African History Book List · 
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Women and Slavery, Volume One
Africa, the Indian Ocean World, and the Medieval North Atlantic
Edited by Gwyn Campbell, Suzanne Miers and Joseph C. Miller
The literature on women enslaved around the world has grown rapidly in the last ten years, evidencing strong interest in the subject across a range of academic disciplines. Until Women and Slavery, no single collection has focused on female slaves who—as these two volumes reveal—probably constituted the considerable majority of those enslaved in Africa, Asia, and Europe over several millennia and who accounted for a greater proportion of the enslaved in the Americas than is customarily acknowledged.…
Revealing Prophets
Prophecy In Eastern African History
Edited by David M. Anderson and Douglas H. Johnson
This book examines the richly textured histories of prophets and prophecies within East Africa. It gives an analytical account of the significantly different forms prophecy has taken over the past century across the country.…
Namibia’s Liberation Struggle
The Two-Edged Sword
By Colin Leys and John S. Saul
It took twenty-three years of armed struggle before Namibia could gain its independence from South Africa in March 1990. Swapo’s victory was remarkable in the face of an overwhelmingly superior enemy.…
Decolonization & Independence in Kenya, 1940–1993
Edited by B. A. Ogot and W. R. Ochieng
This is a sharply observed assessment of the history of the last half century by a distinguished group of historians of Kenya. At the same time the book is a courageous reflection in the dilemmas of African nationhood.…
The Migrant Farmer in the History of Cape Colony, 1657–1842
Petrus Johannes Van der Merwe wrote three of the most significant books on the history of South Africa before he was 35 years old. His trilogy, of which The Migrant Farmer is the first volume, has become a classic that no student of Cape colonial history of the seventeenth, eighteenth or nineteenth century can ignore.…
Education in the Development of Tanzania, 1919–1990
By Lene Buchert
Deals with the realities of education in a debt-ridden African country trying to cope with the pressures of externally imposed educational budgets.
Colonialism in the Congo Basin, 1880-1940
This exceptional study of the Mongo people of the upper Congo River basin focuses on the evolution of Mongo work patterns from the period of the late nineteenth century to 1940, the high-water mark of the colonial period.…
From Civilization to Segregation
Social Ideals and Social Control in Southern Rhodesia, 1890–1934
This study examines the social changes that took place in Southern Rhodesia after the arrival of the British South Africa Company in the 1890s. Summer’s work focuses on interactions among settlers, the officials of the British South America Company and the administration, missionaries, humanitarian groups in Britain, and the most vocal or noticeable groups of Africans.…
Ethnicity & Conflict in the Horn of Africa
Composed of eleven studies on the Horn of Africa, the book is based on primary research by David Turton, Hiroshi Matsuda, John Lamphear, Eisei Kurimoro, Wendy James, P.T.W. Baxter, Tim Allen and others.…
Apartheid’s Genesis
Edited by Philip Bonner, Peter Delius and Deborah Posel
Apartheid is synonymous in most people's minds with a virulent form of racial ideology and social engineering. Yet ideologies of racial domination and segregation long preceded apartheid, and cannot by themselves explain the shift in racial domination that apartheid involved.…
Kakungulu & the Creation of Uganda: 1868–1928
This is a history of the early days of Uganda. The account has an African focus because it shows the British takeover through the experiences of an extraordinary leader.“At this spot in the year 1901 the British flag was first hoisted by Semei Kakanguru, emissary and loyal servant of His Majesty the King.…
Individual Freedoms and State Security
In The African Context
In 1980 the ZANU/PF government of Robert Mugabe came to power after an extended war of liberation. They inherited a cluster of emergency laws similar to those available to the authorities in South Africa.…
Swahili Origins
Swahili Culture and The Shungwaya Phenomenon
Kiswahili has become the lingua franca of eastern Africa. Yet there can be few historic peoples whose identity is as elusive as that of the Swahili. Some have described themselves as Arabs, as Persians or even, in one place, as Portuguese.…
Being Maasai
Ethnicity and Identity In East Africa
Edited by Thomas Spear and Richard Waller
Everyone “knows” the Maasai as proud pastoralists who once dominated the Rift Valley from northern Kenya to central Tanzania. But many people who identity themselves as Maasai, or who speak Maa, are not pastoralist at all, but farmers and hunters.…
The Long Journey
South Africa’s Quest for a Negotiated Settlement
Edited by Steven Friedman
Most South Africans don’t have the faintest idea what happened at Codesa, or is happening at subsequent multiparty negotiations. Plenaries, working groups, subgroups, independent election commissions, transitional executive councils, government of national unity… it’s incomprehensible to almost everyone who hasn’t been involved, and probably quite a few who have.…
Liquor and Labor in Southern Africa
Edited by Jonathan Crush and Charles Ambler
In June 1976 political demonstrations in the black township of Soweto exploded into an insurrection that would continue sporadically and spread to urban areas across South Africa. In their assault on apartheid the youths who spearheaded the rebellion attacked and often destroyed the state institutions that they linked to their oppression: police stations, government offices, schools, and state-owned liquor outlets.…
An African American in South Africa
The Travel Notes of Ralph J. Bunche 28 September 1937–1 January 1938
Edited by Ralph Bunche and Robert R. Edgar
Ralph Bunche, who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1950, traveled to South Africa for three months in 1937. His notes, which have been skillfully compiled and annotated by historian Robert R. Edgar, provide unique insights on a segregated society.…
Soldiers of Misfortune
lvoirien Tirailleurs of World War II
This is a study of the African veterans of a European war. It is a story of men from the Cote d'Ivoire, many of whom had seldom traveled more than a few miles from their villages, who served France as tirailleurs (riflemen) during World War II.…
Unhappy Valley
Clan, Class & State In Colonial Kenya
By Bruce Berman and John Lonsdale
This long-awaited book is a considerable revision in the understanding of the history of colonial Kenya and, more widely, colonialism in Africa. There is a substantial amount of new work and this is interlocked with shared areas of concern that the authors have been exploring since 1976.…
Changing Uganda
Dilemmas of Structural Adjustment
Edited by Hölger Bernt Hansen and Michael Twaddle
Yoweri Museveni battled to power in 1986. His government has impressed many observers as Uganda's most innovative since it gained independence from Britain in 1962. The Economist recommended it as a model for other African states struggling to develop their resources in the best interests of their peoples.…
Faces in the Revolution
The Psychological Effects of Violence on Township Youth in South Africa
By Gill Straker
One of South Africa’s most serious problems is the large number of youths in the black townships who have been exposed to an incredible depth and complexity of trauma. Not only have they lived through severe poverty, the deterioration of family and social structures, and an inferior education system, but they have also been involved in catastrophic levels of violence, both as victims and as perpetrators.…
