bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Writings on African Archives (Part 4)
Authors: McIlwaine J.H.
Published: April 2022

For a general introduction to this working bibliography and an account of criteria for inclusion see Part 1 in ARD 62. This section contains a number of items relating to the various West African workshops organized by the Association of Commonwealth Archivists and Records Managers (ACARM), of which copies are available in the library of the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London where the Association has its Secretariat. Although in general in this series of bibliographies entries have not been made for “in-house” finding aids produced by archives, an exception is made here for the extensive series produced by the National Archives of Nigeria. This is because these cyclostyled lists were fairly widely circulated, and certainly many of those produced in the 1960s are available in libraries outside the country (in the U.K. for example in the Institutes of Commonwealth Studies and Historical Research and SOAS at the University of London).
Accessing African Archives, Libraries & Journals: Partnerships, Ethics & Equity in the 21st Century
Authors: Limb Peter
Published: April 2022

In terms of African scholarly resources, the new millennium has begun much as the last ended. Book and journal famines, limited Internet connectivity outside capital cities, and continuing brain and document drains that sap the resources and morale of African scholars and libraries. Co-operation among Africana librarians and between scholars and information workers thus has never been more urgent. The author reports on several important new projects focusing on electronic scholarly communication, publishing, and information resources, including the African e-Journals Project, African Journals Online, and the African Online Digital Library. He also draws attention to the contradictions and ethical issues apparent in some Western collecting practices, for instance the deployment of Western financial muscle to acquire African collections.
On Documenting Africa in the Netherlands
Authors: van Doorn Marlene
Published: April 2022

Almost ten years ago to the day I gave a talk at SCOLMA's 1992 annual general meeting on African documentation in the Netherlands, and possibilities for European co-operation. My talk focused on the Afrika-Studiecentrum (ASC) in Leiden and the work of the Library and Documentation Department. This talk, too, will focus on the Afrika-Studiecentrum. As the only research and documentation centre in the Netherlands devoted exclusively to Africa, the Afrika-Studiecentrum plays a pivotal role in Dutch African Studies and, as in 1992,1 happen to work there, so it is what I know best. I would like to tell you something about the Afrika Studiecentrum's origins and objectives, its research programme and the work of the Library, Documentation and Information Department.
African Studies in Portugal & the Lusophone World
Authors: de Nobrega Alvaro Correia
Published: April 2022

The word “Luso” comes from an old constellation of Iberian-Celtic tribes established in the mountainous areas of today's Portugal and Spain. They were a warlike people who offered fierce resistance to the Roman conquest. However, once the territory was conquered, the romanisation was so intense that, apart from one or two words, little remained of the previous cultural legacy. One cannot even affirm that this ancestral people, the Lusitans, were the main basis of today's Portuguese population. We can, however, see the undeniable importance of these tribes from their numerous archaeological remains. However, as Jorge Dias, an eminent Portuguese anthropologist notes: “the country was destined to be a meeting point of many races, coming from the Mediterranean, like the Phoenicians, who secured the ports, and others from the extreme north, like the Normans who invaded its coasts”.
From Pencil to PC: Bringing Archive Catalogues Online
Authors: Hill Amanda
Published: April 2022

In the last ten years researchers have become accustomed to being able to search the catalogues of university and research libraries remotely: first using the Telnet protocol, but increasingly via the World Wide Web. It has been many years since personal visits to such libraries were necessary in order to discover information about their printed book holdings. Users of academic libraries with these facilities are now used to exploring collections from a distance and arranging access to off-site items in advance of their visit. Union catalogues such as COP AC, which provides access to the holdings of 22 UK university libraries and the British Library, have made resource discovery easier still. For archives, however, the situation has been less straightforward.
Department of Library and Information Science, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria; past, present and future
Authors: Ibrahim Umar
Published: April 2022

It is only courteous to start a discussion of the development of the Department of Library and Information Science at Ahmadu Bello University by first and foremost paying a glowing tribute to two outstanding scholars. The first is F.A. Sharr, who not only recommended in his report On the library needs of Northern Nigeria that a central library training school should be established at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, but went further to propose the types of programmes to be offered in the library school. His report undoubtedly allowed the Department to begin its life with a firm vision of its mission.

The second is Dr. Edward Anthony Olden, who, as noted by Benge (1982, xviii) was involved with the foundation of the Department.
Library and information services in Ibn Kashim Ibrahim Library, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria
Authors: Izah Maimuna
Published: April 2022

Kashim Ibrahim Library, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria is one of the largest libraries in Africa. It is the main library of the university and serves the research and study needs of staff and students located on the main campus.

The origins of the library date back to 1955 when it was established to serve the Nigerian College of Arts, Science and Technology, Zaria Branch. A new and bigger building was put up in 1963. However as the university grew and expanded it became too small and inadequate, and in 1976 the library moved to its present location. This occupies an area of about 13,000 square metres. It has a capacity for holding 500,000 volumes of books and a seating capacity for 2,000 readers. As of September 2003 it has a stock of about 475,600 volumes of books and about 6,350 serial titles.
Film Archives: A Decaying Visual History
Authors: Forbes David
Published: April 2022

The 20th Century saw a movement from the Industrial Revolution to what we could call the Communication Revolution, and perhaps a newer revolution in the past 20 years, which we could characterise as the Information Revolution.

The Communication Revolution began with the discovery of photography (and shortly thereafter, cinema) at the end of the 19th Century. The Lumiere brothers in France, Edward Muybridge in England, and Thomas Edison in America explored the possibilities of moving and still images. Rapid expansion of technology and opportunity saw the rise of revolutionary cinema in Russia, and the emergence of Hollywood - the beginnings of an industry that today engulfs our world with images.
ITDG's approaches to knowledge sharing
Authors: Gibson Sandra
Published: April 2022

The Intermediate Technology Development Group (ITDG) has been involved in the production and dissemination of information, focused on promoting small-scale technology transfer, since it was founded in 1966. We take a positive view on the importance of knowledge: it is both a mission statement and organisational objective.

A challenge for ITDG is to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of knowledge sharing practices. Each of our country or regional offices has a library which serves the needs of staff and the public. Other avenues are being explored to see how we can bring information closer to our key users, the poorest in society. This paper presents various ways in which ITDG is exploring alternative ways of sharing knowledge.
Classifying Africa
Authors: Ndakotsu Tsuzom M.
Published: April 2022

Africa will not easily shed its sensitivity to its past. It is therefore not surprising that there is a high degree of dissatisfaction with the treatment of the continent in the major library classification schemes. Both the LC and the DDC have gone through far reaching revisions which still fall short of what Africa expects for itself. Given that Africa is trying to keep pace with the rest of the world of information, this article argues that rather than continue to whine about neglect, Africa can take its fate into its own hands and in the process make its own contribution to classification by endowing the library world with a home-grown, Africa-based scheme which can help the revisers of the major schemes to integrate properly the continent into the mainstream.
An Unsinkable “Warship” of the Victorian Era: H.M.S. Ascension Island, 1835
Authors: Pinfold John
Published: April 2022

It is well known that during the Cold War Britain was regarded as an unsinkable aircraft carrier; much less well known is the fact that this idea of the island as ship was first thought of by the British over a hundred years earlier when Ascension Island in the South Atlantic was officially regarded as a “Sloop of War of the smaller class.” The Bodleian Library of Commonwealth and African Studies has recently acquired a logbook of this “ship” for 1835, which sheds a fascinating light on life on the island during this period of naval occupation.

Ascension Island was first discovered by the Portuguese in the early 16th century, but as it was so dry and barren (it was many years before a supply of fresh water was discovered on the island) it was neither settled nor much used as a source of supply for the East India fleets of Portugal, Holland or England.
Situation of Archives in Africa: The Case of National Archives of Malawi
Authors: Lihoma Paul
Published: April 2022

The National Archives of Malawi (NAM) is a member of the East and Southern Africa Regional Branch of the International Council on Archives (ESARBICA), a regional body that presently comprises fourteen countries (Angola, Botswana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zanzibar and Zimbabwe). The state of archives in the ESARBICA region varies from country to country owing to the fact that the countries are at different levels economically, politically and otherwise.
“A Monument more Lasting than Bronze”: The Collections of the Bodleian Library of Commonwealth and African Studies at Rhodes House, Oxford
Authors: Pinfold John
Published: April 2022

“The past is only the present become invisible and mute; and because it is invisible and mute its memoried glances and its murmers are infinitely precious. We are tomorrow's past. Even now we slip away like those pictures painted on the moving dials of antique clocks … and we, that were the new thing, gather magic as we go.“

(Mary Webb, in the preface to her novelPrecious Bane, 1924)

This sense of the precariousness of both the past and the present is something that most, if not all, historians must have felt at some time as they search, sometimes in vain, for relevant sources for their research. And archivists and librarians, even as they save what they can from disappearing, maybe for ever, or from the ravages of decay, know that it is perhaps only a small fraction of what should or could be saved.
Public Sector Reform and Records Management in Sierra Leone
Authors: Smith Kelvin
Published: April 2022

Several decades of poor governance in Sierra Leone and the more recent civil conflict have left Sierra Leone's public sector and economic situation in a precarious position. Against this backdrop there is a desperate need to build capacity for public sector management at both central and local levels. Kelvin Smith, of The National Archives (TNA) Records Management Department, has made three recent visits to Sierra Leone as part of a programme to establish a Human Resource Management Office (HRMO) and to implement a Records Management Improvement Programme. TNA has for many years worked closely with the International Records Management Trust on projects such as this.
Materials relating to sport in Africa in the collection of the Melville J. Herskovits Library of African Studies, Northwestern University: an overview
Authors: Guittar Michelle , Easterbrook David L.
Published: April 2022

From its inception, the goal of the Melville J. Herskovits Library of African Studies at Northwestern University has been to collect as comprehensively as possible materials from and related to Africa, regardless of subject. As a result, the Herskovits Library has acquired materials related to sport from its beginning. Formally established as a separate library in 1954, the Herskovits Library traces its origins to the arrival of Melville J. Herskovits at Northwestern University, who was the first anthropologist appointed to the faculty in 1927. Herskovits initially arrived at the university with a research focus on the study of black culture in the western hemisphere, although this quickly changed following two research trips to the interior of Suriname in 1928 and 1929. He conducted research in West Africa for the first time in 1933, and from that time on, his research agenda was increasingly Africa-related.
Boycotts and Bailouts: the archives of the Commonwealth Games Council of Scotland
Authors: Magee Karl
Published: April 2022

In December 2010 the archives of the Commonwealth Games Council for Scotland were transferred to the University of Stirling Archives. The Council is the lead body for Commonwealth sport in Scotland and is responsible for selecting, preparing and managing Scotland's team at the Commonwealth Games. It is one of the seventy-one national Commonwealth Games Associations who are members of the Commonwealth Games Federation which is the parent body for the Games. The bulk of the collection, which consists of approximately one hundred and fifteen linear metres of records, relates to the planning, organisation and administration of the 1970 and 1986 Commonwealth Games, which were both held in Edinburgh. As well as these two major sporting events organised in Scotland the archive also contains material relating to the participation of Scottish athletes at other Commonwealth and Olympic Games.
Anglophone Africa in the Olympic Movement: the confirmation of a British wager? (1948-1962)
Authors: Charitas Pascal
Published: April 2022

In July 2010 I discovered the National Archives (Kew, London) while working on a dual project: my doctoral thesis, and a grant awarded by the Olympic Studies Centre in Lausanne, Switzerland. My goal was to conduct a comparative historical analysis of the administrative and political colonial situations of the United Kingdom and France. I wanted to understand their influence on the integration of the former British and French colonies into the Olympic movement between the end of the Second World War (1945) and the hosting of the Olympic Games in London (1948) on the one hand, and colonial independence in Africa in the 1960s on the other, reflected at the IOC by the creation of the Committee for International Olympic Aid (CIOA) to help the new countries in the Third World.
Archiving a Cameroonian photographic studio with the help of the British Library ‘Endangered Archives Programme’
Authors: Zeitlyn David
Published: April 2022

In 2005 I helped organise an exhibition of the work of two Cameroonian studio photographers in the National Portrait Gallery, London (see ed. Swenson 2005). This arose from my twenty year involvement as a social anthropologist working in Cameroon. One of the photographers, Joseph Chila, introduced me to Jacques Touselle who had taught him photography in the early 1960s. Together we made several visits to ‘Photo Jacques’ in Mbouda, Western Province, and I was shown the pile of boxes containing what I now know to be some 40,000 negatives, which is the legacy of Touselle's 40 year career. The collection is an unparalleled archive of local photographic practices spanning several decades. With the help of the British Library's ‘Endangered Archives Programme’ the negatives are being scanned and catalogued as a first step to ensuring their long term survival.

Since pioneering work in the late 1970s (e.g. Sprague 1978) there has been an explosion of interest in African photography.
Towards the epistolarium: issues in researching and publishing the Olive Schreiner letters
Authors: Stanley Liz , Dampier Helen
Published: April 2022

The Olive Schreiner Letters Project (OSLP) is making use of ‘personal papers’ associated with, amongst a number of other important concerns, the history of Southern Africa, and doing so in an innovative way. The OSLP is transcribing and analysing all of the extant letters of the feminist, social theorist and writer Olive Schreiner (1855-1920), and will contribute theoretically and methodologically to the use of letters and other epistolary materials in social science and humanities research. In addition, the project will publish in digital format transcripts of the complete Schreiner letters, which will be free access. The project is funded by the ESRC (RES-062-23-1286), and is multi-site, led by principal investigator Professor Liz Stanley, and with research and technical teams based at the universities of Edinburgh, Leeds Metropolitan and Sheffield.
“Court Adjourned”: a Colonial Service literary interlude
Authors: Kirk-Greene Anthony
Published: April 2022

From the very beginning immersion and competence in law and administration were looked on as the sine qua non of the District Officer's work. To all intents and purposes, these twin responsibilities could be regarded as his badge of office. In Northern Nigeria a common Hausa word for the DO was for many years Joji, a corrupted form of “Judge”. When I arrived in Muri Division in 1950,1 was introduced to the emir as Karamin Joji, the “small” or “junior” judge. In East Africa the DC was known as Bwana Shauri, the one responsible for affairs and court cases. Instruction in law (but not, I would emphasise, in administration) was a major feature of the Colonial Service training courses at Oxford, Cambridge and later London.
Challenges of Broadening Access to Scholarly E-Resources in Africa - the JSTOR example
Authors: Masinde Siro , Okoh Toja
Published: April 2022

African libraries at higher learning and research institutions have undergone a lot of transformation with the advent of the internet. The structural adjustment programmes introduced by the Bretton Wood institutions that emphasised cost sharing in higher education and reduced spending by governments on education resulted in the near collapse of African libraries since most could no longer afford to subscribe to journals due to reduced grant funding for institutions and subsequent cost cutting measures at these institutions (Banya & Elu, 2001; Teffera & Altbach, 2004). In the 1990s it became imperative that drastic measures needed to be taken in order to reverse the deteriorating situation in which most African institutions were becoming cut off from current research and thinking from elsewhere. Several initiatives to increase the availability of scholarly information in Africa emerged, mostly driven by donors and non-governmental / non-profit institutions.
Asians and Uganda: a bibliography and introductory essay
Authors: Mickleburgh Andrew
Published: April 2022

Asians have played important roles in the social and economic history of Uganda from the start of the colonial period up to the present. Asians had contact with the East African Coast for at least 2000 years. The first Asians to arrive in Uganda were troops from the Punjab, sent to join the colonial army in the mid-1890s. They were followed immediately by indentured workers and ‘free migrants’. Although some colonial officials viewed Asians as important agents in social change and sought to encourage the indentured workers to settle in Uganda, less than twenty percent chose to remain after their contracts expired.

For much of the twentieth century growth of the Asian population in Uganda was due to migration and natural increase in roughly equal proportions. Most migrants came from either the Punjab or Gujurat in Western India, but were not in any sense a homogenous group.
Eric M. Bonner, Africana bookseller
Authors: Pollak Oliver B.
Published: April 2022

Eric M. Borgzinner was born in London in 1903. His father, a German Jew, had emigrated to England as a young man. During the First World War the family changed its name to Bonner. Eric trained reluctantly for a career in banking. He served in the British Army during the Second World War ending his contribution, using his German language skills, in an Allied denazification project. Following the war he pursued his true passion, bookselling. He probably started as a “runner,” purchasing single items from one bookseller and making a few shillings or a pound by reselling it to a bookseller who specialized in the item.

Between 1949 and 1970 Bonner, an antiquarian bookseller, produced at least 39 catalogues, about two per year, almost all of which are in the British Library. He specialized in Africa, Australia, New Zealand, voyages, exploration, with some attention to the East and West Indies.
Some highlights in AMLIB's 21 years of existence
Authors: Fraser Maryna
Published: April 2022

Twenty-one years ago, on 1 May 1978, an historic workshop was held which led to the formation of the Association for Archivists and Manuscript Librarians (AMLIB). This name was suggested by founder member Dr A M Lewin Robinson, and Dr Moonyean Buys provided the Afrikaans version as well as the format for the Newsletter. Hosted by Professor Reuben Musiker at the University of the Witwatersrand the theme of the workshop was Current Issues Confronting Archivists and Manuscript Librarians. The issues discussed were ‘A Coordinated Collecting Policy, Problems of Copyright, Sensitive Material’ and ‘Care of Collections.’

At the end of a stimulating and fruitful day the delegates resolved that an association should be formed and a steering committee was appointed, comprising Maryna Fraser (Barlow Rand Archives), Anna Cunningham (University of the Witwatersrand Library), and Marie Coetzee(University of South Africa Library).
Sources of Literature on Nigerian Visual Art Since 1960: history, potentialities and constraints
Authors: Emi Rod Adoh , Adetoro Niran
Published: April 2022

A major constraint to the study of the visual arts as a school subject in Nigeria today is the dearth of art literature such as learned journals and textbooks. Several factors have also contributed to this problem. It is the objective of this paper to examine these and assess their impact on the study of visual arts in Nigeria in contemporary times. In doing this, it will mention the efforts that some individuals, groups of persons and organisations have made and are still making to address the problem. It concludes by stating that much could still be done to meet the demands for books on visual arts in order to enhance the study of the subject now and in the future.
Institutional Repositories at the University of Botswana Library: Opportunities and Challenges
Authors: Kgosiemang Rose T.
Published: April 2022

Institutional Repository (IR) is seen as a new way for an institution to contribute to the broader world of scholarship. The system is also seen as a collaboration between libraries, technologists, administrators, and faculty to enhance access to the scholarship of the institution. Preserving the institution's intellectual property and increasing the institution's visibility and prestige are some of the reasons for establishing an institutional repository (Macha and De Jager, 2011). Giesecke (2011) is of the view that institutional repositories require carefully thought plans, mutual consultation among all stakeholders and “with intellectual leadership from the faculty and the library working in partnership” there will be successful preservation and continued fostering of the growth of the human knowledge.
The Value of Managing Library Information Resources in Digital Form in Uganda
Authors: Mukasa Geoffrey , Kamusiime Nicholas
Published: April 2022

The explosion of information in libraries has led to several means and measures of managing this information. New technologies are driving new developments in electronic publishing and learning and people have become increasingly dependent on digital information and the internet as a medium for gaining and exchanging information. There is growing evidence in Uganda of successful digitisation projects to develop digital resources. Libraries and Archives have embarked on digitising their information resources to provide access to and to preserve their unique materials in their collections.

The records at UCU have been digitised and made available in both digital and microfilm format. The digitised Archives of the Church of Uganda Office of the Archbishop are divided into series and these are: Administrative Records, General File, Dioceses, Programs/Activities/Institutions, and Related Organisations.
Log Analysis and Text Mining on Internet Access to Dissertations of the INSEPS (Institut National Superieur de l'Education Populaire et du Sport) Dakar, Senegal
Authors: Rossi Pier Luigi , Thiaw Anastasie
Published: April 2022

The dissertation collection of INSEPS (Higher National Institute of Popular Education and Sport, Dakar, Senegal) consists of 152 documents (PDF format) related to academic work submitted between 2005 and 2008 (2005:21,2006:29, 2007: 45 and 2008: 57) as well as all references to available dissertations of INSEPS’ library (imported from a CDS/ISIS database).

These have, since January 2011, been hosted on the BEEP (Electronic libraries in partnership) website which uses the Greenstone software (Rossi, 2011). Pdf files of the collection were created either by scanning paper or by converting electronic versions (Word files). The collection of electronic documents was achieved as part of the SIST (System for Scientific and Technical Information) project funded by the MAEE (French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs).
Endless Possibilities: Why Africa keeps travel writing alive
Authors: Saro-Wiwa Noo
Published: April 2022

Why do we travel? Sometimes we are curious, sometimes we are looking for profit; sometimes we are escaping the mundane or running away from circumstances; some travellers are looking for romance or a chance to immerse themselves in a landscape they love. We travel to understand ourselves as well as the place we are visiting. And our journeys reveal hidden aspects of our character. We may become more adventurous, or perhaps surprise ourselves with our timidity or latent prejudices.

It is hard to pin down exactly when travel as a recognised genre first began. Expeditions are one of the oldest human endeavours, and people, be they military officers, missionaries, explorers, scientists or migrants, have combined it with literature ever since linear alphabets were invented. Travel writing as a genre is thought to have begun with Herodotus, the Greek historiographer, who reported from foreign lands in the fifth century BC. Travel literature became popular in China during the Song Dynasty between the 10th and 13th centuries, and it featured strongly in Arab literature from the 15th century onwards.
‘Nigeria is my Playground’: Pẹlu Awofẹsọ's Nigerian travel writing
Authors: Jones Rebecca
Published: April 2022

Since the turn of the millennium a crop of travel books by Africans or Africans in diaspora describing their travels within Africa have appeared to assert a fresh African self-representation in travel writing. Noo Saro-Wiwa's travel book Looking for Transwonderland (2012) tells the story of British-Nigerian journalist and travel writer Saro-Wiwa's travels around Nigeria for the first time since the death of her father Ken Saro-Wiwa. Looking for Transwonderland describes Saro-Wiwa's journey all over Nigeria, from Lagos to the north via the east and southwest, including a stop in her father's village in Ogoniland. Saro-Wiwa represents herself as a pioneer, one of the first travel writers of western-published, tourist-oriented travel writing about a country which in global tourism terms is “this final frontier that has perhaps received fewer voluntary visitors than outer space” (p.8).
The Internet and the Democratisation of Knowledge Production: An Africanist Historian's Perspective
Authors: Sharp Thomas
Published: April 2022

The end of the Cold War is said to have brought an end to the sanctity of national sovereignty in sub-Saharan Africa, by opening up authoritarian regimes to international pressures for economic and political reform (Konings, 2011). Donor conditionalities of good governance coincided with protests from local populations, who increasingly formed part of a global civil society constituted by transnational activist networks (Keck and Sikkink, 1998; Comaroff and Comaroff, 1999). Within these intertwined processes of globalisation and democratisation, Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) were seen to play a crucial role (Wasserman, 2011). In particular, the internet formed the basis for a new “digital public sphere”, which could circumvent the political and territorial restrictions of authoritarian African states (Mudhai, Tettey, & Banda, 2009). Whilst the initial optimism of this “netaphoria” was significantly tempered by the turn of the millennium, it has recently been resurrected with the “social media revolutions” in the Arab world (Khondker, 2011).
Looking for Africa: Sources in London Archives at London Metropolitan Archives (LMA)
Authors: Wiltshire Richard
Published: April 2022

This paper is based on a talk given to SCOLMA on the 3 November 2014 by Maureen Roberts, Senior Development Officer and Richard Wiltshire, Senior Archivist Business Archives at London Metropolitan Archives.

This article explores sources on Africa in the collections at London Metropolitan Archives and highlights the strong links London had with the African continent and its people. Particular focus is given to the archives of Standard Chartered Bank, and of Eric and Jessica Huntley, Black publishers and to associated cataloguing and outreach projects the repository has been involved in.

Based in Clerkenwell, London Metropolitan Archives is the largest local authority archive in the United Kingdom and holds over 105 linear shelf kilometres of archives. Managed by the City of London Corporation, London Metropolitan Archives collects records relating to pan-Greater London and the City of London Square mile. London Metropolitan Archives is open to the public as a free service for all including family historians, academics, school children, community and other user groups.
The Thomas Hardie Dalrymple Grassfields Photographs Collection 1937-1942 (Royal Commonwealth Society Collections, University of Cambridge Library)
Authors: Fubah Mathias Alubafi
Published: April 2022

Collections of photographs by colonial officers, missionaries and medical personnel taken during the colonial era, can be found in many public and private archives and museums, in Africa, Europe and America. Although the existence of most of these collections have been made known to the public through exhibitions, catalogues and publications (Geary 1991, 2000; Webb 1987, 1988), some have received scant or no attention. This, however, is in spite of the role of colonial photographs as “testimony about early explorations and distant peoples and places” (Geary 1988). Colonial photography, Geary notes, is part of the “discourse about foreign worlds and foreign peoples—a discourse revealing as much about ‘us’ as it reveals about ‘them'” (Geary 1988: 11).
Africana Personal Papers at Indiana University: issues and questions
Authors: Frank-Wilson Marion
Published: April 2022

Indiana University (IU) owns several collections of Africana personal papers. In this presentation, I will discuss this conference's theme, that is the research potential of such papers, from a librarian's perspective, based on my work with those collections, and based on research which resulted from this work.

First, a brief overview of IU's collections of personal papers:

While IU's Africana collection in the Wells Library (i.e., the main library) is primarily a working collection, it also includes several collections of personal papers. Probably the most notable among them is the

• H.K. Banda Archive: this archive, dating mostly from the 1950s to the 1990s, was given to us by Dr. Don Brody, the late President Banda's official biographer.
Personal Archives in the Library of the University of Botswana
Authors: Kgosiemang Rose T.
Published: April 2022

The 1998 University of Botswana Collection Development Policy compiled by J.O. Asamani, the then Acquisitions Coordinator, is explicit on materials generated through purchase. It is also clear on acceptance of gifts and donations. The policy was not specific on the collection of private archives even though it did not sanction the function. The whole process of collection development has since been narrowly confined to published collections and papers that are either published in journals or those that have been presented at workshops and conferences. It is the view of the present paper that for the sake of the interested user it is important for the collection development policy to stretch beyond published material.

The University of Botswana library has been in existence since 1971. The UB Library system consists of the main library on the Gaborone Campus and three branch libraries.
Characteristics of Visually Impaired Information Users in Nigeria
Authors: Adetoro Niran
Published: April 2022

Persons with visual impairment have been known to experience functional loss of vision or visual incapability which cannot be rectified by refractive corrections, medications or surgery (Adetoro, 2009). Visually impaired persons experience eye disorders which include retina degeneration, albinism, cataracts, glaucoma, muscular problems that result in visual disturbances, cornea disorders, diabetic retinopathy, congenital disorders and infection (Arditi and Rosenthal, 1998). They contend with visual system defects which affect their individual ability to perform activities of daily living. These conditions include partial sightedness, low vision and total blindness.

The visually impaired rely on alternative formats such as Braille, large prints and talking book or audio recordings to meet their reading needs.

In Nigeria, the population of the visually impaired is estimated at 3 million (Atinmo, 2002). Very few of these have received formal education and are capable of reading or writing Braille. The majority resort to begging on the streets as a means of livelihood (Adetoro, 2009).
Museums, Libraries and Archives: Collaborating for the Preservation of Heritage Materials in Nigeria
Authors: Zaid Yetunde , Abioye Abiola
Published: April 2022

Preservation of heritage materials constitutes a big challenge to heritage institutions in Africa. The challenge of heritage preservation in the tropics seems to be overwhelming due to a number of factors which include the harsh tropical environment, absence of a preservation policy and general lack of preservation awareness and appreciation of the importance and sensitivity of heritage materials. The strategic role of preservation to the survival of and long term access to heritage materials cannot be over-emphasised. It not only prevents or delays deterioration but also ensures access. “Without preservation, access becomes impossible and collections will decay and disintegrate” (Drijfhout, 2001). The greatest obstacle to access is deterioration or loss of collection.

National heritage institutions such as the National Library, the National Archives and the National Museums are in the forefront in the preservation of heritage materials in Nigeria.
Bookselling and the library: a partnership for enhancing the book trade in Ghana
Authors: Alemna A. A.
Published: April 2022

The paper describes the types of booksellers in Ghana, their problems, and the library's role as a partner with booksellers for enhancing the book trade in Ghana. The writer is of the view that the future of bookselling in Ghana does not appear gloomy. There are several ways in which libraries can help in promoting the book trade in Ghana, and attempts must be made to develop this partnership.
A Very Different Land: Echoes of Kenya in the 1930s and '40s
Authors: Sunman Hilary
Published: April 2022

‘A Very Different Land’ tells the story of how the strong . agricultural economy of present day Kenya is based on the agriculture of the Colonial period, a story told through the eyes of my father and his colleagues. My father, Owen, was an Agricultural Adviser in Kenya from 1928 to 1950, rising from Assistant Agricultural Officer to assistant director of the department. It was a period which saw a transformation in farming throughout all parts of Kenya.

Kenya was always part of my life. I grew up surrounded by talk of life in Kenya, and it was a benchmark of comparison and memory. My parents both loved their life there and my childhood was full of reminiscences and Swahili phrases; when we went to France and my parents were searching for a word in French, out came a word in Swahili.
2013: The Year of David Livingstone
Authors: MacKenzie John M.
Published: April 2022

The first minister of Scotland, Alex Salmond, delivered his 2012 Christmas message in front of a portrait of David Livingstone at the exhibition in the National Museum of Scotland. Salmond stressed the values and achievements of the great Scot and suggested that they should energise Scots to fresh accomplishments in the future. This adoption of Livingstone as a heroic ideal to be followed in the present symbolically heralded the year of events, conferences, publications and web developments for the bicentennial year.

This report summarises the extraordinarily diverse way in which Livingstone, born on 19th March 1813, has been commemorated in a variety of different communities, academic, museum, public, medical, and religious - in both Scotland and in Africa. There was an exhibition at the National Museum of Scotland with an accompanying book edited by Sarah Worden (reviewed elsewhere in this issue).
Images of Africa at Kew Gardens
Authors: Fitzgerald Syvia
Published: April 2022

Africa had long been of interest in Europe - as we see in the herbals of Charles de l'Escluse (1601), & Mathias de l'Obel (1650). Kew's interest in Africa stems from the earliest days of the Gardens, which were set up in 1759 for Princess Augusta under the supervision of William Aiton, advised by Lord Bute & Sir John Hill. Hill's Hortus Kewensis, published in 1768 lists many trees, shrubs and herbaceous plants from Africa, describes Fritillaria longifolia as new from the Cape of Good Hope and gives a coloured plate of it.

Princess Augusta died in 1772, and her Gardens passed to King George III (Farmer George), who appointed Sir Joseph Banks as botanical director. Banks was sharply aware of the worth of field exploration - he had himself just returned from 3 years with Captain Cook on ‘The Endeavour’ during which they explored the South Pacific and coastal Australia.
Organization, cataloguing and storage of photographic materials
Authors: Falconer John
Published: April 2022

I ought at the outset of this paper to offer two disclaimers. The first relates to my presence at a conference specifically devoted to African subjects, since my present work with the India Office Library collections brings me into very little contact with material from that continent. The second is that while the question of storage of photographs has important conservation implications, I make no claims to either qualifications or indeed expertise in this field. As regards the first point, I can claim some past acquaintance with African photographs, but would also say that for the purposes of discussing general questions of cataloguing and storage the problems are, broadly speaking, similar for all historical photographs. As to storage and conservation, such decisions as are made in this area are inevitably connected to more general cataloguing questions and I will therefore do no more than raise a few broad points in this regard.
Medical Practices in World War 1 Africa - An Overview
Authors: Samson Anne
Published: April 2022

The centenary of the Great War has led to a widening of interest in aspects of the African theatre. Until 2013 the focus was mainly military. Since then, social and cultural aspects have come more to the fore with particular emphasis on the diversity of the participants. Focusing on East Africa as the main African theatre of conflict, the works by Michelle Moyd, Edmund Yorke and Jan-Bart Gewald amongst others are examples of the recent trend.

More recently, working with the diaries of medical officers, such as Norman Parsons Jewell, who served in Africa, highlighted the value of medical records to understanding the conditions faced by the military authorities in fulfilling their task. References to medical services and interactions between forces in memoirs of German participants suggest that rich comparisons can be made between the various imperial powers which saw service in Africa.
‘Publish or Perish’ in African Studies: New Ways to Valorise Research
Authors: Limb Peter
Published: April 2022

New modes of publishing African Studies accelerate research, creating digital repositories, but valuing the outcomes is complex, and contested. For tenure of both librarians and academics, refereed publications remain the Holy Grail. Fears of quality decline accompany a rise in self-publishing and inverse social media brevity. Valuing works requires reliable sources, but permanency concerns remain: online news in Africa can quickly disappear, as evident with Ebola reporting; and if you trust Google, in African languages some news never occurred! But at the same time, new modes of publishing and communication allow wider review, and the contesting of canon. Twenty years ago, Africanists hoped open access credentialing was just around the corner. This has not eventuated but a measure of recognition is conceded as society itself goes online. Blogs and open access journals will not clinch jobs, but they can let scholars leave an imprint. Graduate digital courses with blogs replacing essays and completed projects offered back to libraries show a trend to capacitise a new generation of teachers, valorising research. Librarian job descriptions insist on digital skills. Granting bodies privilege the digital. Publishers go online. African studies associations hold digital workshops. If output in core media maintains centrality in ranking and citation then there is now a merging of forms. New books appear, some to acclaim, using digital sources, new knowledge discovery techniques emerge. Across all these trends, there will remain a need to balance digital and print collected by libraries, and refereed writing with more spontaneous communication, but their boundary is likely to narrow.
When and why is a collection “hidden”? Awakening interest in the Hornung Papers at West Sussex Record Office
Authors: Court Nichola
Published: April 2022

SCOLMA's 2013 conference was based on the Research Library UK (RLUK)'s 2012 report, Hidden Collections, which SCOLMA defined as “material for which there is no online presence” in its pre-conference publicity. Many researchers are made aware of collections and documents in the custody of West Sussex Record Office via online sources such as the National Register of Archives (NRA), Access to Archives (A2A) - still an extremely useful resource, even though new catalogues and additions to existing catalogues can no longer be entered - and our own website, using our Search Online facility. The purpose of this paper is not to dispute the importance of an online presence in our increasingly digital world.
African Books Collective: African Published Books in the North
Authors: Cox Justin , Kitchen Stephanie
Published: April 2022

This is a presentation about the African Books Collective that for some 30 years has distributed African published academic, literary and children's books around the world. The aim of the paper is to provide some insights into how books published in Africa are making their way to libraries with collections on Africa, and to discuss current and future trends; it being understood that ‘decolonising library collections’, the theme of this conference, would by rights involve acquiring and maintaining materials from outside the global North.

Upon its creation in 1990, ABC represented a large number of university presses on the continent and independent publishers, some of which are large firms still trading today. Today few university presses are trading or publishing new books. This work was largely picked-up by private independent publishers and research institutes such as CODESRIA, OSSREA, the Institute of Southern African Studies and others.
Accessing UK Archival Holdings from South Africa
Authors: Davis Joanne
Published: April 2022

This paper presents my ideals for ensuring that African researchers and those from the Global South achieve direct access to UK archival holdings with the time and consideration required to make substantive interventions in our research projects and fields of study. My observations and recommendations are derived from my experience of archival research gained as I travelled across the United Kingdom unearthing records of the 19th century Xhosa intellectual, the Reverend Tiyo ‘Zisani’ Soga, for my doctoral studies of Soga's English works. Soga had studied in Glasgow and Edinburgh between 1846 and 1856 and was ordained as a minister in the United Presbyterian Church of Scotland (UPC); in 1857 he returned as a missionary to the AmaXhosa with his newly-wed bride, Janet, née Burnside.
Indigenous Publishing in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Chronology and Some Landmarks
Authors: Zell Hans M.
Published: April 2022

This chronological timeline sets out some of the key dates, events, and landmarks in the development of indigenous publishing in Sub-Saharan Africa. It also includes details of the major conferences, meetings or seminars on African publishing, held in Africa or at venues elsewhere, since 1968. An earlier version of this chronology first appeared in The African Publishing Companion: A Resource Guide, and has now been updated through to the period up to 2019, and considerably expanded to include publication of a number of benchmark studies, conference proceedings, journals, and reference resources on the African book world.

Whereas Africa's association with printing and literature goes back many centuries – indeed, many African countries have a long and prolific artistic and literary history – the beginning of publishing probably started with the advent of Islam in the seventeenth century.
The Afro-Turks: a call for study and inclusion
Authors: Alabi Adesanya M.
Published: April 2022

Migration – forced or voluntary – is a constant in human history. The African diaspora as a result of the Atlantic slave trade has been much studied. The story of the Afro-Turks is less well known. This article explores the possibility of building an archive and recording oral histories. It attempts to evaluate the available resources about the Afro-Turks in the modern Turk state of Turkey and asks: When, how and from where did African people come to Turkey? How do they understand their history? And what is their place, as an ethnic minority, in modern Turkey?

On June 11,2013, a great crowd of the people converged at Gazi Park, Istanbul to express their displeasure at the news that the Turkish government under Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan planned to use the greenish park for the erection of a Mall.