bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Co-operation in African Acquisitions: SCOLMA looks to the future
Authors: McKee Malcolm
Published: April 2022

SCOLMA has now existed twenty-three years. One of its basic aims throughout its existence has been to promote library co-operation in the acquisition of African material.

SCOLMA has achieved much on very slender resources. The Area Specialization Scheme in particular has resulted in much African material being available in this country, which would otherwise have never been collected. Inevitably, it has not been wholly successful, as the participating libraries have had varying degrees of success in their endeavours. This has been due to the inability of some libraries to devote sufficient resources to the project, and the fact that some libraries have attached more importance to it than others for various reasons.

SCOLMA has always understood that priorities can change over the years, and that academic interests in member-libraries’ institutions cannot be expected to remain the same for ever.
Parker’s Piece
Authors: Larby P.M.
Published: April 2022

The government cuts of the early 1980s have dealt harshly with Oriental and African area and language studies in Britain’s univerisites. Between 1981 and 1985 London University's School of Oriental & African Studies (SOAS), the major world institution in these fields, lost 37% of its budget and 25% of its teaching staff - those from its Department of Africa’s language teaching establishment dropped from thirty to nine. The continent of Africa boasts more than 1,000 languages: SOAS can now offer teaching in only nine. In other universities staff losses in African studies number some fifty posts of which only fourteen have been replaced. African studies in general have been reduced from inter-disciplinary programmes of area studies to a subordinate status within subject disciplines.
African Studies, Africanistics or Africanology: The German Approach
Authors: Brann Conrad Max Benedict
Published: April 2022

The ambivalence of the term Afrikanistik is shown by its use in two works, one edited by Professor Bernd Heine (University of Cologne) Recent German research on Africa: language and culture, the other by Professors Hermann Jungraithmayr (now University of Frankfurt) and J.G. Moehlig (University of Cologne) entitled Lexikon der Afrikanistik; afrikanische Sprachen und ihre Erforschung. Whilst the former uses the term Afrikanistik to include languages and culture, as defined by Diedrich Westermann in the original title of the International Institute for African Languages & Cultures, the latter takes a more narrow interpretation of the discipline, as representing African linguistics stricto sensu.
A Brief Survey of the Existing Literature on Science and Technology Relating to Lesotho
Authors: Ambrose David P.
Published: April 2022

The elusive nature and the rapid expansion of the total literature relating to African countries call for guides which can save time in the search for information. The following is designed as a contribution in relation to Lesotho. It also provides an example of the diversity of publication sources for materials on a single country. Some of the more recent items included may one day (in more detailed annotated form) become a supplement to earlier bibliographic work, part of which was published (Willet & Ambrose, 1980) asLesotho: a comprehensive bibliography.Approximately 300 of the 2562 entries in this book (compilation completed in 1977, but published only three years later) are concerned with science and technology. There is now, however, more than enough additional material to produce a second volume as large as the original 550-page book.
Some constraints to agricultural development in Tropical Africa
Authors: Russell E. W.
Published: April 2022

It is a commonplace of discussions in this U.N. Population Year that in many developing countries the rate of increase of food supplies is barely keeping up with increase in population, let alone exceeding it to allow a higher standard of nutrition. Crop yields per hectare in many of these countries remain low to very low, yet in nearly all the heavily populated areas of sub-Saharan Africa, for example, crop yields on Government-financed agricultural experiment stations are appreciably higher than on farmers’ fields just outside their boundaries. There are, in fact, a number of examples of experiment station yields being up to 10 times as high under conditions where adequate farm inputs are used, such as improved seed, adequate fertiliser and pest control, and adequate farm machinery to ensure all farm operations are done on time.
Method and Purpose in Africana Bibliography
Authors: Harris Gordon
Published: April 2022

Why produce bibliographical tools which deal solely with Africa? Some might say that it is passe, or even absurd, to separate Africa from the rest of the world in this way.

But there are several reasons why such bibliographical activity should continue. Firstly, Africana bibliography caters directly for the large community all over the world which studies Africa, namely the Africanist community. Secondly, if a bibliography is confined to Africa, it can afford to be a bibliography in depth. It can afford its own structure and its own classification scheme. A general bibliography or general index can never give the depth or sensitivity that is possible with a completely Africanist bibliography or index. General indexes are bound to be subject-orientated, but an Africanist index provides a list of interdisciplinary references if it has a geographical layout—so important in these days of area studies.
Kings College London Library
Authors: Pound R. W.
Published: April 2022

King's College London agreed to participate in the area specialisation scheme in 1966, with responsibility for the publications of the Portuguese African territories, principally because of its well established Portuguese Department. The College Library already possessed a strong collection of Portuguese history, largely as a heritage of Professor Edgar Prestage's term of office as Camoen Professor, and this included most of the basic secondary works on the history of the Portuguese in Africa. Established links with Portuguese Government agencies, particularly in the Instituto de Alta Cultura and the Junta de Investigações do Ultramar, brought in, as gifts, a continuing supply of monographs in series such as Estudos, ensaios e documentos and Estudos de Ciencias Politicas e Sociais, many of which dealt with the African territories.
Arabic Documentation in Darfur
Authors: O'Fahey R. S.
Published: April 2022

One major obstacle to the study of Sudanese history before the Mahdist period (1885—1898) has been the seeming lack of any substantial documentation of local origin; nowhere was this more so than in Darfur. But it is now becoming apparent that, contrary to previous assumptions, Darfur and probably also Kordofan are very rich in Arabic documents, preserved as family archives, dating from the pre-Mahdist period.

As part of a continuing programme of research on the history of the Darfur Sultanate (c. 1650—1916), I recently visited Darfur on a trip financed by the Norwegian Research Council and sponsored by the Central Records Office (CRO), Khartoum, who kindly arranged for Sayyid Ahmad Ibrahim Uthman of the CRO to accompany me.

During a period of six weeks spent in the Al-Fashir region i.e. around the province capital, a total of over 200 documents from the Darfur Sultans and their officials, and some from Mahdist officials, were located and photographed.
Cataloguing Policies and Problems in Kenyan Libraries
Authors: Thairu R.W.
Published: April 2022

What is presented here is not based on field research as would ideally have been the case but is based on personal observations supplemented with what is in the literature.

Discussion will be related to the basic role of library and information services for national development in recognition of the fact that these services are central to national development, particularly in the non-industrialised countries otherwise generally referred to as developing countries. This was the central theme of the 1984 IFLA Conference in Nairobi The paper discusses two aspects of a practice in library and information services, a practice that enhances the effectiveness of the services in question. In the context of this paper, cataloguing is described as the process through which sources of information in a collection are described in order to facilitate their recall.
The Zimbabwe Documentation Project
Authors: Johnstone I.J.
Published: April 2022

This stage of the Zimbabwe documentation project was made possible by a UNESCO grant which the National Archives sought after Independence in order to locate, list and where possible acquire or copy documentation in Britain relating to Zimbabwe from the earliest times through to the present. Such documentation was seen as ranging from manuscript material through to films and photographs and certain printed and published material. Most of the latter category comprises the output of the Zimbabwe liberation movement when it was in exile in the 1960s and 1970s, which obviously it was difficult to acquire in Rhodesia at that time. In fact it remains difficult to acquire even now since much of it tended to be ephemeral in nature. (The national library is part of the Zimbabwe Archives, which is why the project also encompasses printed items). The intention was also to supplement the written record by interviewing relevant people in Britain for our Oral History Programme.
Computerized datasearching for the African scholar
Authors: Shayne Mette
Published: April 2022

This article will give some insight into problems and advantages of computerized literature searches for the African scholar. I should point out that there are two types of databases, the reference databases which point users to another source, i.e., give the user bibliographic information. Those are the ones I will deal with here. The source databases contain original information or manipulated statistics prepared for specific purposes. I intend to point out areas where a computerized literature search is useful, and areas where there are pitfalls. My experience is that graduate students rarely are familiar with the bibliographic or data sources available to them.

Two different methodologies have been described in the professional literature oh determining the value of certain databases.
The photographic collection of the National Archives of Zimbabwe
Authors: Bourdillon Jane
Published: April 2022

The Illustrations Section of the National Archives of Zimbabwe (NAZ) is administered by the library, which, in addition to being a legal depository, is Zimbabwe’s national reference library. It collects printed and audiovisual materials, relating to this country, both published and unpublished, for permanent preservation. The photographic collection originated as a group of 343 prints and negatives illustrating the country’s history from 1561 to 1924 and collected for an exhibition in 1936, and it has grown into a classified and indexed collection of nearly 23 000 negatives and approximately 26 000 photographs. There is also a number of other large deposits, as yet unprocessed, which will be referred to later. The section strives to reach the twin goals of preserving a photographic record of every aspect of life in this country and of providing a service to members of the public.
Sir Roy Welensky and his archives (Part 2)
Authors: Hargrave J.F.
Published: April 2022

So to the catalogue in detail. It is divided into seven parts, topped and tailed by 25pp. of introductory matter and 107pp. of index of personal names and principal subjects.

Part 1 contains the bulk of the pre-Federation material. It runs to 103 boxes of which the first nine cover Welensky as Director of Manpower, the Northern Rhodesian Executive Council (mainly commuting death sentences imposed on murderers - or not), the Legislative Council and its committees and the Unofficial Members’ Association and the Liaison Office. Twenty boxes house material relating to boards and committees with which Welensky was involved: Rhodesia Railways (the Board and the Higher Authority), Chilanga Cement Works (a project of the Northern Rhodesian authorities in conjunction with the Colonial Development Corporation; references to a cement pool seem to be to collusive marketing arrangements rather than swimming or the mafia) and the Rhodes Centenary Exhibition (1953) at Bulawayo.
“Sorry: no free reading’
Authors: Staunton Irene
Published: April 2022

Following Zimbabwe's Independence in 1980, the Government immediately set about rectifying the inherited inequities in the education system. Free access was given to primary education, and enrolment rose from 820,000 to 2.3 million a decade later. Advances at secondary level were even more dramatic: enrolment increased more than tenfold, to over 700,000 in 1990.

There were many logistical problems to be overcome in order to cater for this huge increase in the number of students: buildings, trained teachers, equipment, books and, of course, the financing of this expansion. I shall only focus on books since it is these which we are discussing today.
Writings on African Archives (Part 1)
Authors: McIlwaine J.H.
Published: April 2022

It is just twenty years since SCOLMA's journals carried a two part survey (one in the last issue of Library materials on Africa, the second in the first issue of its successor, African research & documentation) of writings relating to African archives. Compiled by J.D. Pearson, the first part covered manuscripts and archives in African countries, while the second covered African related material located outside Africa. Pearson was encouraged to undertake his survey of the literature by the discussions at the Nairobi International Conference on African Bibliography of 1967, with its pioneering account of the archival literature prepared by Peter Duignan. As far as I am aware there has been no systematic attempt to cover this literature since, although there have been useful overviews such as David Easterbrook's survey in Africana journal in 1980.
Infotrac and Africa
Authors: Easterbrook David L.
Published: April 2022

InfoTrac is an online periodicals index developed and marketed by the Information Access Company (IAC), of Belmont, California. It is very “user friendly” by design, and can provide for readers printouts of citations in a matter of a few seconds without the assistance of a librarian. The InfoTrac database itself consists primarily of citations from nearly 1000 journals which are also indexed by IAC its Business Index, Magazine Index, and Legal Resources Index retrospective to 1982. In addition material from the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal as indexed in its National Newspaper Index for the previous two months will be found in InfoTrac. The data base is cumulated and updated monthly. In all accounts, both verbal and written, InfoTrac is enormously popular with readers. Much of this popularity, however, seems to focus on the technology of InfoTrac obscuring some important issues not the least of which are the accessibility of the journals indexed and the reliability and relevance of the information to which an unassisted reader is quickly lead.
Documentation on women: possible strategies for networking in Lesotho
Authors: Chadzingwa M.M. Tsidi
Published: April 2022

The objective of this paper is to survey what type of information and documentation on women exists in Lesotho; to examine where and how it is accumulated, disseminated and used; to assess the strengths and weaknesses of those methods in practise, and then to determine strategies on how an adequate documentation system may be developed and be fitted into the existing national, regional and international documentation infrastructure.

It will be noted that the beginning of the UN Decade for Women in 1975 marks the point of departure for this survey. The period is so marked because it prominently opened a debate on women issues; it stimulated research and gave birth to various associations/organisations, all of which generated massive literature as well as introducing vigorous communication on the subject.
A Literature review of written materials on legal deposit laws for Nigerian libraries since 1950
Authors: Erinle E.K.
Published: April 2022

In this paper the author has attempted a review of related literature in three main areas, namely, the importance of legal deposit laws for Nigerian libraries; legal deposit as a special means for collection development for depository libraries and collection strategy problems in depository libraries.

Much has been written about Nigerian library laws since the first legislation was enacted in 1950. “By virtue of Section 3(1) of the publication ordinance 1950, the University of Ibadan Library became one of the two legal depositories for Nigerian publications”. The second depository library at the time was the Secretariat Office, Lagos. The legal force behind deposit was defined by Agidee in his important 1970 article on Library Laws 1948-68: “Laws or legislations are rules made by a state or community for establishment and operation of an institution and that such rules or regulations become binding on the members of the state or community”.
African Studies in Schools - Can the Universities Help?
Authors: Rogers Peter
Published: April 2022

Interaction between University African Studies Departments and African Studies in schools has never been more necessary than at the present time. The current standing of African Studies in the UK is largely a1 monument to the enterprising young academics of the 1950s and 60s who, fired with an enthusiasm born in the heady days of African Independence Movements and decolonisation, risked their academic careers on Africa. They challenged the academic establishments of universities in this country, and to an amazing extent secured funding to establish specialist centres which then proceeded to justify themselves by an explosion of new ideas about Africa.

But the passage of time takes its toll and at the last ASAUK conference I was very conscious of this.
African Studies and the Education of the Public
Authors: Bown Lalage
Published: April 2022

If anyone asks us why we believe more citizens of Britain should have their awareness of Africa increased, what do we answer? Or do we simply say that African Studies is a good intellectual discipline, with no more immediate practical relevance than Latin or Astronomy?

My own belief is that we need a rationale if we are to move into greater activity in the dissemination of knowledge about Africa among the community, and that there are valid rationales to hand. For one, Britain has important economic relationships with various parts of the African continent (Nigeria now being a major trading partner of this country, for instance). For another, even if we don't see Brandt as a full or satisfactory statement, its analysis does underline the complex inter-relationship between us and the Third World. For a third, “what do tney know of England who only England know?” - i.e. it's necessary to understand other cultures in order to become conscious of one's own. For a fourth, the study of Africa is exciting in itself.
Some Comments on Compiling the "Current Bibliography of the Savanna States of Nigeria", and on the Documentation of the Area
Authors: Olden Anthony
Published: April 2022

The aim of the “Current Bibliography of the Savanna States of Nigeria” is to provide a guide to publications and theses on the country's-ten northern states. It appears as a regular feature in Savanna; the semi-annual journal concentrating on Nigeria's northern savanna which was launched at Ahmadu Bello University in 1972. The inclusion of a current bibliography was the idea of Geoffrey J. Williams, one of the two geographers who planned the journal. Dr. Williams compiled the bibliography oh his own up to 1974, when he left Nigeria to take up a professorship at the University of Zambia. He collaborated with John A. Achema (then one of the university library staff) in 1975 and 1976, with myself in 1977, and then stopped because of the difficulties of carrying out such work in Zambia.
Towards an African Index Medicus Background of the Project
Authors: Lippman M J.
Published: April 2022

In much of Africa, there is a vast amount of informational material in the health and medical sector being produced. This material, in the form of research findings, journals, conference proceedings, reports, theses and dissertations, etc. is, however, not being indexed or otherwise controlled bibliographically and therefore inaccessible to the people who need it. Medical and health research depends on exchange of information and it is fundamentally important that ways and means exist for researchers, planners, administrators and practitioners to have ready access to available information sources. This information is important not only to health sector personnel locally in Africa, but can play a significant role in research being done in developed countries.
African Documentation in the Netherlands, and Possibilities for European Cooperation: The Library and Documentation Department of the Africa-Studiecentrum, Leiden
Authors: van Doorn Marlene C.A.
Published: April 2022

This article will provide brief background information about the Afrika-Studiecentrum, its origins, aims, organisational structure and research activities, followed by a more detailed description of the library and documentation department The origins, contents, arrangement, coverage and distribution of the quarterly abstracts journal, Documentatieblad are explained, and are followed by a look at possibilities for European cooperation.

The Afrika-Studiecentrum began as the Leiden branch of the Rotterdam-based Afrika-Instituut, a commercially-oriented institute formally established in 1946 with the aim of promoting Dutch trade with Africa. In 1957 it split off from the parent institution and became an independent foundation, the present Afrika-Studiecentrum. Since then, it has grown from a relatively small documentation centre with a staff barely exceeding 10, to a relatively large interuniversity institute with a staff of around 40.
The Documentation of African Research
Authors: Binns Margaret
Published: April 2022

The role of the International African Institute is to facilitate and promote communication between African scholars working within Africa and between these scholars and Africanists outside the continent

One of the major problems facing African scholars is their lack of access to current books and journals published outside the continent (or even in an African country other than their own). Increasingly they feel they are being marginalised from the mainstream of current debate, unable to participate effectively in international conferences and seminars, reluctant to submit articles for publication in international journals. The Institute has been active in initiating and promoting schemes which attempt to address this problem.
Information provision for rural Ghana
Authors: Alemna A.A.
Published: April 2022

With a population of roughly 15 million, Ghana covers a land area of approximately 92,000 sq. miles., almost the same as that of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The country is divided into 10 regions, with English being the official language used in schools and for business. The educational programme follows, to a large extent, the pattern of Western (chiefly British) ways. A striking and potentially disturbing feature of the population is its youthfulness. The highest population densities are found in the urban and farming areas of the southern part of the country. Despite considerable urbanisation following World War II and independence in 1957, rural dwellers still represent 70-80 per cent of the population. Altogether, there are no less than 75 different languages and dialects, each more or less associated with a distinct tribal group. Fortunately, the divisive tendencies which might be expected to arise from this situation have been kept under control, largely as a result of imaginative governmental policies over many decades.
The challenges of African film bibliography: content and audience
Authors: Schmidt Nancy J.
Published: April 2022

The focus of my discussion will be on Sub-Saharan Africa, since this has been the scope of my work. I will discuss issues related to compiling bibliographies and filrhographies in the past and present – from the 1960s to 1990s. The focus will be on a few of the major challenges which I often think about, but do not know how to resolve.

What is a Sub-Saharan African film, and who is a Sub-Saharan African filmmaker? There is no more agreement on a definition of African film than of a definition of African literature. However, there is much less discussion of definitions of African film than of African literature.

Bibliographies and filmographies are compiled and many generalizations are made about African film without definitions being provided. Compilers and authors seem to assume that others understand their point of reference.
Acquiring books from Southern Africa: a librarian’s view
Authors: Pinfold John
Published: April 2022

The starting point for this paper is the circular written by Mary Jay of African Books Collective shortly after the seminar held at the 1995 London International Book Fair. In this she said ‘We do not really know how much is spent by librarians on purchasing books from Africa, nor do we have a clear idea of how they find out what is available’. This paper is an attempt by one librarian working in an academic library to start the process of finding the answers to those questions, but it should be stressed that what follows represents the experience of one, possibly atypical library, and that to know the full picture, we shall have to wait for the results of the research project currently being undertaken by Doris Matovelo at Loughborough University.
Resource for Sudanese studies: the Sudan Archive of the University of Durham
Authors: Cory E.S.B. , Forbes L.E.
Published: April 2022

The connection between the Sudan and Durham (England) may not be immediately obvious. Indeed, one might wonder why the largest collection of original research material on the Sudan outside the Sudan, apart from the Public Record Office, London, happens to be in Durham rather than elsewhere. In 1957, the year after the Sudan became independent and some years before the Oxford Colonial Records Project and St. Antony's Middle East Private Papers collection were set up, Durham had the three vital ingredients for successful archival enterprise: knowledge and enthusiasm (Mr. R.L. Hill, lecturer in Modern Near Eastern History at Durham University, formerly of Sudan Government Railways); premises and academic support (Professor T.W. Thacker, Director of the School of Oriental Studies, Durham University); and a sponsor in good standing with potential donors, with a Durham interest (Mr. K.D.D. Henderson, formerly of the Sudan Political Service and Secretary of the Spalding Trust).
Library resources for third world studies
Authors: Larby Patricia M.
Published: April 2022

Many libraries in the United Kingdom collect publications which have a bearing on Third World studies. In preparing a relatively short paper on resources for Third World studies it has been necessary to be highly selective in order to give prominence to those collections which are concerned primarily with modern studies,ierecent history and political and economic development of countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America; collections which are intended for in-depth study and research which serve a clientele involved in some way in the affairs of those countries. Such collections are mostly located in government or other official organisations, in universities or other research bodies. In the interest of brevity commercial and industrial libraries are not included, nor are the national and para-national libraries: the British Library, the other copyright libraries, the British Library of Political and Economic Science at the London School of Economics.
Mammals of Africa: Guide to Reference Material
Authors: McIlwaine John
Published: April 2022

In my Africa: a guide to reference material (London, Hans Zell, 1993), works relating to the biological sciences were deliberately excluded. In order to fill a part of this gap, I am hoping to produce a series of lists of major reference sources relating to African flora and fauna. The first listing was concerned with sources relating to the birds of Africa (see ARD, 75, 1997, 12-38); the present article covers African mammals.

In the zoological context, ‘reference material’ is defined as works which can be used to identify mammal species and their distribution within Africa, and to find information on their habits and behaviour. The major categories are:

Taxonomic checklists which attempt to establish complete listings of scientific and popular names for all species known to have occurred within a particular region (zoogeographical, regional, national, a particular game park, etc.).
Center for the Book's South African Journey
Authors: Cole John Y.
Published: April 2022

From May 25-June 4,2004, the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress led “South Africa: A Journey to Promote Reading & Literacy”, a trip that focused on reading and literacy promotion efforts currently underway in schools, libraries, and educational institutions throughout South Africa. The visit took place during the 10th anniversary year of the new South African democracy - and the link between democracy and reading was a theme for the journey and many of the presentations and discussions. Participants learned about the “new” South Africa directly from their South African counterparts, sharing ideas and experiences with people who also believe in the power of books, reading, literacy, and libraries.
The Inter-Agency Material Production Committee (IAMPC), Botswana
Authors: Dintwe Motumi M. , Badisang Bobana E.
Published: April 2022

This paper will focus on the development of the Inter-Agency Material Production Committee, its objectives, terms of reference and their evolution. An assessment on whether the Committee has achieved what it initially set out to achieve will be made.

The idea of forming the IAMPC was conceived at a conference on Libraries and Literacy held in Kanye in 1985. The actual launching of the Committee was done three years later in 1988. The Committee, a joint venture between the Botswana National Library Service (BNLS) and the Department of Non-Formal Education (DNFE) comprised officers of the two departments and other extension departments and NGOs. 30 institutions were represented initially.

The two departments, BNLS and DNFE, were already cooperating in the provision of the Village Reading Rooms Service (VRRs), another joint venture which has been operational since 1986. These are cultural centres set up in primary school classrooms for local rural communities in smaller and remote villages where there are no library facilities.
The location of Colonial Staff and Civil Service Lists in British libraries: a preliminary checklist
Authors: Kirk-Greene A.H.M.
Published: April 2022

In an extensive survey of the published sources available for research into the biographical data of members of the British Colonial Service and its successor (1954), HM Overseas Civil Service (‘Colonial Service biographical data: the published sources’, ARD 46, 1988, 1-16), I identified five principal serial publications beyond such general but limited reference works as Who was who. Dictionary of national biography, The Times and Daily Telegraph obituaries, and my Biographical dictionary of the British colonial governor: 1, Africa (1980). These were:

i.

The Colonial Office Lists, 1862-1966

ii.

The Colonial Service Lists, 1933-1939

iii.

Territorial Staff Lists

iv.

Territorial Civil Service Lists

v.

Colonial Blue Books
The experience of the Institute of Southern African Studies, National University of Lesotho in publishing, marketing and distributing internationally
Authors: Nyeko Janet A.
Published: April 2022

How does an academic publisher identify and reach its intended market? This is especially important when, because of the nature of the publications and a small national market (one university), most of the publications are sold to or exchanged with institutions in northern Europe and America. Also, most of the research, out of which the publications originate, is funded by donor agencies in those countries. The aim of this paper is to discuss how the Institute of Southern African Studies (ISAS) markets and distributes its publications, especially to the developed North. To do so it is necessary to describe briefly how ISAS operates, its publications’ objectives and the clienteles it aims to serve. It is also necessary to assess the marketing strategy.

The Institute of Southern African Studies was established in 1979 to be the research centre of the National University of Lesotho. Its main aim is to promote and coordinate. research on a variety of issues. However, the emphasis is on policy-related and development-oriented research on Southern Africa, and Lesotho in particular.
A sampling of the literature on Burkina Faso
Authors: Rupley Lawrence A.
Published: April 2022

The first edition of Daniel McFarland's Historical dictionary of Upper Volta (Metuchen, N.J. and London, Scarecrow Press, 1978. 217 pp.) was published in 1978. From that time until the early 1990s, McFarland updated many of the entries and collected new materials. Dut to family health considerations he felt unable to complete the second edition. I agreed to undertake that project in 1995 with complete access to his collected material. That volume was published in 1998: Daniel Miles McFarland and Lawrence A. Rupley Historical dictionary of Burkina Faso [fomer Upper Volta (Haute Volta)] 2nd ed. Lanham, MD, Scarecrow Press, 1998. Ixxvii, 279 pp. This article is an outgrowth of that work. Following some general background on the country, this article reviews a sampling of the published literature concerning Upper Volta/Burkina Faso. Where citations are not included in the text, they can be found in the bibliography.
Africa in the Public Records
Authors: Banton Mandy
Published: April 2022

To attempt a discussion of ‘sources for African history in the Public Record Office’ immediately raises the question, ‘are there such sources?’. Or are there only sources for the history of the British encounter with Africa, or, indeed, as some would claim, the English encounter with Africa?

The editor and compilers of the 1971Guide to manuscripts and documents in the British Isles relating to Africamay have such questions in mind when they chose to use the title ‘documentsrelatingto Africa’ rather than perhaps, ‘sources for the history of Africa’. In this volume you will find, in the section devoted to the Public Record Office, twenty-two closely printed pages listing in the region of one thousand record classes.
F.R. Statham's “Mr Magnus”: A Forgotten Novel of Cecil Rhodes
Authors: Pinfold John
Published: April 2022

In her novel of Rhodes, Manly virtues, Anne Harries rightly refers to Rhodes's dislike of Olive Schreiner's Trooper Peter Halket of Mashonaland. What is less well-known is that there was another novel of Rhodes written at this time, which he must have disliked just as much, if not more so. Indeed there is some evidence that he acted to suppress it. The Bodleian Library never received it under legal deposit, and the Library at Rhodes House was only able to acquire a copy through the second hand trade in 1929; this copy has the author's name cut out of the title page, and the words “was suppressed” written on the inside front cover. The copy in the Library of the University of Cape Town bears the additional information “all copies called in”. It remains a work of considerable rarity today.
Britons in Africa: Samuel Pasfield Oliver (30 October 1838-31 July 1907)
Authors: Ofcansky Thomas P. , Barringer Terry
Published: April 2022

Samuel Pasfield Oliver, a Royal Artillery officer who was educated at Eton and Woolwich, was a man of wide and diverse interests. His travels took him to many far away places, including China, Asia Minor, India, Greece, Sardinia, and Nicaragua. However, Oliver is best remembered for his travels in Madagascar and Mauritius. His publications about these two countries encompass an array of topics, including anthropology, geography, military affairs, and travel and exploration. Several of his books, particularly The true story of the French dispute in Madagascar and Madagascar: An historical and descriptive account of the island and its former dependencies, remain classics. Oliver's other works range from travelogues to a history of Cornish castles.
The Special Collection on Publishing in Africa at Oxford Brookes University, Part 2
Authors: Cole Geoff
Published: April 2022

In a previous issue ofARDmy colleague Paul Richardson provided an introduction to the establishment of The Paul Hamlyn Foundation/Code Europe Special Collection on Publishing in Africa in the Library at Oxford Brookes University. Paul writes from the perspective of an academic and a publisher and brings these particular insights to the collection. I write as a librarian and would like to discuss the establishment of the collection from that perspective.

Several events during the last year have given me an insight into the potential of a collection like this.

At the London International Book Fair in March 1998 the Southern African Book Development Education Trust organised a series of seminars under the title of ‘Publishing for Children in Africa’. Speaker after speaker spoke about the potential for development and the urgent need for support of the publishing industry in that continent.
Accidental Archives: Tracing Africa in the India Office Private Papers in the British Library
Authors: Wallace Marion
Published: April 2022

This article deals with the British Library's collections on Africa, and especially with its collection of private papers of India Office officials (with a particular focus on the twentieth century). The choice of India-related collections may seem surprising, but in fact these records contain much that is relevant to African history.

In this article I am concerned not only to describe what is held at the British Library, but to discuss the historical construction of these collections. That is, how factors that might be thought mundane and pedestrian - decisions about the selection or destruction of records, and their preservation and arrangement - affect both the nature of archival holdings and the scholarship built upon them.
Non-specialist Nigerian Archival holdings in the United Kingdom: An introductory overview
Authors: Kirk-Greene Anthony
Published: April 2022

For historians (who, for once, are in the minority in this gathering of Nigerianists) archives represent both the bedrock of research and the essence of the historical record. When, in the context of this symposium, we talk about the archives of modern Nigeria up to 1960, we are really limiting ourself to the colonial period: anything before 1900 is neither ‘modern’ nor, strictly speaking, ‘Nigeria’, and anything after independence relates to artefacts which probably ought to be ia Nigerian rather than British repositories. Naturally, the descriptive term “Nigerian” as used in this archival context refers to anyone who worked in Nigeria or to material relating to Nigeria, and not narrowly to nationals from that country.
The Institute of Commonwealth Studies
Authors: Larby P.M.
Published: April 2022

The Institute of Commonwealth Studies (University of London) exists to promote advanced study of the Comomonwealth of Nations within a research environment. Its activities include the promotion of inter-disciplinary and inter-regional research; courses and supervision for higher degrees; and an imaginative programme of seminars, conferences and publications. Within the Institute's walls are currently housed the British Documents of End of Empire Project and the activities of Dr. Anne Thurston, whose initiatives in the field of archival materials in Commonwealth countries and associated backup programmes of staff training and conservation workshops, have stimulated an awareness of the value of archives in many African countries. The Association of Commonwealth Archives and Record Management has its Secretariat at the Institute.
The Archives of the Royal Geographical Society
Authors: Kelly C.
Published: April 2022

The archives of the Royal Geographical Society (RGS) can be of use to anyone interested in European travellers in Nigeria. The quantity of records is small and there are no large deposits of the papers of important political figures, yet almost all the well known travellers of the 19th and early 20th century are represented there in some way. From its foundation in 1830 the RGS has generated records and correspondence through its own activities and those of its Fellows. In addition the Society has been the recipient of manuscripts, letters, diaries and field notes of those who have felt the RGS to be a suitable home for records of their independent travel or geographical enquiry.

Documents of the 19th century relating to Nigeria reflect, at first, the enthusiasm felt by the government and by the RGS to see the course of the river Niger and its tributaries accurately mapped.
The Natural History Museum
Authors: Banks Rex E.R.
Published: April 2022

The Natural History Museum has been at South Kensington, London in the romanesque style building of Alfred Waterhouse since 1881. Before that it existed as the Natural History Department of the British Museum, when that institution was established in 1759, with the collections of Sir Hans Sloane, offered to the nation on his death in 1753. The separation of the natural history collections to a new building at South Kensington was forced on the Trustees as a result of the rapid growth of those collections since the Museum's foundation, but especially during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. This growth of collections and libraries has, of course, continued right down to the present time, and has compelled the Trustees to transfer some parts of the Natural History Museum to out-stations, such as, for example, the Zoological Museum, Tring, where the ornithological collections are now housed.
Nigerian and other African archives at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
Authors: Hepper F. Nigel
Published: April 2022

Most people know Kew only as a public garden with very special greenhouses and other buildings. Few visitors realise that it is a scientific institution with research laboratories, a great herbarium and archives of all descriptions. In the context of this symposium the living collections in the Gardens are unlikely to be applicable as an archive, although there are many specimens of great historical interest, including the world's oldest greenhouse plant (Encephalartos Iongifolius) which is an African species brought from Natal by Mason in the 1770s.

Over five million dried specimens are housed here in systematic order. They have been received from collectors all over the world during the last two centuries. The Herbarium is especially rich in tropical African collections, including Nigerian. For example those from Theodor Vogel's Niger Expedition of 1841 formed the basis of Hooker's Niger Flora (1849).
Nigeriana in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office Library
Authors: Cousins M.
Published: April 2022

“God did not make Nigeria. The British did” is a remark attributed to a principal chief of Lagos, of the Royal House of Addo. Whether the attribution is correct I cannot say, but the political and geographical entity that we now know as Nigeria was most certainly a creation of the European scramble for Africa in the nineteenth century, and it was indeed the British who coined the name Nigeria itself.

As the Secretary of State for the Colonies was the Minister charged with the duty of advice to the Crown on matters relating to Britain's overseas dependencies, the library of the Colonial Office (CO) naturally reflected these wideranging official concerns and developed into what Sir Charles Jeffries described as “a unique and comprehensive collection… an institution of which the Office is justly proud”.
Nigerian Collections in Pitt Rivers Museum Archives, University of Oxford
Authors: Edwards E.
Published: April 2022

Pitt Rivers Museum is one of the major anthropological museums in the world and as such has considerable object collections from Nigeria. Less known is its archive collection which contains a small but interesting collection of material relating to Nigeria. The Museum has been collecting archival material since its foundation in 1884 and the collections are still growing annually as more material is donated. At present the entire collection stands in the region of sixty manuscript collections of varying sizes and about 70,000 photographic images. The archive collections do not document specific objects in the museum collections (any material of this nature belongs with specific object records) but the broader historical and intellectual contexts which shaped anthropology in general and the Museum's collection in particular. The Nigerian material, although it is somewhat uneven, typifies this collecting policy and comprises both manuscripts and photographs.
National Bibliography in Ghana
Authors: Sam Joel
Published: April 2022

Various governments of Ghana have, at least on paper, shown recognition of the need for a national library, which will undertake as one of its principal responsibilities the preparation of the national bibliography. In January 1963, for example, the Ministry of Education set up a Technical Advisory Committee to advise on the need for a national library. The Committee had several sittings and it did succeed in submitting proposals to obtain some financial support if not for the building of a national library then, at least, for developing some of its functions, including the publication of retrospective and current national bibliographies.

Earlier in 1961, the George Padmore Research Library on African Affairs (GPRLAA) had been established by Dr Kwame Nkrumah, former President of Ghana, in memory of his friend, the late George Padmore, with the objective of providing a centre for the study of African affairs in Ghana.
Factors Influencing Indigenous Publishing in Africa
Authors: Badisang Bobana
Published: April 2022

Citing Ayi Kwei Armah, Kotei has this to say about the plight of indigenous publishing in Africa: “if you [the writer] set out to print anything on your own, the printing costs will stagger you. If you manage to print, the distribution difficulties will blow your mind. If you give your stuff to a local publisher, you will sympathize so much with his problems so that you may not write again…So all our work… appears first to an audience which either regards us like some glass-enclosed specimen…or like an exotic weed to be sampled and made a conversation piece…or else we become some international organization's pet”.

This article assesses the development of the indigenous publishing industry in Sub-Saharan Africa - the economics of publishing in relation to production, marketing and distribution of locally published materials, indigenization, current trends in publishing and the book trade in general, and the roles played by the different bodies concerned.
Matabele Jim: The Journal of an Early White Settler in Rhodesia
Authors: Pinfold John
Published: April 2022

Rhodes House Library has recently acquired a typescript of the journal of “Matabele Jim” Archer Burton (1850-1922) who went out to southern Africa in 1894 to trade with the Matabele and the Mashona and to prospect for gold. There he became involved with Cecil Rhodes’ Chartered Company, and during the rebellion in Mashonaland in 1896 he took part in the Mazoe Valley action, being shot through the face at close range, a wound he was lucky to survive and which left his face disfigured for the rest of his life. He was evacuated to England for hospital treatment, but returned to Rhodesia in 1898, finally leaving the country for the last time in 1901. The original journal, illustrated with pen and ink sketches of great clarity, remains in the possession of Archer Burton's son, but is also destined for eventual deposit at Rhodes House.