Refine
Year of publication
Document Type
- Article (15465)
- Part of Periodical (2723)
- Working Paper (2347)
- Doctoral Thesis (2040)
- Preprint (1798)
- Book (1737)
- Part of a Book (1068)
- Conference Proceeding (745)
- Report (471)
- Review (165)
Language
- English (28718) (remove)
Has Fulltext
- yes (28718) (remove)
Keywords
- taxonomy (726)
- new species (434)
- morphology (171)
- Deutschland (142)
- Syntax (125)
- Englisch (120)
- distribution (113)
- Deutsch (98)
- biodiversity (97)
- inflammation (95)
Institute
- Medizin (5280)
- Physik (3517)
- Wirtschaftswissenschaften (1893)
- Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) (1579)
- Biowissenschaften (1530)
- Center for Financial Studies (CFS) (1482)
- Informatik (1382)
- Biochemie und Chemie (1083)
- Sustainable Architecture for Finance in Europe (SAFE) (1061)
- House of Finance (HoF) (704)
Son of a Red Devil
(2012)
This is the story of Lukemba Gelindo. He was adopted by a former football player, August Hellemans - also called Gustaf - of the national Belgian team - The Red Devils. Gelindo and his brother were adopted after they were abandoned in a nursery home where they had been mistreated. He grew up in a Flemish village where people had never seen a black person. In general, Flemings are still surprised when they hear blacks speaking their language fluently. This can lead to perplexing and frustrating encounters with ignorance and arrogance, such as during a job interview where Gelindo had to justify himself over and over again as to where he learned to speak the Flemish language. This is also the story of the differences in mentality between the Flemings and Walloons viewed from a black perspective through the eyes of someone who is intimately familiar with both cultures. Gelindo's parents were Flemings but he always went to French speaking schools. It is as well, a story about racism, especially racism that stems from Flemings - which is quite implacable, to say the least. Evidence of this statement is not far-fetched; black people are completely absent in the Flemish media, except perhaps as footballers or musicians, meant to entertain but not to claim rights, entitlements or any serious measure of social visibility. More personally, this story is about Gelindo's experience undergoing psychiatric treatment and also about the sexual tensions between his mother and him. Among other things, it is also Gelindo's aim to speak out against the manner in which young black children get objectified by the rich and famous as the latest 'must have' things, designer accessories up for adoption and adaptation. Like in the rest of the world, this trend is also seen in Flemish magazines in which parents pose in photos with their little black trophy children. The account is direct, honest, uncompromising, laced with cynicism, and in many ways therapeutic.
This book is largely the personal account by Patrick Mbunwe Samba, of how life in his home village of Binshua has been permeated throughout by belief in witchcraft. The book not only provides a historical account informed by his reminiscences of his childhood, it shows as well that even today, belief in witchcraft is very widespread. Witchcraft exerts a profound influence on society in Binshua and in Cameroon in general. The book also provides accounts of the experiences of others, some of them very recent, and gives examples of what injustices and suffering can be caused by the notion that any misfortune must have been caused by witchcraft. For the overwhelming majority of people in village communities such as Binshua, Samba argues, anything not immediately understandable is witchcraft - which is synonymous with mystery. Many educated Africans, too, revert to such traditional attitudes in stressful situations. It may be thought surprising that in spite of the impact of Christianity, Western culture and the improved level of education, the majority of people still believe in witchcraft, and that this phenomenon not only persists but is actually increasing. The book perplexes and challenges by avoiding to provide simple answers to the question whether which witchcraft is real or imagined.
It is in Mauritius that the first newspaper of the African continent was published. Annonces, Affiches et Avis Divers was created in 1773 by the French administration for the islands of Mauritius and Reunion. Since its independence from Britain in 1968, Mauritius has known a very rich media history with an impressive number of publications and a relatively good level of press freedom. However, many challenges remain. Confrontational episodes in the relationship of the local media with the political sphere, the rise of sensationalist journalism, increased concentration of ownership in the industry as well as market uncertainties have taken their toll on a profession which often prides itself in the defence of freedom of speech and democracy. The media conference jointly organised by UNESCO and the University of Mauritius in 2010 offered a singular opportunity - the first time ever in Mauritius - for media practitioners, regulators, lawyers, politicians, academics and civil society to discuss the state of the media as part of the country's democratic systems. Media roles and functions, the legal and regulatory framework, self-regulation, market issues and new trends such as citizen journalism were thoroughly examined. This book brings together papers and conclusions from that conference. Whilst much ground has been covered especially since the emergence of private radio stations, much still needs to be done to move towards a true media democracy. The book points to media governance, access to information, training of and professionalism among media practitioners as areas of unfinished business. This is an invaluable contribution to on-going debates about press regulation, liberalisation of electronic media, new forms of journalism, continuous training and professionalization in Mauritius.
The bicultural polity of Cameroon has become problematic over the years. In addition to the increasing marginalization experienced by its English speaking component in many domains (politics, administration, economy, culture), it is facing mounting inequality and disarray despite the nation-building aspirations at reunification in 1961. This book examines the very basis of the union crisis by tracing the causes to the asymmetrical nature of negotiations between the contracting partners the founding fathers of the union and the politics of guile and force that has characterized the regimes in Yaound. From a federal model that takes the equality of the contracting parties as a given, the polity has developed into an ethno-regional patchwork designed by its architects to be essentially unequal in nature. Consequently, the segmented Anglophone community can exist only in contradiction within itself. They have been worked into the regimeís statecraft of consciously maintaining or re-activating ethnic boundaries inherited from colonialism. An analysis of the cultural and linguistic dimension of the union shows contrasting drives between the assimilation/attempts to dominate by the French-speaking component and resistance by Anglophones. The analyses further show the projected harmonization and rollback by the State, the creative blends and the crystallization around continuing or reproduced colonial experiences, a fierce competition between elites with a drive to impose the culture of the demographically dominant and a refusal to accept the idea of a linguistic minority. The contentious experience, Yenshu Vubo argues, can still be remedied by reforms in a politics of possibilities.These reforms must be ready to re-examine the constitutional basis of the union by revisiting the often dismissed question of the form of the state defined as one and indivisible (a new federal architecture as requested by several political voices). Institutions should be restructured to attend to diversity issues and essential linguistic differences while consolidating any strategic gains of the union such as the creative blends and the acceptance of specifi cities of each community, statutory equality of citizenship and the essential clauses of the fi rst federation.
Blessing
(2011)
Fatti Ashi died. Startling her family and community, she comes back to life just a few hours after dying. Blessing chronicles the life of this Fatti Ashi, a young village girl who from the moment she rejoins the land of the living is faced with both obstacles and opportunities consistent with an attempted mergence of two worlds. From a child who is molded with her father's advice to merge ancestral skull worship and Christianity to an underprivileged teenager who falls in love with the alphabet and finally becoming a woman who desires emotional and financial independence, Fatti Ashi's life yields misunderstandings and isolation. As a child in the village, her life is a battleground for family rivalry and religious conflict. As a teenage wife in the city, she befriends a sex worker who encourages her to bring meaning into her life rather than simply living to the dictates of others. She takes up the challenge by embarking on adult education and becoming a breadwinner but is taken aback when her husband requests a divorce. In a search for solutions to save her marriage, she entertains traditional religion, Catholicism and Pentecostalism. Disappointment and desperation lead her to take a deeper look at the situation. Is she to stay married simply for convenience? Is she to continue following religious paths laid out by others, clearly not as beneficial to her? Is she to please society to her detriment? The long journey of self-discovery takes her through scandal and humiliation but in the end, she emerges as a confident, admired and happy woman.
This book brings together six seminal essays by Professor Bernard Nsokika Fonlon, essays first published mostly in the 1960s in ABBIA (Cameroon Cultural Review) and in the pages of leading newspapers in Cameroon. Preoccupied with the cultural dignity, humanity and freedom of Africa and Africans, Fonlon never contented himself with stating the problem. In a very Socratic and scientifically systematic approach, he proposed solutions as well. Patiently pedagogical, philosophical and steeped in the classics he convinced his readers through the force of argument. In 'The Task of Today;' Fonlon invites Cameroonians and Africans to face the challenge of nation-building and development in a world where imperialism is far from dead and buried. 'Random Leaves from My Diary' shares his aspirations and challenging experiences as a young seminarian learning to be relevant to God and the Catholic Church. In 'Will We Make or Mar' Fonlon is worried, and indeed frustrated, by the temptations of material pursuits and the love of money threatening to derail modern elites charged with the postcolonial destiny of African nations. As a member of the Cameroon National Union, in 'Under the Sign of the Rising Sun, ' Fonlon preaches patriotism and compromise. In 'Idea of Literature, ' Fonlon expresses his passion for art as the pursuit of beauty and the sublime, stressing, as he was wont to do, that no race or culture has a monopoly of this aspiration. 'A Case for Early Bilingualism' invites Cameroonians to take advantage of their English and French linguistic colonial heritage, by embracing bilingualism in early childhood and playing a major role in an interconnected world where interpretation and translation is eternally needed.
Death of Hardship
(2012)
Death of Hardship kaleidoscopically unveils human intrigues, predicaments and woes. It brings into sharp focus the most dreaded products of cruel oppression, exploitation, and destruction - the worst forms of human degradation and sufferings. However, it also sheds beams of hope, celebrating optimism in the struggle and eventually opening the curtain to the stage of victory of the oppressed and impoverished under the shameless sky.
So the Path Does Not Die
(2012)
Protagonist Finas search for happiness and belonging begins on the night of her aborted circumcision and continues through her teenage years in Freetown, Sierra Leones capital; her twenties in the Washington Metropolitan Area; and ends with her return to Sierra Leone to work as an advocate for war-traumatized children. The novel explores the problems she encounters in each setting against the backdrop of the tensions, ambiguities, and fragmentation of the stranger/immigrant condition and the characters struggles to clarify their ideas about home and abroad. Finas circumcision gets significant, though not sensational, play in the different attitudes toward the practice between her and her fiancé Cammy, a Trinidadian urologist. The differences complicate their relationship at a time when skeletons from their pasts threaten their impending marriage. The stories of Finas friend, African-American Aman and her fiancé, Nigerian Bayo; of Edna (Finas foster sister) and her husband Kizzy; and of Mawaf, a war-traumatized teen, unfold in subplots that merge with the main plot and overarching theme of belonging as characters straddle home and abroad places.
This book brings and blends together a dozen scholarly articles published by the author since the 1970s. It sketches two different yet related stories: first, that of one of the most ancient and prestigious African civilizations, the antiquity and sophistication of which are becoming more and more prominent as field research unfolds their many facets. Second, the story of the researcher himself, who has had to alter and shift his approach to that civilization as he got to meet Grassfielders, colleagues, friends and scholars who changed his views about the Grassfields kingdoms and their people. This book bears witness to those many encounters. Historical and anthropological research is not only a question of relevant theories and methodologies. It is also a human endeavour made of networks and friendships.
The subject of revolutionary overthrow of constitutional orders in Africa is at the intersection of three disciplines: jurisprudence and legal philosophy, constitutional law and power politics, and civil-military relations, that is, military security policy which is one aspect of national security policy. The subject is of interest in at least four ways. It problematizes the inescapable question of governance in the African continent. It challenges the democratization agenda in Africa - how does one democratize not only political governance but also the instruments of violence in the state? It also challenges African constitutional lawyers and policy makers to seek a constitutional model that addresses the enduring menace of the power of the gun in African affairs and the changing role of the military in African politics. Finally, it underscores concerns about sovereignty and national security. This book contributes to a fuller understanding of the coup syndrome in African. To this end, it vigorously interrogates the place of coups in the governance of Africa, and explores the relevance of Kelsen's theory of revolutionary legality in the context of coup d'états in Africa. It is a major contribution by a leading thinker in the field.