Africa

In the first decades of the nineteenth century, no place burned more brightly in the imagination of European geographers--and fortune hunters--than the lost city of Timbuktu. Africa's legendary City of Gold, not visited by Europeans since the Middle...

Finalist for the Bethwell A. Ogot Book Prize to the author of the best book on East African Studies, 2015.In the second half of the 1960s and the early 1970s, the Ethiopian student movement became the major oppositionforce against the imperial regime in...

Groundbreaking look at slaves as commodities through every phase of life, from birth to death and beyond, in early America In life and in death, slaves were commodities, their monetary value assigned based on their age, gender, health, and the demands of...

Soon to be a major motion picture The first close-up look at the hidden world of Somali pirates by a young journalist who dared to make his way into their remote havens and spent a year infiltrating their lives. For centuries, stories of pirates have...

From 1927 until his death in 1979, E.F. Joseph documented the daily lives of African Americans in the Bay Area. His images were printed in the Pittsburgh Courier and the Chicago Defender but not widely published in his home community. A graduate of the...

The first ten editions of The Phylaxis magazine are reprinted here in a bound edition. These magazines are the official instrument of The Phylaxis Society, an association of predominantly African-American Freemasons committed to exploring the history and...

"A Roots for a new generation, rich in storytelling and steeped in history." --Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review "A compelling saga that gives a voice to those that history tried to erase...Poignant and eye-opening, this is a must-read." --Booklist 2021...

Following a bitter Civil War, America ended the abhorrent practice of slavery on Dec. 6, 1865, the day the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution was ratified. Now, the African-American community, along with other minority groups, is being lead back to...

Every so often, a memoir comes along with the power to transcend the events in an individual's life and unite people in a collective movement of inspiration and understanding. The Nature of Shadows is such a memoir. At the risk of painting myself too...

History lies heavily on South Africa, and Adam Hochschild brings to bear a lifetime's familiarity with the country in an eye-opening work that blends history and reportage. Hochschild looks at the tensions of modern South Africa through a dramatic prism:...

Paul Kruger was the dominating figure of Boer-and therefore South African-history of the nineteenth century. His life spanned the time of the Great Trek-the European settlement of the interior-right up to the end of the Second Boer War, and the shadow of...

An introductory guide to the mbira: the spiritual traditions, historical perspectives, and practical applications of a sacred Zimbabwean instrument. In this accessible overview steeped in history and tradition, teacher and student Māhealani Uchiyama...