Durban participate in a global traffic of ideas, diseases, DNA, contraband, and currency through their ceaseless interactions with foreign sailors. They exploit their knowledge of the seamen's languages and cultures so as to more effectively solicit their marks in a competitive and cosmopolitan environment.

Social historians provide passing glimpses of dockside prostitution in their consideration of larger historical themes—Company rule, slavery, British colonial governance, the Mineral Revolution, the Anglo-Boer War, and apartheid—but they have yet to treat it as a distinct analytical category through which to view the past. Yet popular intellectual trends suggest that research into the dockside sex trade would add new dimensions to the histories of cosmopolitanism, gender, globalization, maritime recreation, and the Atlantic and Indian Oceans.

This article provides a quick and accessible introduction to the historiography of dockside prostitution in South Africa.

The Virtues of Dockside Dalliance: Why Maritime Sugar Girls are Safer then Urban Streetwalkers in South Africa's Prostitution Industry

by Henry Trotter

in Susan Dewey & Patty Kelly (Eds.), Policing Pleasure: Sex Work, Policy and the State in Global Perspective (New York: NYU Press, 2011), pp. 86-99

South African sex workers are exposed to different amounts of violence depending on the prostitution sector that they... more South African sex workers are exposed to different amounts of violence depending on the prostitution sector that they work in, such as the street, truck stop, hotel, agency, brothel, and dockside trades. By comparing the structural features of these sectors, we can not only gauge the likelihood of violence within each, but also devise more precise policy instruments to reduce violence at an industry-wide level. I focus here on the neglected dockside prostitution sector, showing how its structural characteristics enhance the women’s power vis-à-vis their clients. Detailed policy recommendations conclude the article.

Navigating Risk: Lessons From the Dockside Sex Trade for Reducing Violence in South Africa's Prostitution Industry

by Henry Trotter

Sexuality Research & Social Policy: Journal of NSRC, 4/4 (Dec 2007): 106-119

The diversity of South Africa's prostitution industry exposes sex workers to varying levels of violence. The street,... more The diversity of South Africa's prostitution industry exposes sex workers to varying levels of violence. The street, truck stop, hotel, agency, brothel, and dockside trades are characterized by different structural features that determine the prevalence of client, police, and third-party abuse against prostitutes. Comparing the structural elements of each sector allows not only gauging the likelihood of violence within a given niche but also devising more precise policy instruments to reduce violence at an industry-wide level.

This article, "Navigating Risk," focuses on the dockside prostitution sector in Cape Town and Durban, showing how its structural features enhance the women's power vis-à-vis their clients and the police. It discusses 5 key variables that influence the likelihood of violence within each prostitution sector:

* the social and legal status of the client
* the location of the negotiation
* the location of the sexual act
* the level of discretion in the solicitation process
* and the role of third-party involvement

Detailed policy recommendations conclude the argument.

Trauma and Memory: The Impact of Apartheid-Era Forced Removals on Coloured Identity in Cape Town

by Henry Trotter

in Mohamed Adhikari (Ed.), Burdened by Race: Coloured Identities in Southern Africa (Cape Town: UCT Press, 2009), pp. 49-78

Communities often cohere around memories of historical suffering: yet coloured South Africans, a people whose diverse... more Communities often cohere around memories of historical suffering: yet coloured South Africans, a people whose diverse ancestry experienced enslavement, dispossession, genocidal extermination, and apartheid degradation, for the most part, they do not invest in remote historical traumas. Most coloured Capetonians instead focus upon a painful experience within living memory: the forced eviction of 150,000 coloured people from their homes and communities in the Cape Peninsula between 1957 and 1985 under the Group Areas Act. It is this experience that gives coloured identity vital resonance, especially amongst working class people, many of whom have yet to overcome the losses of that trauma.

Based on over one hundred life history interviews with coloured and African forced removees, this article examines the impact of Group Areas evictions on contemporary coloured identity. It suggests that, in the wake of mass social trauma, coloured removees coped with their pain by reminiscing with each other about the "good old days" in the destroyed communities. Their removal to racially defined townships ensured that they mainly shared their memories with other coloured people, and much less with African or Indian removees.

Apartheid social engineering to a large extent thus determined the spatial limits within which coloured memories circulated, creating a reflexive, mutually reinforcing pattern of narrative traffic. Over the past four decades, the constant circulation of these nostalgic stories has developed a "narrative community" amongst coloured people in the townships. This experience of popular sharing and support in the context of loss today gives coloured identity in Cape Town a dimension that would be lacking if it were only mobilized for political or economic purposes.

Charlatans Chicanery

by Mohamed Eno

Thr poem is an excerpt from my forthcoming volume Guilt of Otherness

The volume is under review with a subject area expert and a literary critic. The volume is under review with a subject area expert and a literary critic.

Slavery and Colonialism: The Worst Terrorism on Africa

by Mohamed Eno

Co-authored with Omar A. Eno, Mohamed H. Ingiriis, and Jamal M. Haji; Published in African Renaissance, Vol. 9, No. 1, 2012.

Humans need not justify terrorism of any kind, regardless of whether one is Muslim, Christian or Jew, because it is... more Humans need not justify terrorism of any kind, regardless of whether one is Muslim, Christian or Jew, because it is the axis of evil and devastation of mankind. However, the deliberate use of the term terrorism in recent decades was carefully selected, mainly, against a certain religion (Islam). The idea was then globally politicized by the Western world. Leaving that scholarly view in its own right, we disagree with the opinion raising terrorism as the devil’s just-born child of evil, when in reality Africans had been terrorized for centuries as slaves and human chattel. Hence the basis for the concept of this thesis: conceptualizing the episode of ‘terrorism’ and ‘terrorist’ from the broader perspective of its practice from the Middle Passage or the Atlantic Slave Trade. To portray that argument and broaden the scope of the debate over this critically sensitive subject, we divided the discussion into three sections: an examination of what constitutes terrorism and terrorist; history of terrorism and terrorists from an Africa perspective; and the ideological constraints within the subject of terrorism as practiced by the US and its Western allies.

2004 Marriage & Family in Africa

by Sahaya G. Selvam

2006 Youth ministry Africa

by Sahaya G. Selvam

Monitors cross the Red Sea: The biogeographic history of Varanus yemenensis

by Daniel Portik

Participation – In what? Radio, convergence and the corporate logic of audience input through new media in Zambia

by Wendy Willems

Forthcoming in: Telematics and Informatics, 2012.

Recent literature has pointed to the way in which new media such as the internet and mobile phones have the capacity... more Recent literature has pointed to the way in which new media such as the internet and mobile phones have the capacity to enable more participatory and interactive communication, either through user-generated content or through a broader participation of audiences in mainstream media’s content production. This potential is celebrated even more in contexts in which there is deemed to be a lack of political accountability or limited consultation of citizens by government. This article investigates the extent to which new technologies have changed the quality of audience participation in radio content production in Zambia. Engaging with literature on participation in media studies as well as development studies and based on interviews with station managers, producers and presenters of six radio stations in Zambia, the article examines both the opportunities and limits of the use of internet and mobile phones in audience participation. It argues that there is a need to situate these practices within a broader corporate logic in which participation is not merely about adding more voices but also feeds into radio stations’ commercial strategies of increasing revenue and accessing personal data of listeners through SMS and social media.

Inmigración africana hacia Europa,¿ un proceso sin fin?. El caso de Gambia

by Dan Rodríguez-García

Rodríguez García, D. (2001) “Inmigración africana hacia Europa: ¿un proceso sin fin?. El caso de Gambia”. Ô Wïllaeri (La cooperació), Full informatiu d’ETANE especial 10ª Diada Cultural Afrocatalana, núm.1, junio 2001, pp. 5-7.

En este artículo se analizan las causas y motivaciones de la migración gambiana hacia Catataluña, ofreciendo... more En este artículo se analizan las causas y motivaciones de la migración gambiana hacia Catataluña, ofreciendo información de primera mano procedente de trabajo de campo realizado en origen. Se empieza argumentando que desde los años 1970s, la región del Sahel ha sufrido un proceso de desertificación que ha afectado gravemente a la agricultura, el principal sector de producción. Esta depresión medio-ambiental y económica, particularmente acuciante durante los años 1980s, además de factores políticos internos (conflictos sociopolíticos en la región, restricciones al cruce de fronteras en países vecinos), y externos (las políticas de inmigración restrictivas en países de destino tradicionales de este flujo, como Reino Unido; y el boom económico de España en los 1980s como factor de atracción), ha hecho que la inmigración senegambiana sea la más importante de origen subsahariano en Cataluña. Un flujo migratorio que se ha incrementado desde entonces siguiendo la lógica de las redes migratorias.

Female Genital Mutilation Among Senegambian Immigrants in Africa and Catalonia, Spain: The Debate Between Cultural Relativism and Universalism [Las mutilaciones genitales en la población senegambiana en Cataluña y África: El debate entre universalismo y relativismo cultural]

by Dan Rodríguez-García

Rodríguez García, Dan (2002) “Las mutilaciones genitales en la población senegambiana en Cataluña y África: El debate entre universalismo y relativismo cultural”. En: González Echevarría, A. y Molina, J. L. (coords.) Abriendo surcos en la tierra. Investigación básica y aplicada en la UAB, Bellaterra: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, pp. 79-102.

Las mutilaciones genitales femeninas (MGF) han recibido en los últimos años una especial atención desde distintas... more Las mutilaciones genitales femeninas (MGF) han recibido en los últimos años una especial atención desde distintas esferas sociales, como uno de los aspectos más conflictivos de la interculturalidad. Existe un amplio consenso en considerar la práctica de las MGF como uno de los límites de la diversidad en las democracias plurales. La complejidad del tema requiere, sin embargo, un tratamiento profundo, que debe empezar con el conocimiento de las características socio-culturales y organizativas de la sociedad de origen y de la función y los significados de la práctica en cuestión. Esto no obsta a la crítica. Más bien se trata de proveernos de las herramientas necesarias para abordar una cuestión muy compleja y cuya simplificación tiene perversas consecuencias. La polémica en torno a la práctica de mutilaciones genitales entre la población inmigrante senegambiana en Cataluña sirve aquí de ejemplo crucial para debatir la eterna tensión entre particularismo (diversidad) y universalismo (unidad) en las sociedades plurales.

"You Are Indebted to Your Family": Transmigration and Reciprocity ["Tú debes a tu familia": Transmigración y reciprocidad]

by Dan Rodríguez-García

Rodríguez García, Dan (2003) “‘Tú debes a tu familia’. Transmigración y reciprocidad entre la población senegambiana residente en Cataluña”, Actas del IX Congreso de Antropología de la Federación de Asociaciones de Antropología del Estado Español: Cultura i Política, Barcelona: Universidad de Barcelona.

http://www.ub.edu/reciprocitat/GER_WEB_CAS/Actividades/Actividades%20Simposio%202002/Ponencia-Rodriguez-D.pdf

Analizando el caso de la inmigración senegambiana en Cataluña, en esta publicación se argumenta que se trata en la... more Analizando el caso de la inmigración senegambiana en Cataluña, en esta publicación se argumenta que se trata en la mayoría de casos de estrategias migratorias colectivas organizadas fundamentalmente por la familia, a la que el inmigrante –transmigrante– debe corresponder. La colectividad y la reciprocidad son tan importantes que es en gran medida a través de estas estructuras que se orienta la acción diaria de los individuos, su ciclo vital y los proyectos futuros. Se trata aquí de subrayar la importancia de la reciprocidad en un contexto de mundialización de los flujos transnacionales.

Inmigración y mestizaje hoy: Formación de matrimonios mixtos y familias transnacionales de población africana en Cataluña

by Dan Rodríguez-García

Rodríguez García, Dan (2004) “Inmigración y mestizaje hoy. Formación de matrimonios mixtos y familias transnacionales de inmigrantes en Cataluña”, Migraciones, 16: 77-120.

Una de las consecuencias de le inmigración y del asentamiento permanente de los inmigrantes en los países del sur de... more Una de las consecuencias de le inmigración y del asentamiento permanente de los inmigrantes en los países del sur de Europa, es el aumento del número de matrimonios mixtos o bí-nacionales y la formación de familias transnacionales. Combinando el uso de metodologías cualitativas y cuantitativas, este artículo analiza los patrones de endogamia y exogamia (matrimonio dentro / fuera de un determinado grupo o categoría) de inmigrados africanos en Cataluña, centrando la atención en las uniones entre hombres senegaleses y gambianos y mujeres españolas: características Socio-demográficas, situación de transnacionalidad, dinámicas intergeneracionales de cambio y retención socio-cultural y formación de identidades multi/trans-culturales. El trabajo sugiere que los factores sociales, situacionales y personales pueden ser más importantes qué el origen cultural "per se" a la hora de explicar los patrones de endogamia y exogamia y las dinámicas de convivencia y crianza de los hijos en las uniones mixtas, lo cual supone una crítica a las explicaciones extremadamente culturalistas. Por otro lado, las conclusiones apuntan a que las parejas mixtas y sus descendientes se manejan -en mayor o menor medida- en múltiples localizaciones y bagajes culturales, por lo que sería un error menospreciar o pretender que los vínculos multiculturales no existen o que no pueden ser revitalizados y funcionales. A lo largo del artículo se propone, pues, un análisis complejo de la interculturalidad, criticando una interpretación de los procesos de mestizaje y segregación como realidades contradictorias o exclusivas.

Mixed Marriages and Transnational Families in the Intercultural Context

by Dan Rodríguez-García

Rodríguez García, D. (2006) “Mixed Marriages and Transnational Families in the Intercultural Context: A Case Study of African-Spanish Couples in Catalonia, Spain”. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 32(3): 403-433. (Award of Excellence in Research in the Social Sciences, UAB 2009: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/sociologyandsocialpolicy_ethidemig~db=all)

One of the consequences of international migration and the permanent settlement of immigrants in southern EU countries... more One of the consequences of international migration and the permanent settlement of immigrants in southern EU countries is the growing number of inter-country marriages and the formation of transnational families. Using both quantitative and qualitative data, this article examines patterns of endogamy and exogamy (i.e., marriage within/outside a particular group or category) among African immigrants in Catalonia, focusing on bi-national Senegalese– and Gambian–Spanish couples. Socio-demographic profiles, transnationality, the dynamics of cultural change or retention, and the formation of transcultural identities are explored. The evidence presented suggests that social-class factors are more important than cultural origins in patterns of endogamy and exogamy, in the dynamics of living together and in the bringing-up of children of mixed unions. Such a conclusion negates culturalists’ explanations of endogamy and exogamy while, at the same time, emphasising the role of social actors as active subjects in these processes. I further argue that mixed couples and their offspring deal—to a greater or lesser extent—with multiple localisations and cultural backgrounds (i.e. here and there), rather than experiencing a ‘clash between two cultures’. Therefore, it would be a mistake to pretend that multicultural links do not exist and that they cannot be revitalised and functional. The paper starts and ends by addressing the complexities of processes of interculturalism, resisting an interpretation of hybridity and segregation as contradictory or exclusive realities.

Making White: Constructing Race in a South African High School

by Nadine Dolby