Sociology of Africa: February 2018

Tuesday, February 27, 2018

Patrice Lumumba: the most important assassination of the 20th century

The US-sponsored plot to kill Patrice Lumumba, the hero of Congolese independence, took place 50 years ago today

Georges Nzongola-Ntalaja

The Guardian – Mon 17 Jan 2011

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/jan/17/patrice-lumumba-50th-anniversary-assassination

Patrice Lumumba, the first legally elected prime minister of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), was assassinated 50 years ago today, on 17 January, 1961. This heinous crime was a culmination of two inter-related assassination plots by American and Belgian governments, which used Congolese accomplices and a Belgian execution squad to carry out the deed.
Ludo De Witte, the Belgian author of the best book on this crime, qualifies it as "the most important assassination of the 20th century". The assassination's historical importance lies in a multitude of factors, the most pertinent being the global context in which it took place, its impact on Congolese politics since then and Lumumba's overall legacy as a nationalist leader.
For 126 years, the US and Belgium have played key roles in shaping Congo's destiny. In April 1884, seven months before the Berlin Congress, the US became the first country in the world to recognise the claims of King Leopold II of the Belgians to the territories of the Congo Basin.

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Monday, February 26, 2018

Garvey's Ghost By Geoffrey Philp

Garvey's Ghost

By Geoffrey Philp

https://www.bookfusion.com/books/116198-garvey-s-ghost

When Kathryn Bailey's teenaged daughter disappears from their home in Miami, the single Jamaican woman pursues every possible angle to find her. Kathryn's search leads her to a meeting with Jasmine's college professor, Jacob Virgo, a devout Garveyite and Rastafarian. Although their initial encounter is unpleasant, they must join forces to find Jasmine before it is too late. Through the teachings of Marcus Garvey, they learn to break down subtle barriers and find an unexpected bridge to new understandings and love.

Recommended Books on Africa, Africana and Black Studies

Delores P. Aldridge and Carlene Young. Out of the Revolution: The Development of Africana Studies. Lanham, MD: Lexington, 2003. ISBN 0-7391-0547-7.
Maulana Karenga. Introduction to Black Studies. University of Sankore Press, 2010.
Peter Gran. Beyond Eurocentrism: A new view of modern world history. Syracuse University Press, 1996.
Michael George Hanchard. Black Transnationalism, Africana Studies, and the 21st Century. Journal of Black Studies, Nov 2004; vol. 35: pp. 139 - 153.
James L. Conyers. The Evolution Of Africology: An Afrocentric Appraisal. Journal of Black Studies, May 2004; vol. 34: pp. 640 - 652.
Mark Christian. Black Studies in the 21st Century: Longevity Has Its Place. Journal of Black Studies, May 2006; vol. 36: pp. 698 - 719.
Molefi Kete Asante. A Discourse on Black Studies: Liberating the Study of African People in the Western Academy. Journal of Black Studies, May 2006; vol. 36: pp. 646 - 662.
A. Adu Boahen. African Perspectives on Colonialism. John Hopkins University Press 1989.
David Birmingham. Decolonization Of Africa. Routledge 1995.
Frederick Cooper. Africa since 1940: The Past of the Present. Cambridge University Press, 2002.
Terry Kershaw. Toward a Black Studies Paradigm: An Assessment and Some Directions. Journal of Black Studies, Jun 1992; vol. 22: pp. 477 - 493.
Mervat Hatem. Africa on My Mind. International Journal of Middle East Studies. (41) 2009.
Carolyn Somerville. The “African” in Africana/Black/African and African American Studies. International Journal of Middle East Studies. (41) 2009.
Terence Walz. The Fruit of the Africanist Contribution. International Journal of Middle East Studies. (41) 2009.
John O. Voll. Reconceptualizing of the “Regions” in “Area Studies”. International Journal of Middle East Studies. (41) 2009.
Appiah, Kwame Anthony. 1992. “The Invention of Africa.” Pp. 3-27. In My Father’s House: Africa in the Philosophy of Culture. New York: Oxford University Press.
Bonilla-Silva, Eduardo. 2003. Racism Without Racists: Color-Blind Racism And the Persistence of Racial Inequality in the United States. New York: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers.
Comaroff, Jean and John. 1991. “Africa Observed: Discourses of the Imperial Imagination.” Pp. 86-125, Of Revelation and Revolution: Christianity, Colonialism, and Consciousness in South Africa. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. X
Grant-Thomas, Andrew and john a. Powell. 2009. “Structural Racism and Color Lines in the United States. Pp. 118-144 in Twenty-First Century Color Lines: Multiracial Change in Contemporary America. Edited by Andrew Grant-Thomas and Gary Orfield. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. X
Mazrui, Ali. 2005. The Re-invention of Africa: Edward Said, V. Y. Mudimbe, and Beyond. Research in African Literatures 36 (3): 68-82.
Hochschild, Adam. King Leopold’s Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin, 1998.
Achebe, Chinua. A Man of the People. New York: Anchor, 1967, 1989.
Maier, Karl. Into the House of Ancestors: Inside the New Africa. New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1998.
Peterson, Scott. Me Against My Brother: At War in Somalia, Sudan, and Rwanda. New York: Routledge, 2000.

Tugrul Keskin - Assistant Professor of International and Middle Eastern Studies

Tugrul Keskin is an Assistant Professor of International and Middle Eastern Studies and an affiliated faculty of Black Studies, Sociology and the Center For Turkish Studies at Portland State University. He is also the Middle East Studies Coordinator (INTL). His research and teaching interests include Sociology of Islam and the Middle East, Social and Political Theory, Post-Colonial Theory, Islamic Movements, Development and Urbanization in the Middle East, Sociology of Africa, and Modern Kurdish, Uyghur and Turkish Nationalism. Previously, Dr. Keskin taught as an instructor of Sociology and Africana Studies at Virginia Tech University and has also taught as a Visiting Assistant Professor of Sociology at James Madison University and Radford University. He received his PhD in Sociology from Virginia Tech, with certificate degrees in Africana Studies, Social and Political Thought, and International Research and Development. He is the founder and moderator of the Sociology of Islam mailing list, and editor of the Sociology of Islam and Muslim Societies Newsletter: http://www.pdx.edu/sociologyofislam. Dr. Keskin has recently had his edited book, The Sociology of Islam: Secularism Economy and Politics published by Garnet/Ithaca Press, 2011. Tugrul Keskin is a board member of Sociologists Without Borders and serves as a book review editor of Societies Without Borders http://societieswithoutborders.org/.