Refine
Year of publication
- 2015 (333) (remove)
Document Type
- Book (333) (remove)
Language
- German (171)
- English (145)
- French (9)
- Multiple languages (4)
- Italian (1)
- mis (1)
- Portuguese (1)
- Spanish (1)
Has Fulltext
- yes (333)
Is part of the Bibliography
- no (333) (remove)
Keywords
- Biografie (4)
- Deutsch (3)
- Germanistik (3)
- Kongress (3)
- Tschechische Republik (3)
- Übersetzer (3)
- Eich, Günter (2)
- Adorno, Theodor W. (1)
- Afrika (1)
- Arañas (1)
Institute
Mit Hilfe der Sprache verstehen wir einander, kommunizieren wir mit den Menschen um uns herum, denken wir über Dinge und Vorgänge nach; die Sprache hilft uns die Welt und die Menschen um uns zu erfassen. Die Sprachen, die sich gleichzeitig mit den menschlichen Gemeinschaften entwickeln, eignen wir uns nicht nur an und benutzen sie, sondern wir erforschen sie auch. Die Erforschung der Sprachen hat auf allgemeiner Ebene weltweit eine sehr lange Tradition. Auf ihre Entwicklung haben einen bedeutenden Einfluss nicht nur die „traditionellen“ Wissenschaftsdisziplinen wie zum Beispiel die Linguistik, die Literaturwissenschaft, die Pädagogik oder die Geschichtswissenschaften, sondern auch sich stetig etablierende neuere Wissenschaften, zu denen etwa die Soziolinguistik, die Psycholinguistik, die Kontakt- oder Areallinguistik oder die Fremdsprachendidaktik gehören. Wie zum Teil bereits durch einige soeben genannte wissenschaftliche Disziplinen angedeutet, wird die Erforschung der Sprachen durch die gesellschaftspolitische Entwicklung eines konkreten soziokulturellen und regional eingeschränkten Umfelds während einer bestimmten zeitlich begrenzten Epoche beeinflusst. Eine der wichtigsten Herausforderungen für die heutige Gesellschaft ist neben der Entwicklung einer funktionellen Mehrsprachigkeit des Einzelnen auch die Respektierung sprachlicher wie kultureller Vielfalt, die Wahrnehmung der Sprache als identitätsbestimmendes und identitätsentwickelndes Phänomen sowie als wichtiger Bestandteil unseres gemeinsamen kulturellen Erbes.
In diesem Verständnis wurde die Konferenz Deutsch ohne Grenzen zum Anlass für eine internationale wissenschaftliche Diskussion über die aktuelle Entwicklung im Bereich der multidimensional und transnational aufgefassten germanistischen Linguistik und Literaturwissenschaft, ausgewählter Gesellschaftswissenschaften sowie der Didaktik im Fach Deutsch als Fremdsprache im europäischen Kontext.
Der vierteilige Sammelband beinhaltet den Großteil der im Verlauf dieser Konferenz präsentierten theoretischen und empirischen Beiträge, die im September 2014 an der Pädagogischen und an der Philosophischen Fakultät der Südböhmischen Universität in České Budějovice stattgefunden hat. Ihr Hauptorganisator war der Germanistenverband der Tschechischen Republik. An der Konferenz nahmen 142 Fachleute aus elf Ländern teil. [...]
Der vorliegende Teil des Sammelbandes stellt die linguistische Sektion dar, in der das Phänomen Grenze als eines der Zentralthemen der gegenwärtigen linguistischen Forschung thematisiert wurde. Die einzelnen Beiträge konzentrierten sich auf die Frage, ob die Sprache als Kommunikationsmittel wirklich ohne Grenzen ist. Hinsichtlich der Komplexität der natürlichen Sprachen ist die Frage völlig berechtigt, ob gewisse Grenzen wirklich bestimmt werden können, sollen oder sogar müssen, wenn diese komplexen symbolischen Systeme verstanden bzw. auf metasprachlicher Ebene beschrieben werden sollen. Dank der Vertretung von Vortragenden aus mehreren Ländern konnte die Problematik im Kontext der tschechischen wie auch der internationalen germanistischen Forschung untersucht werden. Außer anderem kann auch diese Grenzüberschreitung und die damit verbundene Konfrontation von diversen Perspektiven der Erforschung des Gegenwartsdeutschen für einen bedeutenden Beitrag dieser Konferenz gehalten werden. Dem Wort Grenze wird auch der gesamte erste Aufsatz dieses Sammelbandes gewidmet, in dem dieses Wort vom lexikalischen und stilistischen Gesichtspunkt aus sehr ausführlich untersucht wird.
Die einzelnen Studien spiegeln die aktuelle empirische und theoretische Erforschung der deutschen Sprache wider, wobei sie diverse Schwerpunkte akzentuieren. In den ersten Beiträgen steht die Diachronik im Fokus. Sie widmen sich unter anderem der Beschreibung von mittelalterlichen medizinischen Texten, den sog. Zaubersprüchen, Segen und Beschwörungen, und ihrer sprachlichen Charakterisierung, der historischen Semantik und Möglichkeiten deren Erforschung am Beispiel von historiographischen Texten, der frühen Kodifizierung der deutschen Zeichensetzung, der Problematik der geschriebenen Sprache in der Zeit des Humanismus an der böhmisch-sächsischen Grenze, der Distribution und Funktion von Phraseologismen in journalistischen Texten der 2. Hälfte des 19. Jahrhunderts, den deutschen Dialekten in Mähren und der Rolle der Sprache, die sie als Kommunikationsmittel einer bestimmten Nation hinsichtlich der historischen Soziolinguistik erfüllt.
Die Zahl der Verfahren und der Sterilisationen nach dem Gesetz zur Verhütung erbkranken Nachwuchses
(2015)
In dem Buch wird die Zahl der Verfahren nach dem Gesetz zur Verhütung erbkranken Nachwuchses von 1934 bis 1945 (nach Hochrechnung) im "Altreich" auf ca. 436.000 geschätzt. Durchgeführt wurden laut Schätzung im "Altreich" ca. 294.000 Sterilisationen. Dazu kommen noch ca. 10.000 bis 20.000 Sterilisationen in den "angeschlossenen" oder annektierten Gebieten bis 1945.
Adorno und die Kabbala
(2015)
Im neunten Band der Reihe geht Ansgar Martins kabbalistischen Spuren in der Philosophie Theodor W. Adornos (1903–1969) nach. Der Frankfurter Gesellschaftskritiker griff im Rahmen seines radikalen materialistischen Projekts gleichwohl auch auf "theologische" Deutungsfiguren zurück. Vermittelt durch den gemeinsamen Freund Walter Benjamin (1892–1940) stieß Adorno dabei auf das Werk des Kabbala-Forschers Gershom Scholem (1897–1982). Zwischen Frankfurt und Jerusalem entwickelte sich eine lebenslange Korrespondenz.
Für Adorno erscheint vor dem Hintergrund lückenloser kapitalistischer Vergesellschaftung jede religiöse Sinngebung in der Moderne als unmöglich. Der Tradition der jüdischen Mystik schreibt er hingegen eine innere Affinität zu dieser hoffnungslosen Logik des "Verfalls" zu. Sie scheint ihm zur unumgänglichen Säkularisierung religiöser Gehalte aufzufordern. Adornos kabbalistische Marginalien beziehen einen breiten Horizont jüdisch-messianischer Ideen ein. Er verleugnet dabei nie, dass es ihm um eine sehr diesseite Verwirklichung geoffenbarter Heilsversprechen zu tun ist: Transzendenz sei als erfüllte Immanenz, als verwirklichte Utopie zu denken. In diesem Anliegen sieht Adorno selbst jedoch gerade seine Übereinstimmung mit der Kabbala.
Adornos kabbalistische Motive, die auf Scholems Forschungen zurückgehen, werden hier ausführlich an seinen Schriften und Vorlesungen untersucht. In seinem Verständnis der philosophischen Tradition sowie im Modell der Metaphysischen Erfahrung suchte er etwa explizit Anschluss an Deutungen der Kabbala: Das unerreichbare Urbild der Philosophie sei die Interpretation der geoffenbarten Schrift. Wie säkularisierte heilige Texte wurden Werke von Beethoven, Goethe, Kafka oder Schönberg so zum Anlass für "mystische" Interpretationen. Deren detaillierte Untersuchung erlaubt, das viel beschworene jüdische Erbe von Adornos Philosophie zu konkretisieren und bedenkenswerte Einzelheiten von der Negativen Dialektik zur Ästhetik in den Blick zu nehmen.
Nyuma Ya Pazia
(2015)
Nyuma Ya Pazia or Behind the Curtain is about corruption involving the president, and his ministers who rob the country of Mafuriko or Abracadabra. President in conjunction with his Premier brought fake foreign insecticide company; Richmen to invest in power generation in Mafuriko. Through logrolling Richmen lands a very lucrative tender used as a conduit of stealing millions from the Central Bank. Richmen is used to syphon billions of dollars from the treasury. When people get wind of this theft, force the government to crumble thereby rulers are punished by being jailed or other being sentenced to death. The book satirizes African kleptocratic regimes.
El libro pretende brindar un recorrido inicial a través de la fauna de arañas de la Argentina. Está organizado en veintiún capítulos. En el primero de ellos se presentan características generales de las arañas. Cada uno de los capítulos siguientes corresponde a una familia distinta. Se exponen aspectos morfológicos, fisiológicos y etológicos, entre otros. Las arañas de interés sanitario presentes en el país se encuentran incluidas. El libro cuenta con más de 120 fotografías, todas fueron realizadas por el autor, y hasta ahora no habían sido publicadas. La obra está dirigida a todos los que se interesan por el mundo de las arañas, en particular a estudiantes y profesionales de ciencias biológicas, médicas y afines.
Writing the history of archaeology has become increasingly diverse in recent years due to developments in the historiography of the sciences and the humanities. A move away from hagiography and presentations of scientific processes as an inevitable progression has been requested in this context. Historians of archaeology have begun to utilize approved and new historiographical concepts to trace how archaeological knowledge has been acquired as well as to reflect on the historical conditions and contexts in which knowledge has been generated. This volume seeks to contribute to this trend. By linking theories and models with case studies from the nineteenth and twentieth century, the authors illuminate implications of communication on archaeological knowledge and scrutinize routines of early archaeological practices. The usefulness of different approaches such as narratological concepts or the concepts of habitus is thus considered.
Mit Hilfe der Sprache verstehen wir einander, kommunizieren wir mit den Menschen um uns herum, denken wir über Dinge und Vorgänge nach; die Sprache hilft uns die Welt und die Menschen um uns zu erfassen. Die Sprachen, die sich gleichzeitig mit den menschlichen Gemeinschaften entwickeln, eignen wir uns nicht nur an und benutzen sie, sondern wir erforschen sie auch. Die Erforschung der Sprachen hat auf allgemeiner Ebene weltweit eine sehr lange Tradition. Auf ihre Entwicklung haben einen bedeutenden Einfluss nicht nur die „traditionellen“ Wissenschaftsdisziplinen wie zum Beispiel die Linguistik, die Literaturwissenschaft, die Pädagogik oder die Geschichtswissenschaften, sondern auch sich stetig etablierende neuere Wissenschaften, zu denen etwa die Soziolinguistik, die Psycholinguistik, die Kontakt- oder Areallinguistik oder die Fremdsprachendidaktik gehören. Wie zum Teil bereits durch einige soeben genannte wissenschaftliche Disziplinen angedeutet, wird die Erforschung der Sprachen durch die gesellschaftspolitische Entwicklung eines konkreten soziokulturellen und regional eingeschränkten Umfelds während einer bestimmten zeitlich begrenzten Epoche beeinflusst. Eine der wichtigsten Herausforderungen für die heutige Gesellschaft ist neben der Entwicklung einer funktionellen Mehrsprachigkeit des Einzelnen auch die Respektierung sprachlicher wie kultureller Vielfalt, die Wahrnehmung der Sprache als identitätsbestimmendes und identitätsentwickelndes Phänomen sowie als wichtiger Bestandteil unseres gemeinsamen kulturellen Erbes.
In diesem Verständnis wurde die Konferenz Deutsch ohne Grenzen zum Anlass für eine internationale wissenschaftliche Diskussion über die aktuelle Entwicklung im Bereich der multidimensional und transnational aufgefassten germanistischen Linguistik und Literaturwissenschaft, ausgewählter Gesellschaftswissenschaften sowie der Didaktik im Fach Deutsch als Fremdsprache im europäischen Kontext.
Der vierteilige Sammelband beinhaltet den Großteil der im Verlauf dieser Konferenz präsentierten theoretischen und empirischen Beiträge, die im September 2014 an der Pädagogischen und an der Philosophischen Fakultät der Südböhmischen Universität in České Budějovice stattgefunden hat. Ihr Hauptorganisator war der Germanistenverband der Tschechischen Republik. An der Konferenz nahmen 142 Fachleute aus elf Ländern teil. [...]
Der vorliegende Teil des Konferenzbandes enthält Beiträge aus der Sektion Didaktik Deutsch als Fremdsprache. Diese Beiträge harmonisieren mit der aktuellen Entwicklung im Bereich des Fremdsprachenunterrichts, der durch eine Reihe von Faktoren beeinflusst wird, u. a. durch die neuesten Befunde der Wissenschaften, die sich mit der Erforschung der Lernprozesse und des Sprachenunterrichts befassen, ebenso wie durch politische, sprachpolitische oder wirtschaftliche Faktoren. In Europa gewinnen die Fremdsprachenkenntnisse in den letzten Jahrzehnten zunehmend an Bedeutung. Das hat zur Folge, dass neue Sichtweisen auf den Fremdsprachenunterricht und dessen Erforschung gesucht werden und sich etablieren.
Die einzelnen Studien reflektieren den aktuellen Stand der theoretischen und der empirischen Forschung auf dem Gebiet der Fremdsprachendidaktik in ihrem breiten Forschungsspektrum sowie die Implikationen von deren Ergebnissen für den Fremdsprachenunterricht. Sie fokussieren nicht nur auf Lern- und Lehrprozesse bei Fremdsprachen auf allgemeiner Ebene, sondern akzentuieren im Hinblick auf den Konferenzschwerpunkt auch Fragen des Deutschunterrichts. Deutsch wird in letzter Zeit im gesamteuropäischen Kontext zu einer typischen zweiten Fremdsprache (L3) auf Primar- wie Sekundarstufe. Der Band enthält aber auch Studien, die hemen wie Deutschunterricht für Vorschulkinder oder aber für tschechische Germanistik- oder DaF-Studierende bearbeiten. Des Weiteren werden hier Studien zu folgenden hemen präsentiert: früher Fremdsprachenunterricht, Mehrsprachigkeit, Professionalisierung der FremdsprachenlehrerInnen, Entwicklung von sprachlichen Fertigkeiten, Aussprache und Grammatik im Deutschunterricht, Motivation, Analyse von Fremdsprachenlehrwerken, (inter)kulturelle Aspekte des Deutschunterrichts, literarische Texte und bildende Kunst im Deutschunterricht, Arbeit mit Fehlern und kontrastive Linguistik.
Eastern Dan-French dictionary, preceded by a grammar sketch, is the first and only dictionary of this language spoken in Western Côte d'Ivoire by half a million people. Both in dictionary and in the grammar sketch, lexical and grammatical tones are marked throughout. Polysemy and idiomatics are broadly represented, dictionary entries include abundant illustrative examples reflecting the cultural specifics of Dan. The dictionary has a French-Dan index. The publication is oriented both to Dan languages learners and professional linguists; it can be also used by the native speakers of Dan.
Western Dan-French dictionary is the first and only dictionary of this language spoken in Western Côte d'Ivoire by half a million people. In the Dictionary, lexical and grammatical tones are marked throughout. Polysemy and idiomatics are broadly represented, dictionary entries include abundant illustrative examples reflecting the cultural specifics of Dan. The dictionary has a French-Dan index. The publication is oriented both to Dan languages learners and professional linguists; it can be also used by the native speakers of Dan.
Indigenous knowledge is the dynamic information base of a society, facilitating communication and decision-making. It is the cornerstone of many modern-day innovations in science and technology. It is also a ready and valuable resource for sustainable and resilient livelihoods, and attracts increasing public interest due to its applications in bio-technology, health, bioprospecting, pharmaceuticals, agriculture, food preparation, mathematics and astronomy. INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE OF NAMIBIA is a fascinating compendium aimed at a wide readership of academics and students, government officials, policy makers, and development partners. The 17 chapters examine the indigenous knowledge of medicinal plants for treating HIV/AIDS, malaria, cancer, and other microbial infections of humans and livestock; indigenous foods; coping and response strategies in dealing with human-wildlife conflicts, floods, gender, climate change and the management of natural resources. A new rationalisation of adolescent customary and initiation ceremonies is recommended in response to the HIV/AIDS pandemic; and a case study of the San people of Namibia speaks to the challenges of harmonising modern education with that of indigenous people.
Re-Viewing Resistance in Namibian History brings together the work of experienced academics and a new wave of young Namibian historians - architects of the past - who are working on a range of public history and heritage projects, from late nineteenth century resistance to the use of songs, from the role of gender in SWAPO's camps to memorialisation, and from international solidarity to aspects of the history of Kavango and Caprivi. In a culturally and politically diverse democracy such as Namibia, there are bound to be different perspectives on the past, and history will be as plural as the history-tellers. The chapters in this book reflect this diversity, and combine to create a remarkable collection of divergent voices, providing alternative perspectives on the past. Re-Viewing Resistance in Namibian History writes 'forgotten' people into history; provides a reading of the past that reflects the tensions and competing identities that pervaded 'the struggle'; and deals with 'heritage that hurts'.
This edited volume is about the rekindled investment in the figure of the first president Julius K. Nyerere in contemporary Tanzania. It explores how Nyerere is remembered by Tanzanians from different levels of society, in what ways and for what purposes. Looking into what Nyerere means and stands for today, it provides insight into the media, the political arena, poetry, the education sector, or street-corner talks. The main argument of this book is that Nyerere has become a widely shared political metaphor used to debate and contest conceptions of the Tanzanian nation and Tanzanian-ness. The state-citizens relationship, the moral standards for the exercise of power, and the contours of national sentiment are under scrutiny when the figure of Nyerere is mobilized today. The contributions gathered here come from a generation of budding or renowned scholars in varied disciplines - history, anthropology and political science. Drawing upon materials collected through extensive fieldwork and archival research, they all critically engage the existing literature about Tanzania and prevailing political narratives to explore how nationhood is (re)imagined in Tanzania today through assent and contest.
This is a commemorative volume devoted to the late Professor Willfried F. Feuser, a literary icon and a comparatist of no mean repute. Though German by origin, Professor Feuser showed great concern to the Africanist agenda of self-realisation, and therefore devoted the greatest part of his productive academic life to the cultural revival and socio-economic emancipation of Africa and the Diaspora through his scholarly publications. This book contains 20 essays on a wide range of issues in literary criticism.
The Last Of The Virgins
(2015)
Evelyn Ndangeh, a pretty Cameroonian teenager brought up in a strict Christian home, vows to preserve her maidenhood until she gets married to a man she truly loves. While in Our Lady of Lourdes College Mankon, she is approached by Lesley Njapa a student of Cameroon Protestant College Bali, after a student of CCAST Bambili. Evelyn turns him down only to find later that she can't stay alone without a man who must be none other than Lesley. Evelyn begins frantic moves to entice Lesley but on meeting him it seems too late though she gets close to his heart. Tragedy strikes when Lesley is involved in a motor accident. Evelyn arrives Bamenda general hospital wailing and settles beside Lesley to console and comfort him in his agony. Anxiety builds up to a crescendo and a medical team is mobilised to save Lesley's life.
According to Fossungu, we need healthy competition for progress. Competition that is not geared toward progress is negative competition. No competition or the absence of self-help is negative competition. With factories competing healthily, consumers have a variety of quality goods and services from which to choose. The entire community benefits when people in any grouping are competing positively; thus making the rules of competition graphical. The central focus of this book is the extent to which Canadian regulations apply without discrimination to all of Canada and to everyone, individuals and corporations alike. A swift answer is affirmative. But is that really it? The book is also about voluntary slavery, which is worse than forced enslavement. Drawing on Ignorance Theory, the book argues that the worst thing that can happen to anyone is to be ignorant of one's ignorance. He who does not know what he does not know will never know. Voluntary African slaves generally employ 'One Has No Choice' (On n'a pas le choix) to cloak their having chosen not to secure their rights. Fossungu demonstrates why he considers this an escapist way of shying away from doing the normal thing, thus giving the dictator or oppressor reason to dictate and oppress with impunity. This is Fossungu at his provocative and controversial best.
One Eternal Sleep
(2015)
In this volume Bill F. Ndi portrays life, death, and dying as one great adventure through which one would explore the limitless bounds of Life. At its best, the collection echoes the words of anthropologist Francis B. Nyamnjoh when he underlines that, 'one is only dead to particular context as a way of making oneself alive to prospective new contexts.' Ndi in this collection invites the reader to learn the art of living through the art of dying and accepting death.
Issue Two of Women in Islam includes investigations of social issues, profiles of inspiring women, book and film reviews, poetry, and opinion pieces. The theme of the dossier, The Female Body: A Contested Land, focuses on womens bodies, including articles on FGM, sexual harassment, and how art can challenge repressive social norms. Another section focuses on masculinity and the ways men can support women in the struggle for equality. Other highlights include profiles of Somali singer and politician Saado Ali Warsame, an analysis of Sudans discriminatory legal system, and a portrait of a Muslim society in Sumatra where religion and matriarchal traditions coexist.
Contemporary Oral Literature Fieldwork is based on rich research experience dating back to the 1990s. The book is written against the backdrop of Africa's confusion with regard to the place of oral literature in the face of the rest of the world, where oral literature exists in conjunction with new literary forms. Wasamba argues that the oral and the written literatures are complementary literary forms. Throughout the work, the author underscores the universal dimension of oral literature as he demonstrates its particular attributes.
This publication addresses the extent to which social work curricula in Kenya prepares graduates to handle issues of poverty and social development, the specific knowledge and skills that they are equipped with an existing gaps therein. In addition, the challenges that confront the training and practice of social workers and what needs to be done to ensure that there is an enabling environment for social work education and practice in the country have also been addressed. The publication, which is the outcome of a study on the promotion of professional social work towards social development and poverty reduction in East Africa, analyses the role that professional social work plays in the efforts to reduce poverty, enhance social development and realise the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in Kenya. Consequently, emphasis has been laid on the status of professional social work education and practice in preparing social workers to address issues of poverty and MDGs in the country. Cross cutting gender issues that impact on social work education and practice which in turn affect the efforts to address poverty in Kenya have also been analysed. Given that the time span for MDGs was to end in 2015, the authors envisage that the lessons learnt through this study, and the gains made with regard to MDGs should not end in the set time span but rather, that social work educators and practitioners, together with other stakeholders in policy formulation and implementation, still have more to of in making sure that these gains are consolidated into social work training and practice, with additional efforts being made towards sustainable poverty reduction efforts in Kenya.
When voters enthusiastically turn up to cast their vote during general elections, they expect that their action would meaningfully change their lives. But in most of Africa, even when elections are held on a regular basis, voters are quite often disappointed by the performance of their leaders who use the new positions as an opportunity to loot public resources and consolidate power. It is almost as if elections are of minimal value to the populace. Notwithstanding this trend, when they are free and fair, general elections can be transformative. They can bring into the political arena men and women of integrity committed to service and account-ability. Inspired by the determination to have inclusive governance and the advancement of democracy, Kenya's 2013 General Election: Stakes, Practices and Outcomes asks important questions related to political participation, coalition building, politics of identity, the international criminal court, electoral systems and institutions, and the judiciary. The papers are written by mainly Kenyan academics and civil society actors who examine the drivers of the 20?3 general elections and the sources of the mandate to lead.This book is part of publications by Twaweza Communications on democratic practice and accountable governance in Kenya.
Bites of Insanity
(2015)
In this collection of poems Nsah Mala casts a critical compassionate gaze at the predicaments in the lives of present day Cameroonians. The poet lambasts power abuse in Cameroon and Africa. He decries the lost glory of traditional values sacrificed at the altar of ingratiation and materialism. Insalubrities are condemned, ignorance and its ramifications satirised, and wanton destruction of the environment indicted. With a fascinating richness of imagery, Mala conveys the disillusionment, bitterness and traumas of ordinary Cameroonians - young and old - debased with impunity by the lethal and sterile grip on power of the high and might. The moral depravity and human frailties mused about in this exceptionally compelling collection have no room in Mala's paradise of Cameroon.
Unmasking Social Science Imperialism : Globalization Theory As A Phase Of Academic Colonialism
(2015)
Contemporary social science is a product of the capitalist world-system and Eurocentrism is constitutive of the geoculture of this system characterized by the parochiality of its universalism, assumptions about the superiority of Western civilization and imposition as the sole theory of global progress. The creation of these structures of knowledge, specifically the institutionalization of the social sciences, is a phenomenon that is inextricably linked to the very formation and maturation of Europe's capitalist world system or imperialism. There is therefore nothing that is natural, logical, or accidental about the institutionalization of the social sciences. These Europeanized structures of knowledge are imposed ways of producing knowledge of the world. This Eurocentrism of social science has justifiably come under increasingly vigorous scrutiny, especially in the period since 1945 with the formal decolonization of Africa, Asia, and much of the Caribbean. This book forcefully argues that if social science is to make any progress in the twenty-first century, it must overcome its Eurocentric heritage that has distorted social analyses and its capacity to deal with the problems of the contemporary world and embrace other non-Western funds of knowledge production.
Between Rhetoric and Reality : The State and Use of Indigenous Knowledge in Post-Colonial Africa
(2015)
Since time immemorial, indigenous peoples around the world have developed knowledge systems to ensure their continued survival in their respective territories. These knowledge systems have always been dynamic such that they could meet new challenges. Yet, since the so-called enlightenment period, these knowledges have been supplanted by the Western enlightenment science or colonial science hegemony and arrogance such that in many cases they were relegated to the periphery. Some Euro-centric scholars even viewed indigenous knowledge as superstitious, irrational and anti-development. This erroneous view has, since the colonial period, spread like veld fire to the extent of being internalised by some political elites and Euro-centric academics of Africa and elsewhere. However, for some time now, the potential role that indigenous peoples and their knowledge can play in addressing some of the global problems haunting humanity across the world is increasingly emerging as part of international discourse. This book presents an interesting and insightful discourse on the state and role that indigenous knowledge can play in addressing a tapestry of problems of the world and the challenges connected with the application of indigenous knowledge in enlightenment science-dominated contexts. The book is not only useful to academics and students in the fields of indigenous studies and anthropology, but also those in other fields such as environmental science, social and political ecology, development studies, policy studies, economic history, and African studies.
Blot On The Landscape
(2015)
This Book is the outcome of a long project begun thirty years ago. It is a book on the makings of pan-Africanism through the predicaments of being black in a world dominated by being white. The book is a tribute and celebration of the efforts of the African-American and African-Caribbean Diaspora who took the initiative and the audacity to fight and liberate themselves from the shackles of slavery. It is also a celebration of those Africans who in their own way carried the torch of inspiration and resilience to save and reconstruct the Free Humanism of Africa. As a story of the rise from the shackles of slavery and poverty to the summit of Victors of their Renaissance Identity and Self-Determination as a People, the book is the story of African refusal to celebrate victimhood. The book also situates women as central actors in the Pan-African project, which is often presented as an exclusively masculine endeavour. It introduces a balanced gender approach and diagnosis of the Women actors of Pan-Africanism which was very much lacking. The problem of balkanisation of Africa on post-colonial affiliations and colonial linguistic lines has taken its toll on Africa's building of its common identity and personality. The result is that Africans are more remote to each other in their pigeon-hole-nation-states which put more restrictions for African inter-mobility, coupled by education and cultural affiliations, the communication and transportation and trading networks which are still tied more to their colonial masters than among themselves. This book looks into the problem of the new wave of Pan-Africanism and what strategies that can be proposed for a more participatory Pan-Africanism inspired by the everyday realities of African masses at home and in the diaspora. This book is the first book of its kind that gives a comprehensive and multidimensional coverage of Pan-Africanism. It is a very timely and vital compendium.
Questions surrounding democracy, governance, and development especially in the view of Africa have provoked acrimonious debates in the past few years. It remains a perennial question why some decades after political independence in Africa the continent continues experiencing bad governance, lagging behind socioeconomically, and its democracy questionable. We admit that a plethora of theories and reasons, including iniquitous and malicious ones, have been conjured in an attempt to explain and answer the questions as to why Africa seems to be lagging behind other continents in issues pertaining to good governance, democracy and socio-economic development. Yet, none of the theories and reasons proffered so far seems to have provided enduring solutions to Africas diverse complex problems and predicaments. This book dissects and critically examines the matrix of Africas multifaceted problems on governance, democracy and development in an attempt to proffer enduring solutions to the continents long-standing political and socio-economic dilemmas and setbacks.
This book makes a rare contribution towards the preservation and promotion of ukhaliro wa bene Malawi (Malawian culture) that is fast waning. This dilution of culture was put in motion by the British colonial masters and got exacerbated with the inception of democratic governance in 1994. There is need for concerted efforts amongst various practitioners and stakeholders, led by the government itself, if the situation is to be put under control. Otherwise, sooner or later, it will simply be remote history that long time ago, there was a unique culture in Malawi. The book is a collection of twenty short stories that generally promote such themes as nkharo yiwemi (good behaviour); uheni wa chigolo na sanje (the bad side of selfishness and jealousy); kulimbikira pa vinthu (hard working spirit); and uheni wa mitala (the folly of polygamy), among others. The strength of the book lies in the fact that there is room for the reader to draw their own lessons based on their understanding of a particular story, in addition to the lesson already highlighted there-in. The book is a must read for all, young and old, especially those interested in understanding the societal values, not only about Malawi, but of Africa as a whole.
'In Who's Afraid of Mongo Wa Swolenka? a book launch is planned which, from information given to His Royal Excellency Gbadarango Binyambutu Buthablaisi, by a traitorous intellectual seeking preferment; and by his security agents, is a campaign led by disgruntled writers and intellectuals of Nubialand for the return of their exiled colleague and international award winner, Professor Mongo Wa Swolenka. How the celebrated leader of Nubialand and master of gunocratic politics responds to the prevailing circumstances is the nerve centre of dialogue, action and morality in the play.' - John Nkemngong Nkengasong, Writer and critic, University of Yaounde I, Cameroon
Africa Reunite or Perish
(2015)
Africa Reunite or Perish is a daring and timely book that explores the essence and nefariousness of neocolonialism in a purportedly independent Africa. The book shows how Africa spends billions of dollars in pseudo threats among African countries due to colonially-entrenched fear and war mongering. The book is emphatic on deconstruction and decolonisation as a categorical imperative for the reunification of Africa beyond the narrow confines of current nation states. Mhango takes a diagnostic-cum-prognostic approach in discussing Africa's predicaments, and in identifying and proposing solutions to problems confronting Africans. The book ascertains Africa's untapped potentials by proving how Africa can live without the infamy of excruciating dependency and beggarliness. It makes a compelling case for African unity beyond the tokenism of officialdom. It prescribes a truly pan-African driven reunification of Africa as the only means of reclaiming the glory she used to enjoy before she was savagely partitioned.
100 years since the end of German colonial rule in Namibia, the relationship between the former colonial power and the Namibian communities who were affected by its brutal colonial policies remains problematic, and interpretations of the past are still contested. This book examines the ongoing debates, conflicts and confrontations over the past. It scrutinises the consequences of German colonial rule, its impact on the descendants of victims of the 190408 genocide, Germanys historical responsibility, and ways in which post-colonial reconciliation might be achieved.
Milestones in Green Transition and Climate Compatible Development in Eastern and Southern Africa
(2015)
It is widely recognised that climate change poses significant serious threats to sustained economic growth and agricultural development, poverty reduction, food security and political stability globally. Nowhere are these challenges more marked than in Africa where two-thirds of all available land is classified either as desert or dry land, in relation to which the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) (2013) has classified the continent as the most vulnerable to climate change variability. This anthology is a product of a call from OSSREA to collate evidence based researches in a book in a bid to assess how far countries in eastern and southern Africa are implementing the UNFCCC, Rio+20, Agenda 21 and other global and Africa-wide decisions concerning the need to address climate change. This will contribute to post-2015 development agenda for sustainable development goals (SDGs), in which climate change and disaster risk reduction will be priority areas of focus. We hope this book will serve as a valuable tool for experts, advisers and policymakers in pursing effective green growth policies and practices and achieving climate compatible development and in doing so inspire readers to choose a more sustainable pathway for humanity. It will also help in looking at climate change as both a challenge and opportunity for development. Further, this book aims at stimulating more research in climate compatible development and climate financing which have put most countries at crossroads.
The Rwandan justice system know as Gacaca, originally preserved by word of mouth was revived, documented, tested and used successfully to handle millions of legal cases in the aftermath of the Rwandan genocide against the Tutsi. This monograph begins by depicting the general picture of customary law and ponders on the practical challenges in the production of the modern Gacaca law in three versions: Kinyarwanda, French and English. The author demonstrates that translation involves language use and transfer, as well as communication within a cultural setting. The book amply demonstrates that linguistic, textual, contextual and cultural cues in translation should not be downplayed. It also shows that the cultural turn in translation has transformed and re-conceptualised the translation theory to integrate non-western thought about translation discipline since time immemorial. A major theme within the book is that teranslation as a mediating form between cultures and contexts should not overlook cultural differences because language is a marker of identity.
Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania have minorities from the Indian sub-continent amongst their population. The East African Indians mostly reside in the main cities, particularly Nairobi, Dar es Salaam, Zanzibar, Mombasa, Kampala; they can also be found in smaller urban centres and in the remotest of rural townships. They play a leading social and economic role as they work in business, manufacturing and the service industry, and make up a large proportion of the liberal professions. They are divided into multiple socio-religions communities, but united in a mutual feeling of meta-cultural identity. This book aims at painting a broad picture of the communities of Indian origin in East Africa, striving to include changes that have occurred since the end of the 1980s. The different contributions explore questions of race and citizenship, national loyalties and cosmopolitan identities, local attachment and transnational networks. Drawing upon anthropology, history, sociology and demography, Indian Africa depicts a multifaceted population and analyses how the past and the present shape their sense of belonging, their relations with others, their professional and political engagement. This book is a must-read for contemporary researchers, students, policy practitioners as well as the general reader.
The volume constitutes Klaus Fiedler's crowning contribution to scholarship. Essays in the first half of the book focus on Malawian Christianity and how contrasting Powers, Gospel and Secular, engage each other, creating social, political and cultural conflict in the process. In the second half, Fiedler examines general missiological themes. These essays provide a broader missiological background, offering a theoretical framework necessary for appreciating the essays in the first half. He concludes with a chapter that reviews selected seminal books on themes under study. Throughout the volume Fiedler applies the 'restorationist revival theory' he constructed in The Story of Faith Missions, an earlier 1994 work putting emphasis on non classical missions and churches, not systematically covered in earlier scholarship. This volume, the first of its kind on Malawian Christianity, will long remain an indispensable text for those interested in Missiology and Malawian Christianity.
The Regional Economic Communities (RECs) in Eastern and Southern Africa have been at the forefront to developing new energy policies and programmes aimed at reaching the UN goal of Ensuring Access to Clean Energy for All by 2030. In the year 2006, the East African Community passed the EAC Strategy to Scale Up Access to Modern Energy Services, committing its Member States to reach the UN goal of -access to all- by 2030. The Inter-governmental Authority for Development adopted its Environmental and Natural Resources Policy in 2007 which includes issues of renewable energy. The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa launched its Model Energy Programme in 2012, followed the same year by its comprehensive baselines database on renewable resources covering all its Member States. In the year 2009, the African Union General Assembly at its 12th Ordinary Session adopted the Policy on 'Scaling Up Renewable Energy in Africa'. The regional policies have been domesticated by Member Sates of the RECs. Although their targets are very ambitious, implementation programmes launched at national level are robust and producing results. Both in the policies and implementation programmes, gender issues have, however, not featured prominently. Noting this deficit, the Organisation for Social Science Research in Eastern and Southern Africa called for researchers to assess the extent to which energy policies in Eastern and Southern Africa have taken gender issues on board. This book is the product of that project. It has ten chapters that investigated the gender-energy nexus in Zimbabwe, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Swaziland, Sudan and Kenya. The book will prove useful to all policy makers, researchers and analysts who may be interested in strengthening the gender content of the programmes as we move towards 2030. We believe it triggers and helps policy makers and researchers to create platforms to use its findings, and those of others, to see how in gender terms those at the bottom of the energy access pyramid can be factored into these programmes, to make sure they are not left behind.
In the nineteen 60s and 70s, the University of Dar es salaam was recognised internationally as a great academic institution, and the site of anti-colonialist, anti-imperialist, socialist studies and activism. With the onslaught of neo-liberalism beginning with Structural Adjustment Programmes in Tanzania in the mid 80s, the university was one of its prime targets; subjected to numerous pressures designed to extinguish the flames of revolutionary scholarship and activism. The establishment in 2008 of the Mwalimu Nyerere Chair on Pan - Africanism with Professor Issa Shivji as its first Chairman, and the annual Distinguished Nyerere Lectures Series inaugurating annual intellectual festivals was, in Professor Shivji's introduction to this volume of collected lectures, 'the resurrection of radical Pan-Africanism at the University of Dar es salaam.' The impact of the festivals and the lectures went well beyond the university community, as substantial number of the participants at these lectures and debates were citizen intellectuals, not part of the university community. The calibre of the distinguished lecturers speaks for itself; there could be no better representation of progressive African intellectuals honouring the legacy of Mwalimu Nyerere, than Professors Wole Soyinka, Samir Amin, Bereket Habte Selassie, Micere Githae Mugo and Thandika Mkandawire whose lectures are published in this book.
The Mind of Africa
(2015)
William Abraham studied Philosophy at the University of Ghana, and even more Philosophy at Oxford University. Thereafter, he gained permission to take part in the competitive examination and interview for a fellowship at All Souls' College. The examination was once described, with some exaggeration, as 'the hardest exam in the world!' It included a three-hour essay. Following his success in becoming the first African fellow of All Souls, his interest in African politics quickly developed into a Pan-African perspective. The Mind of Africa, written while he was still at All Souls, was a fruit of that enlarged perspective. After several years as a Fellow, he had occasion to visit Ghana in 1962. There Kwame Nkrumah, then President of Ghana, successfully persuaded him to return to Ghana to teach at the University of Ghana, Legon and he subsequently resigned from All Souls. In 1968, he went to the United States as a visiting professor. This was followed by invitations to teach at various academic institutions there, including Berkeley and Stanford. He subsequently settled in California, where he continued to teach and research philosophy in the University of California at Santa Cruz until his retirement. ...The Mind of Africa appeared at a time when a number of African countries were obtaining, or fighting for, their political freedom from their colonial rulers and becoming independent nations and expecting to build new societies in accordance with their own visions and conceptions, though not necessarily jettisoning all the features of their colonial heritage. Building new societies requires appropriate ideologies and philosophies fashioned within the crucible of their cultural and historical experiences. Thus, the relation between ideology and society is taken up at the very outset of the book... The Mind of Africa is important for Africa's future and identity.
Africa: Beyond Recovery
(2015)
Professor Thandika Mkandawire, the first to hold the Chair in African Development at the London School of Economics, delivered the thirty-second in the Aggrey-Fraser-Guggisberg Memorial Lecture series at the University of Ghana in 2013. In these lectures, combining with and imagination with down-to-earth political economy, he traces Africa's attempts at growth and development since the independence era, her attempts at recovery from a string of serious socio-political set-backs, and advocates for the role of universities as essential agents in the drive to sustained development.
Tumbuka is the dominant language in the Northern Region of Malawi. It is, however, also spoken in large pockets of Kasungu District in the Central Region and also in the Eastern Province of Zambia, and in Lundazi District in particular. Tonga, spoken in Nkhatabay and Nkhotakota, is like a cousin to Tumbuka with a close resemblance in their phonetics. Like other Bantu languages, Tumbuka is very expressive, but can also be very economic in communication or use of words, and yet clearly delivering the desired message. This can be done through the use of idioms, proverbs, or ideophones. This collection is on commonly used Tumbuka ideophones, where an ideophone shall mean 'a word describing a situation, or a state of affairs, or a set of actions - all in one word.' It is the intention of this collection to provoke both interest in the use of ideophones as a form of expression in literature and to expound on the richness of Bantu languages.
The Christian faith is comprehensive and diverse, so the question, what the centre is, can be asked. Different answers have been given, to which this book adds another. The venture of the Christian faith is missions, following Kenneth Scott Latourette's thesis that the Holy Spirit moves forward the history of the church by bringing in ever new revivals, which produce ever new organisations. Therefore missions are not the children of the churches, but of the revivals, and Africa was not evangalised by the European and American churches, but by the Europeans and American mission societies.
On 20th January 1964, at the Colito Army Barracks just outside Dar es salaam, 15 officers of the Tanganyika Army that was inherited from the colonial state led a mutiny against the independent Tanganyika government. One group went to the State House with the intention of forcing President Julius Nyerere to accept their demands. What would have happened if they had succeeded in entering the State House and if President Nyerere had refused to accept their demands, as he most likely would have done? Anything could have happened and in the worst case scenario Tanzanias history and indeed the history of the whole of Africa would have been seriously affected. This book is about the courage and quick thinking of Peter Bwimbo, the then head of the Presidential Protection Unit and Nyereres Chief Body Guard who, alone, planned and executed an ingenious and successful evacuation of President Nyerere and Vice President Rashid Kawawa, whisking them away from the State House before the mutineers got there. By a clever ruse he convinced the ferry operators on duty before dawn to ferry them across the Kigamboni Creek. From there they walked several miles to a hiding place in a house that was offered by an ordinary citizen and where they stayed until the situation was normalised several days later.
The East African Tax System
(2015)
This book is a comparative study of the tax systems of the five members of the East African Community (Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. It deals with various aspects of business profit tax, customs duties, excise duties, personal income tax and value added tax of the East African Community member states. It also sheds light on the intergovernmental fiscal relations and reviews the status of tax administrations in these countries. The books is of use to a wide range of readers, including students, researchers, policy makers, tax administrators, and business people interested in the East African Tax System and Tax Administration.
Nothing to See Here
(2015)
In Nothing to See Here, sixteen African women writers ably deal with the politics of nationhood and identity, and the burden and beauty of womanity. From the serious, to the absurd to the seriously absurd, these stories will leave you pondering, crying and laughing as you travel from East Africa to Southern Africa through to West Africa. A beautiful collection with 16 well-written, well-plotted stories from 16 amazing African female storytellers. - Zukiswa Warnner
The Pan African Anthropological Association (PAAA) marked the 10th anniversary of its creation by holding its 9th Annual Conference in Yaounde, Cameroon - the city and country of its birth, from 30 August-2 September 1999. The conference, themed 'The Anthropology of Africa: Challenges for the 21st Century', was attended by some seventy participants, mostly African. Among the international participants was Dr Sydel Silverman, President of the Wenner Gren Foundation at the time, a long term partner of the PAAA who was present at the inaugural conference in 1988. The conference proceedings were initially published in 2000 with very limited circulation. Given the continued relevance of the papers presented, and in view of the call by the President of the PAAA for African anthropologists to reunite anthropological theory and practice in the teaching programmes of African universities, the PAAA has republished the proceedings of its landmark 9th Annual Conference. The book consists of forty three divided into eight parts, namely: teaching anthropology in the decades ahead; Health Challenges: HIV/AIDS Anthropological Perspectives; NGOS: Use and Misuse of Anthropology; Anthropological Focus on Environment; Some Applied Issues in Anthropology; The African Family in Crisis; Ethnicity and Ethnic Conflicts; and Population issues and anthropology: Fertility Crisis. Paul Nkwi concludes his introduction to the volume with these words: 'The Anthropology of Africa will remain for a long time, fundamentally applied if it is to meet the challenges of the 21st Century.'
The manual, Beyond Ethnicism. Exploring Racial and Ethnic Diversity for Educators, a first of its kind in Kenya, speaks to the key issues of ethnic and racial belonging that are such a key-determining factor in defining and dividing Kenyans. These two issues influence many social, economic and especially political decisions. The manual transcends the limitations of current discussions on ethnicism and racism. Questions of ethnic and racial belonging are connected to some of the deepest moral and political decisions of our time. Belonging is an emotional subject that as a country citizens should not lose capacity to discuss coherently. An educator who wanted to know how to end ethnicism and racism inspired the writing of this manual. Ethnic and racial favoritism as well as discrimination have seeped into the Kenyan education system. Educators sit in staff-rooms as members of political parties or ethnic communities and sometimes consciously or unconsciously perpetuate ethnic and racial stereotypes and prejudices. Educators find talking about ethnicism and racism difficult. They do not know where to begin yet they can recognise ethnicism and racism in learners. Sometimes they practice it themselves, favouring or discriminating learners on the basis of ethnicity or race. Educators are sometimes helpless in arresting ethnicist and racist practices in their learners or themselves, as they do not have the tools to do so. This manual is a practical resource which assists educators in contextualising ethnic and race related concerns without undermining the human rights, it also helps in creating the space for discourse amongst educators on how to combat ethnicism and racism. It asks rarely addressed critical and significant questions on the meaning of ethnic and racial belonging. The manual addresses the arresting of stereotypes and prejudice before they morph into actual discrimination and sometimes violence.
Names and Secrets
(2015)
Names and Secrets won the Burt Book Award, Kenya and is the story of Chekai, a teenage boy who survives school bullying to become a champion of peaceful coexistence in an ethnically and economically divided society. Matur County is an example of a country that faces internal divisions. It is a county that is under increasing danger from external threats, including terrorism. Chekai is bullied by his teacher, Ms Letia and his class prefect, Goliath. This reflects the ethnic suspicions and economic inequalities that threaten to tear the society apart. However, Chekai thinks realistically about the problems in his society. Through curiosity, he discovers that unlike what is said, the people of Matur County have a lot in common. He realises that they will only defeat their real enemies if they are united. Chekai wins a presidential essay writing competition and becomes a peace ambassador. He uses his new position to chart a new path on which everyone will walk. This includes those who previously bullied him, and those who had been discriminated against.
This Book is the outcome of a long project begun thirty years ago. It is a book on the makings of pan-Africanism through the predicaments of being black in a world dominated by being white. The book is a tribute and celebration of the efforts of the African-American and African-Caribbean Diaspora who took the initiative and the audacity to fight and liberate themselves from the shackles of slavery. It is also a celebration of those Africans who in their own way carried the torch of inspiration and resilience to save and reconstruct the Free Humanism of Africa. As a story of the rise from the shackles of slavery and poverty to the summit of Victors of their Renaissance Identity and Self-Determination as a People, the book is the story of African refusal to celebrate victimhood. The book also situates women as central actors in the Pan-African project, which is often presented as an exclusively masculine endeavour. It introduces a balanced gender approach and diagnosis of the Women actors of Pan-Africanism which was very much lacking. The problem of balkanisation of Africa on post-colonial affiliations and colonial linguistic lines has taken its toll on Africa's building of its common identity and personality. The result is that Africans are more remote to each other in their pigeon-hole-nation-states which put more restrictions for African inter-mobility, coupled by education and cultural affiliations, the communication and transportation and trading networks which are still tied more to their colonial masters than among themselves. This book looks into the problem of the new wave of Pan-Africanism and what strategies that can be proposed for a more participatory Pan-Africanism inspired by the everyday realities of African masses at home and in the diaspora. This book is the first book of its kind that gives a comprehensive and multidimensional coverage of Pan-Africanism. It is a very timely and vital compendium.
This is a comprehensive, insightful, lucid, intense and unrivalled text on the general part of the criminal law in Cameroon. Beginning with an account of the historical development of the criminal law generally, the author proceeds to analyse and discuss in detail the principles governing application of the criminal law, criminal responsibility, participation in crime, penalties, and sentencing. These principles are broadly the same in other jurisdictions. The book balances theoretical content with case-law illustrations to enhance readability, comprehension and assimilation. It is an invaluable source and essential reading for law students and teachers, and lawyers in private practice and government service.
Secrets, Silences, and Betrayals is an invitation to readers to consider factoring in the often discarded or censored but useful information held by the dominated. The books principal claim is that the unsaid weighs in significantly on the scale of semantic construction as that which is said. Thus, it legitimates the impact of the absentee in broadening and clarifying knowledge and understanding in most disciplines. In other words, just as exogenous epistemologies have underlain and explicated the basis for understanding diverse encounters-social, political, historical, cultural, literary, etc.-Secrets, Silences, and Betrayals challenges, from a pluridisciplinary angle, such highly dominant approaches to investigating the origin, nature, ways of knowing, and limits of human knowledge. It thus yields to the deontological basis to critically reexamine our understanding of the world around us. It is in this regard that the present volume points towards the need for human history to become a cumulative record and re-recording of every human journey and endeavor in life; it brings together disparate voices illuminating topical issues that would be or have been legated to posterity as nonexistent, partial, or half-truths.
Chieftaincy in Africa has displayed remarkable dynamics and adaptability to new socio-economic and political developments, without becoming totally transformed in the process. Almost everywhere on the continent, chiefdoms and chiefs have become active agents in the quest for ethnic, cultural symbols as a way of maximising opportunities at the centre of bureaucratic and state power, and at the home village where control over land and labour often require both financial and symbolic capital. Chieftaincy remains central to ongoing efforts at developing democracy and accountability in line with the expectations of Africans as individual 'citizens' and also as 'subjects' of various cultural communities. This book uses Cameroon and Botswana as case studies, to argue that the rigidity and prescriptiveness of modernist partial theories have left a major gap in scholarship on chiefs and chieftaincy in Africa. It stresses that studies of domesticated agency in Africa are sorely needed to capture the creative ongoing processes and to avoid overemphasising structures and essentialist perceptions on chieftaincy and the cultural communities that claim and are claimed by it.
The Swamps
(2015)
The Swamps presents a debauched tapestry of an utterly dehumanised Cameroonian society seeking regeneration through s a judicious deployment of myth, history, parables, song, mimicry and dance. The inclusion of these features of orature in this political allegory creates particular moods and atmospheres and lends colour and movement to dramatic action. The structure and function of the play defines the individual's identity within the cosmic context which approximates the past and present. Inyang's analysis of class political behaviour in Cameroon exposes the complete erosion of civil liberties by corrupt and venal elite. He impresses the theatre audience with his dramatic eloquence and the fervour of his commitment, and emblazones his name in the front ranks of alternative theatre. This is a rare theatrical gem that demonstrates a brilliant, sustained invention, with great depth and suggestive power.
'Poems from Abakwa in Cameroon Pidgin English is one patriotic rage. An anthology of sorts, this book of poems contains wisdom, inspirational reflections and witticisms for all. Through apt descriptions, illustrations, dialogues, interrogations and incisive phraseology, Peter Wuteh Vakunta creates an effective balance of colorful images that traces and documents disturbing accounts and evidences of corruption, greed, skewed values and life experiences that have assaulted his fatherland, betrayed political leaders and institutions, court judges, and parliamentarians as the police-cum-military continue to put their ambitions above the country's needs while forsaking future leaders-children. Vakunta describes how civil servants represent selfish interests and aspirations. Judges are intimidated as the nation's laws continue to be transgressed. The police and military continue to abuse the trust invested in them by civilians and misdirect their patriotism while virtually the entire nation continues to live shaky lives with a punctured integrity. Vakunta does this in popular lingos commonly used by musicians, business folks, and the common man under several labels-pidgin English, Camfranglais, Cam-tok, Camspeak, Majunga tok ...' Dr. Fidelis Achenjang, Union College, USA
Soul On Sale
(2015)
Soul On Sale (SOS) sounds like a rap song though it isn't. It isn't purely a poem but a long- provocative and vigorous song focusing on the history of injustices and those suffering from injustice urging them to take action. It explores colonialism, corruption and neocolonialism Africa faces. It chides victims to self-reinvent so as to change the status quo manned by begging and venal potentates. It seeks to provoke readers to feel empowered and responsible. Thus, stand and change the world's status quo sui generis. It employs an enthralling-flow style in free verse to catch the attention of the reader.
Born with Voice
(2015)
Born with Voice examines the psyche and scrape of the victims of various crimes, especially sexual discrimination-cum-exploitation, rape, and the killing of people with albinism. The author digs deeper into the hearts and minds, and plights of victims to inspire the society to stand with, and support them. The book offers some nuggets such as, understanding the phenomenon, confronting it and stopping wars that cause sufferings such as rape and death. It champions the urgency of voice for all and sundry. It challenges the industries of technologies of crime and violence to rise above selfish self-interest in the interest of human rights and voicing the voiceless victims of their greed.
There seems to be a sort of prevalent attitude in the Western world that its brand of democracy is something of a catch all solution for all the world's political problems. Hence, Western imperialism has always been sold under the pretext of spreading freedom and democracy. Democracy is beautiful. But it is no proof against imperialism. Whether democracy is causal is another whole consideration. It may be a case of the 'least bad of evil alternatives.' It may be a case of a state of social and political development over and above the way people organize themselves. It may be the fate of rational life on a planet with insufficient energy reserves to support locomotion without predation. But what gives anyone the right to go into a sovereign country and change its foundation through War? The whole democracy and freedom line is a lie to give Western imperialism a friendly face. Imperialism and its lie of spreading democracy is an unmitigated evil, whether for material gain, or the pride fostered by active participation in the machinery of state. Therefore, a people seeking to control their destiny must decolonize imposed Western democracy.
Moving beyond existing approaches that largely deal with the biophysical consequences of climate change realities in Africa, this book explores an alternative perspective that traces climate change as a travelling idea. It focuses on how globally constructed discourses on climate change find their way to the local level in the Bamenda Grassfields of Cameroon, thereby seeking to understand how these discursive practices lead to social transformations, and to new configurations of power. In the translation process from the 'global' to the 'local' level a continuous modification and appropriation of the idea of climate change takes place that finally leads to a concrete implementation of climate change related projects and sensitization campaigns. Hence, it is argued that in this increasingly interconnected and mediated world people in Africa (and elsewhere in the world) do not solely adapt to a changing climate, but also adapt to a changing discourse about the climate. Travelling between traditional rulers and their palaces, to the world of NGOs, journalists and ordinary farmers this study brings the reader on a captivating journey, that reveals how climate change engages in a variety of ways with different lifeworlds, revitalizes local cosmologies, gives birth to a new development paradigm, and moreover how it evokes apocalyptic anxieties and trajectories of blame at the grassroots level.
Largely concerned with Family Politics and Deception in northern North America and West-Central Africa, this book is intended mostly to provoke and enlighten. The book fossungupalogizes on whether or not northern North American courts are able to live up to the standard of 'exclusively saying exactly what the law is' in regard of the apparent war between the mounting same-sex marriage legalization drive and the traditional Western religious conception of marriage as endorsed by America's 1996 Defense of Marriage Act. It also tackles some intriguingly troubling matters emanating from African customary marriages and inheritance, subjects presenting some odd faces of marriage and family very similar at times to those engendered by same-sex marriage in northern North America. Its underlying preaching is that positive things could often be found even in tragedies. Hence, you should learn to make the best of your troubles instead of letting these haunt you - a goal easily attained by cultivating the habit of looking at the larger picture of things. Even one's 'stupid' and non-professional ideas could be learning ground to more people than one ever could have imagined.
The most appealing quality of the novel is its haunting and unusual prose that really ought to be termed poetry. But this is poetry with an added touch as it is also a narrative that weaves together many lives engrossed in the daily struggle for survival. There are no heroes or villains, just ordinary folk trying to make the most of extraordinary circumstances.
From Momany's wealthy and agonizing expibasketism so much can be drawn to teach about, demote or promote, and to portray Canada as it has never been properly understood; not only by outsiders but also by Canadians themselves. This book makes an extensive and detailed use of that basket of experience to deliver the message that Canada is not at all the 'children's-best-interests-friendly' nation that it is often mistaken for. Canada may be entitled to what it claims to be. But, since a country or community can only be correctly seen through the workings of the institutions that incarnate it, this study has dared to show a contrary portrait. It documents and proves the theorization that most of the country's institutions that are supposedly there to carter for and protect children and promote their wellbeing and glowing avenir often end up in reality instead actively working against the said children and all what their best interest should properly signify. The hope is that the experts in the relevant fields can find the material presented herein useful for their further specialized and in-depth analyses and sane policy formulation.
The relationship between police and the public in formerly colonised countries of Africa has never been smooth. It is plagued with clich's of suspicion, mistrust, and brutality which are all a result of the legacy of draconian policing in colonial Africa. This colonial hangover has chiefly been an upshot of sluggish switching from the mantra of colonial policing to community progressive policing advocated in democratic societies. This book, the result of five years of ethnographic and library research on the interaction and relationships between police and members of the public in Zimbabwe, is a clarion call for a generative progressive working together between the police and the public for a peaceful and orderly society. While it traces the historical trends and nature of policing in Africa and in particular Zimbabwe, the book demonstrates how law, morality and policing enrich one another. The book offers critical insights in the interpretation of contemporary policing in Zimbabwe with a view to inform and draw lessons for both police and the public. It should be of interest not only to legal anthropologists but also political scientists, members of the public, police instructors, police officers, and students and educators in academic disciplines such as criminal justice, criminology, law, sociology, African studies, and leadership and conflict management.
Revolution: Struggle Poems
(2015)
Revolutionary as a way of solving problems bedevilling our place under the sun, revolutions we witnessed in The Middle East, revolutionary in writing, text, textiness of text, the poetic genre, attitude of mind, ideas, living. Poems in Revolution take the experimental approach as they deal with the above struggle issues and many others. They go further in bringing into focus how our revolutions have not delivered us across the line, and how to get across the line.
In A Predicament All My Life marks out some of the distressing ills of the postcolonial elite and the challenges of present-day African societies and cultures. The Poems in this collection bring into conversation precolonial Africa and Africa since colonialism. In particular, the poems explore Cameroon's predicament, its reunification traits, and its existential challenges. They represent a people who are out of favour, have lived in misery for most of their lives but are determined to stand firm and seek justice. In addition, the poems depict how women deal with gender oppression in a patriarchal society caught between and betwixt.
Representing research from east, central, west, and southern Africa, Engaging Children and Youth in Africa provides a well-balanced analysis of on-the-ground data with methodological and phenomenological issues that abound in much of research in Africa today. With an introduction that charts out some of the most critical approaches in African-centred research on children and youth, contributors to this volume give the reader a glimpse of the product of engaged research that places children and youth at the centre of analysis. The authors follow recent studies that have insisted on seeing African childhood and youth beyond constraining Western notions of vulnerability or innocence, to capture the ways in which recent advances in technology, the intensification of global processes, and continued weakening of the nation-state have not only contributed to new ways of being children and youth but how they have also provided a new lens through which to study social change.
Finding a Way Home
(2015)
Home is a place in ourselves where we are happy with ourselves, where we find peace with ourselves, where we are satisfied, fulfilled... The important theme coursing through all the stories in the novel, Finding a way home, is that we have to make the journey to find our homes, we have to find the path, and start walking in that path.
When Africa stumbled into independence in the 1960s, the blossoming of newspapers of nearly every political persuasion was widely hailed as a critical stepping stone toward true multiparty democracy. However, rather than marking a clean break with an authoritarian past, the era of multiparty politics in Africa has been a time of increased hardship and repression for journalists who dare criticize powerful incumbents. Media repression continues to rise. After decades of retreat, authoritarian regimes are using social media and other sophisticated systems in a new era of repression to thwart democracy and trample human rights. For consecutive decades, the state of freedom has declined - more people in more places face more repression. While systemic torture in war-torn Somalia and the return of a military dictatorship in Egypt captured headlines, there is also widespread, insidious and 21st-century style surveillance elsewhere with abuse or imprisonment or both of political activists. For the media to play its role as priests of democracy, Tatah Mentan maintains that media freedom must be rigorously defended as integral to the democratic way of life.
On perusing Stream of Consciousness: Poetics of the Universal by Peter Wuteh Vakunta, one is struck by the eclectic and englobing nature of themes broached. Vakunta's poetry is both a transversal and longitudinal dissection of our world. The poet assumes the posture of a divinity casting interrogative glances at the deeds of humans. Not a single terrestrial creature evades his prying eyes. Even the most subtle creatures on Planet Earth are scathed by the poet's effusion of vitriolic emotions. The poet pursues evil-doers right into their graves. Even in their death throes, he continues to deal them fatal blows. Armed with a caustic pen, this chronicler does not sit on the fence and watch events transpire. Instead, he speaks for the downtrodden of all races and social strata: black, white, yellow, Papuan, Andalusian, wretched, opulent. This adds grist to the title of the book. The poet distances himself from the rigor of Kant and the moralism of La Rochefoucauld. Weary of hearing the voices of humans in distress, he paints the portrait of another kind of Humanity. Vakunta's poetry celebrates the harmonious cohabitation of verbal sophistry with the power of the word.
This book brings together twenty think-pieces on contemporary Human Rights issues at the international, regional and national level by one of Africa's foremost scholars of International Human Rights and Constitutional Law, J. Oloka-Onyango. Ranging from the 'Arab Spring' to the Right to Education, the collection is both an in-depth analysis of discrete topics as well as a critical reflection on the state of human rights around the world today. Taking up issues such as the African reaction to the International Criminal Court (ICC), the question of truth and reconciliation before the outbreak of post-election violence in Kenya and the links between globalization and racism, the book is a tour de force of issues that are both unique as well as pertinent to human rights struggles around the world.
African Modernities and Mobilities : An Historical Ethnography of Kom, Cameroon, C. 1800-2008
(2015)
In this book Walter Gam Nkwi documents the complexities and nuances embedded in African modernities and mobilities which have been overlooked in historical discourses in Africa and Cameroon. Using an ethnographic historical approach and drawing on the intricacies of what it has meant to be and belong in Kom- an ethnic community in the Northwest Region of Cameroon - since 1800, he explores the discourses and practices of kfaang as central to any understanding of mobility and modernity in Kom, Cameroon and Africa at large. The book unveils the emic understanding of modernity through the history and ethnography of kfaang and its technologies and illustrates how these terminologies were conceived and perceived by the Kom people in their social and physical mobilities. It documents and analyzes the historical processes involved in bringing about and making kfaang a defining feature of everyday life in Kom and among Kom subjects.
This book argues that the basic component of any society's social security and sustainability is cultural capital and its ability to fully recognise diversity in knowledge production and advancement. However, with regard to African societies, since the dawn of racial slavery and colonialism, cultural capital - indigenous knowledge in particular - has iniquitously and acrimoniously suffered marginalisation and pejorative ragtags. Increasingly since the 1990s, cultural capital informed by African knowledge systems has taken central stage in discussions of sustainability and development. This is not unrelated with the recognition by America and Europe in particular of the central role that cultural capital could and should assume in the logic of development and sustainability at a global level. Unfortunately, action has often failed to match words with regard to the situation in Africa. The current book seeks to make a difference by exploring the role that African cultural capital could and should assume to guarantee development and sustainability on the continent and globally. It argues that lofty pan-African ideals of collective self-reliance, self-sustaining development and economic growth would come to naught unless determined and decisive steps are taken towards full recognition of indigenous cultural capital on the continent.
Boundaries
(2015)
In Boundaries, Musang, from the Grassfields, falls in love with Etonde from the Coast. Although aware of some existing tension and unfounded mistrust between both camps, the couple is ready to marry when Etonde's father, incredibly, rejects the marriage proposal at the last minute. Although traumatized, Musang, finally, deems the rejection a sign from heaven and so reconsiders a lingering vocation idea - the priesthood. Meanwhile, a devastated Etonde, now defiant of men, struggles on to regain her equilibrium. Years after, however, and barely months away from his ordination into the priesthood, Musang, an exemplary postulant, is suddenly given the deprecating choice to go on probation or leave the seminary; he leaves.
Tori Shweet for Cameroon Pidgin English is a compendium of short stories written in Cameroon's most widely spoken lingua franca commonly called Cameroon Pidgin English (CPE). The grassfields of Cameroon serves as the nursery where these culturally enriched stories are nurtured. The collection comprises animal trickster tales, bird survival tales and human-interest stories. In conformity with the philosophy of French novelist, Stendhal, this anthology of short stories is a mirror that reflects the folklore and mores of the ethnic groups that constitute the grassland region of Cameroon. It serves as a window to the worldview, mindset and value systems of the grafi.
A la tète du client is a vitriolic indictment of the unsettling myths and stereotypes surrounding the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Cameroon. It problematizes and lampoons the unethical practices of medical personnel that have made this disease an intractable ailment in Cameroon and beyond. The English translation of A la tète du client titled Fly over the Crooks' Crooked Nest denounces and scourges the predatory behaviour of the wicked who take advantage of the weakest in a context of HIV/AIDs. When two rascals decide to open their own laboratory for medical analysis, without any skills or equipment, the least harmful results amount to 'Obama... blood type O, Axelrod...blood type A...'
The Forest: An African Traditional Definition seeks to provide the conservationist with some basic ideas as to which cultural areas to explore. It utilises illustrative African cultures: from ecologically and culturally rich forest zones of Cameroon which has earned the description of Africa in miniature due to its diversity; and representativeness of ecological and cultural landscapes that reflect the continent. These aim to direct the conservationist to the appropriate beliefs and customs that could be exploited in favour of conservation. There is no overemphasising that most, if not all, African cultures have at least some rudimentary aspects of conservation in the modern sense. These aspects constitute the strong colours that could be used to create an indelible picture of the importance of conservation on the continent.
Despite all the talk about African renaissance, much of the continent is plagued by poverty and instability. To break out of that cycle, the guardians of African heritage (the old independence freedom fighters turned political leaders and their successors) and much of Afrocentric literature rightly promote African ideas and solutions for African problems. While the idea in itself is noble, the danger is for Africa to close itself off and ignore 'outside' technical and intellectual innovations that it desperately needs to advance further. Africa through Structuration Theory - ntu joins the discourse by attempting to restore intellectual freedom and convincingly defends structuration theory not only as the way forward for Africa but also as a legitimate African concept. It is innovative, refreshing and deserves to be heard across the world and appreciated especially by African graduates, current and future leaders of various African institutions or businesses, non-Africans who might hesitate to refer to such a theory when trying to understand and deal with African problems and the wider public who constitute the audience for this book.
Life, Love, Lies
(2015)
Life, Love, Lies is a collection of reflections on perhaps the two most mundane yet fundamental aspects of human existence: love and the concept of living. In between, are matters benign and not so benign - on life - amassed, experienced and/or lived, for well over half a century now; on everything from the tabula rasa of childhood to the flow of world history.
This Book is the outcome of a long project begun thirty years ago. It is a book on the makings of pan-Africanism through the predicaments of being black in a world dominated by being white. The book is a tribute and celebration of the efforts of the African-American and African-Caribbean Diaspora who took the initiative and the audacity to fight and liberate themselves from the shackles of slavery. It is also a celebration of those Africans who in their own way carried the torch of inspiration and resilience to save and reconstruct the Free Humanism of Africa. As a story of the rise from the shackles of slavery and poverty to the summit of Victors of their Renaissance Identity and Self-Determination as a People, the book is the story of African refusal to celebrate victimhood. The book also situates women as central actors in the Pan-African project, which is often presented as an exclusively masculine endeavour. It introduces a balanced gender approach and diagnosis of the Women actors of Pan-Africanism which was very much lacking. The problem of balkanisation of Africa on post-colonial affiliations and colonial linguistic lines has taken its toll on Africa's building of its common identity and personality. The result is that Africans are more remote to each other in their pigeon-hole-nation-states which put more restrictions for African inter-mobility, coupled by education and cultural affiliations, the communication and transportation and trading networks which are still tied more to their colonial masters than among themselves. This book looks into the problem of the new wave of Pan-Africanism and what strategies that can be proposed for a more participatory Pan-Africanism inspired by the everyday realities of African masses at home and in the diaspora. This book is the first book of its kind that gives a comprehensive and multidimensional coverage of Pan-Africanism. It is a very timely and vital compendium.
A Pebble In The River
(2015)
Akli is an old man now. He is in prison. It is from there that he begins telling his story of the colonisation of Northern Africa. Of his village especially, Thadarth. It is a narrative of revolution, war, torture, dispossession, corruption, intolerance, betrayal, terrorism, religious extremism but, above all, resistance. A narrative of inevitability and loss. The loss of faith in a higher power. The loss of those closest to him, which he would endlessly try, in vain, to prevent since his adolescence. He would forever carry the burden of their death and absence, the regret of not having been able to protect them, to be with them. This forged him into a cynic, a man without hope for a better future, a man who wishes for death every day that passes. But his is also a story of love. Unconditional. Pure love. The ineffable kind which he has for his country, his land, the mountains, his family, his friends, his people. A story of his life's first love, Martine, daughter to the French settler, Fino, who left him with a lot of frustrations but also good remembrances. If his story begins in gloom, it is one through which secretly, intimately and ultimately runs the thread of hope. Hope because he is released from prison at the time of the narration. Hope that his daughter, Zira, the fruit of the rape of his wife by terrorists, brings back into his life. It is a story about the persistence of beauty, of good and goodness, even in the face of chaos. It is a story about truth. His truth. Eternal even when obscured. No man can be broken badly enough to not feel love, to not see and enjoy beauty. No man can tear the world apart so much that love and beauty no longer exist. Once this truth is accepted, however chaotic or scary the outside world can be, peace can be found. Peace within one's own being. Peace which Akli finds too.
This book, the first of its kind on Anglophone Cameroon, brings significant local context into the practice of law particularly at a juncture when civil practice has been radically altered by Cameroon's ongoing effort at harmonization of both the substantive and procedural laws applicable in the courts. The book covers a wide spectrum of topics including: the commencement of civil actions, jurisdiction, simplified recovery procedures and measures of execution, provisional execution and stay of execution. It provides a detailed analysis of the relevant rules of court applicable in both the high court and court of appeal. One of its major strengths lies in its use of recent cases to demonstrate the way Cameroonian judges have dealt with local procedural laws, as well as how the differences between Cameroonian indigenous rules of practice and those imported particularly from Nigeria and England are reconciled.
Zimbabwe: The Urgency of Now
(2015)
Zimbabwe: The Urgency of Now, is a follow-up creative non-fiction book to Zimbabwe: The Blame Game. It goes further than The Blame Game and focuses on Zimbabwe in the GNU entity, the 2013 elections, post elections and post GNU Zimbabwe, and Now. They are a myriad number of problems, issues, limitations that still unbundles Zimbabwe's push towards multiparty democracy, social justice, economic sanity and growth, and The Urgency of Now focuses on the solutions to these. It also tackles the land reform in South Africa, how this could be its biggest problem going forward. It goes further and tackles the larger Africa problem toward democracy, growth, stability and unity, and why the progress towards the United States of Africa has been moribund.
The King's Wages
(2015)
Containing hints of political satire, The King's Wages is a play that seeks to unmask the wicked absurdity of getting power at all costs. It tells the story of a man called Tutu who wants to be king and murders his own brother in pursuit of his plan. Tutu finally becomes king, but soon realizes that there is more to it than he bargained for. The chief among the Akan gods, Tano, becomes angry and is bent on punishing Tutu for the fratricide he committed. The ghost of Tutu's brother comes back to haunt him and Tutu is desperate to avert this from happening again. He does not only do the unthinkable as an expedient to save his life, but also manifests his weakness by following the advice of his long-time friend Bota. As a result, he is cursed by his own daughter who commits suicide immediately afterwards. In the end, he loses everything but his life. The story may strike us as mythical, but Brempong deliberately goes beyond the limits of the natural to invest his story with more beauty and profound pathos. He uses glittering expressions and simple language, with slight touches of archaism and interspersed with Akan proverbs. The story he tells is interesting enough, but his brilliant writing style also makes it one of the outstanding works to be seen in modern African literature.
Coffee Time
(2015)
In Coffee Time, Mary Njeri Kinyanjui uses her childhood experiences in a rural coffee farm to show the struggles that farmers go through to earn a living. They linger in poverty as intermediaries along the coffee value chain rake huge profits. It is a story of trade injustice in an asymmetrical world.
Usually shunned, condemned or narcotised as quickly as acknowledged, the absurd remains nevertheless a large part of reality. Loyal to their poetic pen, Teena and Yanee Dewoo choose to embrace and transcribe a fragment thereof in this book, in the manner in which it coloured their own thoughts or materialised around them in the past year in Mauritius - as zealous objection to human existence as defined by Science or Religion, and consequently, as a sort of de-stigmatisation of psychosis.
Die Mathematik ist gleichermaßen eine Kulturwissenschaft mit langer Tradition als auch treibende Kraft hinter vielen modernen Technologien und damit Schlüsseldisziplin des Informationszeitalters. Zum einen zielt die Mathematik darauf ab, abstrakte Strukturen und ihre Zusammenhänge zu verstehen; zum anderen entwickelt sie kraftvolle Methoden, um Frage- und Problemstellungen in zahlreichen Wissenschaftsdisziplinen zu behandeln. Moderne Anwendungen der Mathematik liegen beispielsweise in den Bereichen der Datensicherheit und -kompression, der Verkehrssteuerung, der Bewertung und Optimierung von Finanzinstrumenten oder der medizinischen Operationsplanung.
In dieser Broschüre stellen wir Ihnen das Profil der Frankfurter Mathematik in Forschung und Lehre sowie speziell die Studiengänge
• Bachelor Mathematik
• Master Mathematik
vor. An der Goethe-Universität ist es auch möglich, Mathematik auf Lehramt (L1, L2, L3, L5) zu studieren. ...
Repertorium
(2015)
Register
(2015)