General introduction

Visual Hour 1: Maps and Orientations

Ideas of Africa: Ngugi, Blyden, Nkrumah

Ngugi wa Thiong'o, intro. and ch. 4, "The Quest for Relevance", in Decolonising the Mind (Portsmouth, 1986)

E.W. Blyden, "The Aims and Methods of Liberal Education for Africans", (Monrovia, 1881)

K. Nkrumah, "Africa's Glorious Past", Speech before the First International Congress of Africanists, December 1962

The Politics of Antiquity, Perspectives on Civilization

L. Senghor, The Collected Poetry, (Charlottesville, 1991), excerpts

---, Prose and Poetry, (London, 1965), excerpts

C. A. Diop, "The Meaning of Our Work", preface to The African Origin of Civilization: Myth or Reality, trans. M. Cook, (New York, 1974)

---. selections from Civilization or Barbarism: an Authentic Anthropology, (New York, 1991)

Unity and Modernity

J. Nyerere, "A United States of Africa", Journal of Modern African Studies, I, 1 (1963)

---. "The Rational Choice", Freedom and Development 1968-1973, (London, 1973)

K. Nkrumah, "Blue Print of Our Goal: Launching the Seven Year Development Plan, March 1964", and brief extracts from early statements

Visual Hour 2: Basil Davidson, Africa, vol. 1: "Different but Equal"

Ethiopia: Ancient Myths and Realities

J. Phillips, "Punt and Axum: Egypt and the Horn of Africa", JAH 38, 3 (1997), 423-457 (excerpt)

S. Munro-Hay, "Legend, Literature and Archaeological Discovery", in Aksum: An African Civilization of Late Antiquity, (Edinburgh, 1991)

T. Tamrat, "Church and State in Ethiopia, The Early Centuries", in African Zion: The Sacred Art of Ethiopia, (New Haven, 1993)

Kibre Negest, selections

Christian Ethiopia: Medieval Church and State

T. Tamrat, "Feudalism in Heaven and on Earth: Ideology and Political Structure in Medieval Ethiopia", Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference of Ethiopian Studies, S. Rubenson, ed., (Addis Ababa, 1984)

"Lalibela" and "Amda Tseyon", in R. Pankhurst, ed., The Ethiopian Royal Chronicles,

E. Haberland, "The Horn", in UNESCO, General History of Africa, vol. V, (Berkeley, 1992), 702-721.

Visual Hour 3: "Ethiopia's Christian Art and Architectural Traditions", Illustrated lecture

Reading: "Zara Yaqob" in Pankhurst, ed., Ethiopian Royal Chronicles

17th and 18th century Ethiopia: The Gondar Era

R. Pankhurst, "The Falashas, or Judaic Ethiopians, in their Christian Ethiopian Setting", African Affairs, 91 (1992), 567-582

J. Quirin, "The Gondar Era: Urbanization, Imperial Policies, and the Beta Israel, 1632-1755", in The Evolution of the Ethiopian Jews, (Philadelphia, 1992)

The New Empire from Tewodros through Menilek II

D. Crummey, "Imperial legitimacy and the creation of Neo-Solomonic Ideology in 19th century Ethiopia", Cahiers d'Etudes Africaines, 109, 28 (1988), 13-43

C. Prouty, "King Menilek and Queen Taytu, 1883-9", ch.3 (or) Background, ch.2, Empress Taytu and Menilek II, (Trenton, 1986)

B. Zewde, A Modern History of Ethiopia (Athens, OH, 1991), Abridged, chs. 1-2 (5-20)

Visual Hour 4: Illustrated Lecture on Adwa (1896) and the Italo-Ethiopian Conflict (1935-1941)

Haile Selassie: Italian Occupation, Restoration, Resistance, and Revolution

Haile Selassie, Address to the League of Nations, June 30, 1936, Selected Speeches, (Addis Ababa, 1967), 304-316

B. Zewde, ch. 3-5 (21-45)

Optional:

P. Gilkes, "Recent History: Ethiopia", Africa South of the Sahara, (London, 1998), 452-57

Ethiopia and Eritrea: Revolution, Liberation Movements and Nationalism

"Speech by M. Aklilu Habte Wold", concerning Ethiopian claims to Eritrea, 12 Nov. 1947

"Statement by the Delegation of the Moslem League of Eritrea", 21 Nov. 1949 from Ethiopia and Eritrea, A Documentary Study

Eritrea: Birth of a Nation (Eritrean Government Publicity Statements, 1993), 7-21

M. Hassan, "The Development of Oromo Nationalism" in P.T.W. Barker, et al., Being and Becoming Oromo, (Lawrenceville NJ, 1996)

Visual Hour 5: "Deluge", video

Shona Spirits and Mediums

M.F.C. Bourdillon, "Traditional Religion in Shona Society", in A.J. Dachs, ed., Christianity South of the Zambezi, vol. 1 (1973)

D. Lan, "The Great Spectacle of the Past" ch. 4 of Guns and Rain (London, 1985)

Great Zimbabwe

D. N. Beach, "A Catechism of Great Zimbabwe", The Shona and their Neighbors, (London, 1994)

João de Barros, Records of South-Eastern Africa, (Cape Town, 1964), excerpts

Martin Hall, "The Legend of the Lost City, or, the Man with the Golden Balls", JSAS, 21, 2 (1995), 179-199

M. Horton, "The Swahili Corridor (10^th Century)", Scientific American, 257, 3 (1987), 86-93

Visual Hour 6: Illustrated lecture on Great Zimbabwe

Reading: T. N. Huffman, "The Soapstone birds from Great Zimbabwe", African Arts, (1985), 68-73

Performing Ndebele and Shona Politics

L. Vail and L. White, "The Development of Forms: Ndebele Royal Praises", ch. 3 of Power and the Praise Poem, (Charlottesville, 1991)

T. O. Ranger, "Rhodes's Grave: a History" (n.p., 1999)

Colonization and Chimurenga

I. Phimister, An Economic and Social History of Zimbabwe, 1890-1948, (London, 1988), ch.1

W. H. Brown, On the South African Frontier, (New York, 1899), introductory material, chs. 27-29.

David Sweetman, "Nehanda of Zimbabwe", in Women Leaders in African History, (London, 1984)

Visual Hour 7: "Flame"

Web resource: http://www.zimmedia.com/flame/

Chimurenga II and after

T. O. Ranger, "The Death of Chaminuka: Spirit Mediums, Nationalism and the Guerilla War in Zimbabwe", African Affairs, vol. 81 (1982) 349-369

"Meggi Zingani", in I. Staunton, ed., Mothers of the Revolution: the War Experiences of Thirty Zimbabwean Women, (Bloomington, 1990)

Lan, "Great Spectacle" (review)

Review introductory material on the liberation war

Economy and Crafts, Caste, and Servility in Western Sudan and the Manden

P. McNaughton, The Mande Blacksmiths, (Bloomington, 1993), 1-21, *40-7

M. Diawara, "Women, servitude and history: the oral historical traditions in the kingdom of Jaara (Mali) from the 15^th to the mid-19^th century", in Barber and Farias, eds., Discourse and its Disguises, (Birmingham, 1989)

M. Johnson, "The Economic Foundations of an Islamic Theocracy—the Case of Masina", JAH 17, 4 (1976), 481-3, 488-491

Visual hour 8: "Keita"

The Epic of Son-Jara (Sundiata) - from Parentage to Manhood

Al-Bakri, "Ghana", in Levtzion and Hopkins, eds., Corpus of Early Arabic Sources for West African History, (New York, 1981)

Ibn Battuta, "Mali", in Robert Collins, ed., Western African History, 22-23

J.W. Johnson and F.-D. Sisoko, The Epic of Son-Jara: A West African Tradition, (Bloomington, 1989) [Buy at Columbia Bookstore]

Visual hour 9: Guest lecturer

Son-Jara's Ascent to Power and his Successor Mansa Musa

Continue reading Johnson and Sisoko

P.F. de Moraes Farias, "The Oral Traditionist as Critic and Intellectual Producer: an Example from Contemporary Mali", in T. Falola, ed., African Historiographies, (London, 1993)

Al-Kati, "The Pilgrimage of Kankan Musa (1324-25)", from Tarikh al-Fattash, in Bernard Lewis, ed., Islam, vol. 2 (Oxford 1987)

Timbuktu and Islam

Al-Sadi, Ta'rikh al-Sudan, J. O. Hunwick, transl. and ed., (Leiden, 1999), excerpts

E. Saad, A Social History of Timbuctu, (Cambridge, 1983), 22-41, 81-93

Theocracies and the non-Muslim states: The Case of Masina

M. Johnson, "The Economic Foundations" (review)

B. Diarrah-Sanankoua, "A Controversial chapter in the history of Masina: the duel between Amadu Aamadu and Alhaji Umar Tal", transl. from Sources de l'Histoire d'Afrique, (Paris, 1989)

J.-L. Bourgeois, "Stealing and Restoring Glory: Histories of the Great Mosques of Djenne" in J.L. Bourgeois and C. Pelos, eds., Spectacular Vernacular, (New York, 1989)

Visual hour 10: Illustrated lecture on neo-Sudanic architecture

African Brokers in Senegambia

T. Bluett, Some Memoirs of the Life of Job, the Son of Solomon, the High Priest of Boonda in Africa, (London, 1734), excerpts

A. Bathily, "Job ben Salomon" in Les Africains, vol. 6, (Paris, 1977), 193-227

G. Brooks, "The Signares of Senegal", in N. Hafkin and E. Bay, eds., Women in Africa, (Stanford, 1976)

The Discovery of the Dogon: Idealizing Pre-colonial Africa

M. Griaule, Conversations with Ogotemmeli, (London, 1970), Introduction by G. Dieterlen, and  16-23, 84-90

W. Van Beek, "Sculpture and Dogon Religion", African Arts, 21, 4 (1988), 58-65

R. Hoffman, "Seduction, Surrender, and Portable Paradise: Dogon Art in Modern Mali" in P. Nooter, ed., Secrecy: African Art that Conceals and Reveals, (New York, 1993)

Visual hour 11: Trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Chinua Achebe on Nigeria and the Igbo

C. Achebe, Things Fall Apart, (New York, 1959)

---, "The Role of the Writer in a new Nation" (1964) in G.D. Killam, ed., African Writers on African Writing, (Evanston, 1975)

---, "Igbo World and its Arts" in H.M. Cole and C.C. Aniako, eds., Igbo Arts: Community and Cosmos, (Los Angeles, 1985)

Ousmane Sembene

O. Sembene, God's Bits of Wood, London, 1970, 91-108, 184-202, *1-12, *227-245

S. Niang, "An Interview with Ousmane Sembene, Toronto, 1992", in Ousmane Sembene: Dialogues with Critics and Writers, Samba Gadjigo, et.al., eds., Contributions in Black Studies, no. 11, 1992-1993

Visual Hour 12: "Guelwaar" Film by Ousmane Sembene

Ama Ata Aidoo

A. A. Aidoo, Changes: A Love Story, (New York, 1993), [buy book].