bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Famine in Africa: A Bibliographical Survey
Authors: Seeley Janet
Published: April 2022

In the course of planning a general bibliography of African famine, it became apparent that there were a number of problems raised by the multiplicity and variety of recent publications in this field. At a time when renewed interest has been triggered by the images of African famine on the television screens of the wellfed world, the researcher can no longer gather data exclusively from specialized journals. More diverse sources such as Marxism Today, New Society, and Past and Present, which normally pay comparatively little attention to African events, have in the last year published articles on African famine; it would seem that ‘everyone’ has a licence to write about famine. This deluge of recent publications joins a mass of literature on African famine which has been building up over the last century and a half: historical accounts, colonial records, economic reports, technical hand books, newspapers, periodicals and books.
Biographical Sources for Colonial History in Africa
Authors: Simpson D H
Published: April 2022

Tony Kirk-Greene has described to you some of the separate biographies and autobiographies relating to Colonial Administrators in Africa, and also the Staff Lists, Blue Books and other works recording their careers. I would like to follow this by looking at the value of more general biographical reference works in this respect.

The most familiar of such works are the Dictionary of National Biography and Who's Who. The DNB, originally published in 63 volumes, containing 29,000 entries, between 1882 and 1900, supplemented in three further volumes and now brought up to date with ten year supplements, the latest of which brings it to 1970, concentrates on British biographies, but has also included what was originally called “Colonial achievement”, including administrators.
The School of Oriental and African Studies Library: Africa Division
Authors: McKee M D
Published: April 2022

The growth of the Africa Division of the Library has reflected the growth in the range of the School's activities in African studies. Before the war the emphasis was on languages, but since the war the policy has been to expand into the fields of the humanities and social sciences.

Works on African languages and cultures now total about 32,000. The African languages section is very strong and the collections in the humanities and social sciences are being built up as rapidly as finances permit.
The Information Services of the Tropical Products Institute
Authors: Piper Kenneth
Published: April 2022

The Tropical Products Institute (TPI) helps developing countries to derive greater benefit from their plant and animal resources by dealing with the scientific, technical and economic problems that arise after harvesting. This is done by the provision of an advistory and information service, the supply of experts and training facilities and by carrying out research and development studies. TPI is one of three scientific units of the Ministry of Overseas Development; the other two units are the Land Resources Division and the Centre for Overseas Pest Research. The purpose of this article is to describe the work of TPI's Information Department, particularly the services provided by its Library and Technical Index, and also to indicate the range of publications it produces.

TPI has its origin in the Plant and Animal Products section of the Scientific and Technical Department of the Imperial Institute which began its work in 1894.
African Studies in Australia
Authors: Higgott Richard
Published: April 2022

It was originally intended that this article would be the result of an informal “sounding” of a few Australian academics. After several such “soundings”, it became increasingly obvious that there was sufficient interest in Africa to warrant a reasonably detailed survey of the existing situation. A short questionnaire was therefore drawn up with the hopes of obtaining the following information:

(i)

The names of academics and postgraduate students with a research interest in Africa.

(ii)

The nature of this research and any resulting publications.

(iii)

Courses taught in Australian universities concerning Africa, or which contained a substantial African interest, and approximate number of students involved each year.

(iv)

What would be the level of support for the calling of a conference/meeting of academics with an African interest?
Caribbean research in African Studies: an index to ASAWI bulletin / Caribbean journal of African studies
Authors: Rouse-Jones Margaret D.
Published: April 2022

The African Studies Association of the West Indies (ASAWI) came into being in 1967 for the primary purpose of promoting a scholarly interest in African Studies in the Caribbean area. In the context of this region, the term “African Studies” was to be used to include elements of African culture which persisted in or had an influence on institutions in the region. ASAWI aimed at making a contribution to the body of scholarship on African topics, especially in subjects where West Indian sources and interpretations would add another dimension. ASAWI Bulletin (hereafter Bulletin) was a major forum through which the Association disseminated information to the public.

Eight issues of the bulletin were published between 1967 and 1976. It began as a mimeographed item, but after three issues it appeared in printed form. By the time eight issues had appeared, the editors acknowledged that the Bulletin from its inception had “showed signs of life more akin to a journal.“
A bibliography of the published & unpublished writings of A.T. Matson
Authors: Matson A.T. , Simpson D.H.
Published: April 2022

Albert Thomas Matson, ‘Mat’ to his many friends, was born in Sipson, Middlesex in 1915. He was educated at Southall Grammar School before joining the Royal Army Medical Corps in 1939.1n 1944 he was seconded to the Colonial Service in Kenya as a Health Inspector. After serving in Kisii he was transferred to Nandi District in 1949, where he remained until his retirement fourteen years later.

His interest in Kenyan history arose from a request from Senior Chief Elija arap Chepkwony and his colleagues of the Nandi District Council that the history of their people should be written. Matson responded to their request by undertaking research into oral history in the course of his travels as a Health Inspector and by consulting and copying a great range of archival sources, official and personal, in East Africa and in Britain.
The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and the African Health Literature
Authors: Eyers John
Published: April 2022

The last quarter of the 19th century had established beyond doubt the germ theory of infection over the miasmatic theory of disease. Over the last 50 years of the 19th century unparalleled advances had been made in medical science. Many of the causative organisms of what are now called tropical diseases had been identified. In 1851 Bilharz had discovered the worm which causes schistosomiasis or bilharzia; in 1876 Bancroft had isolated the filarial worm which causes the debilitating disease filariasis; the trypanosome had been discovered in 1877; in 1880 the French scientist Laveran had described the malaria parasite, Robert Koch the cholera vibrio in 1883, and in 1894 the plague bacillus was isolated. Crucial discoveries were made by Patrick Manson in 1879 in China on the transmission of filariasis by the mosquito, by David Bruce in 1896 on the transmission of bovine trypanosomiasis by the tsetse fly and by Ronald Ross in India in 1897 on the development of the malaria parasite in the mosquito.
The Study of African Languages in the United Kingdom: Part II
Authors: Dalby David
Published: April 2022

The first part of this review covered the growth of African language studies in the United Kingdom from 1895 to 1970, by which time the Department of the Languages and Cultures of Africa at SOAS (Department of Africa) represented the largest group of African language specialists in the world.

This expansion had been due in large part to the recommendations of the Scarbrough Commission in 1947, although that same commission was also responsible for the confinement of African language studies to a single British institution. The Scarbrough request for a regular review of Oriental and African studies has been disregarded by successive governments, and even the solitary Hayter review, undertaken in 1961 by the UGC, largely ignored the field of African language studies (apart from an unfulfilled request that they be pursued at Oxford as well as at SOAS).
Postcards of Southern Africa
Authors: Atkinson A.K.W.
Published: April 2022

The postcard is one of the latest arrivals among the “collectables”. The urge to collect postage stamps has a longer history, because adhesives arrived so much earlier. The postal historian looks back even futher in time. But the postcard was not born until 1 October, 1869, and the picture postcard did not appear until the 1870s.

There was a world-wide craze for collecting postcards which began at the turn of the century and persisted until 1918. Then it came to an abrupt end, partly because of the doubling of postage on cards (from ½d to 1d for inland mail) and partly because the more general use of the telephone superseded the postcard as a medium for brief messages.

In recent years there has been a revival of interest in collecting picture postcards. However the emphasis has moved away from contemporary issues (though many enthusiasts do concentrate on the “moderns”).
A guide to the post independence ministerial records in the National Archives of Ghana, 1920-1988
Authors: Akussah Harry
Published: April 2022

Intellectual access to archival sources in the National Archives of Ghana in recent times has been the focus of many prominent historians and academics both local and foreign. Many researchers (Gareth Austin, 1986; Adam Jones, 1987) have documented the inadequacy of search tools, the lack of physical control, and the deteriorating valuable sources in this Archive which was one of the pioneering institutions in Africa. Out of desperation some have even prepared summary guides to some of the holdings they have used or are familiar with (Gareth Austin, 1986)

Though the archival tradition in Ghana spans a period of five decades, there is no comprehensive guide to the total holdings of the Archives. This inadequacy has for a long time eclipsed the real value of the contents of the Archives.
The Library of the Centre d'Etude d'Afrique Noire
Authors: Meynard Francois
Published: April 2022

Fondé en 1958 par un groupe d'universitaires bordelais, le Centre d'étude d'Afrique noire fonctionne dans le cadre de l'Institut d'études politiques de Bordeaux. II est associé depuis 1968 à la Fondation nationale des Sciences politiques et bénéficie depuis 1967 du statut d'équipe de recherche associée au Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS - ERA 70 devenue UA 977). Outre l'équipe de recherche ainsi constituée, le CEAN comprend une unité d'enseignement et un centre de documentation.

Le Centre d'étude d'Afrique noire organise des études de troisième cycle aboutissant à un doctorat “ETUDES AFRICAINES” dont le Diplôme d'études approfondies (DEA) constitue la première année de scolarité. L'enseignement pluridisciplinaire est organisé autour de quatre enseignements principaux: science politique, économie, droit et administration publique, relations internationales.
A Bibliography of Benin: a commentary on published & unpublished sources written in German
Authors: Roese P.M. , Rees A.R.
Published: April 2022

As the history of the former Benin Empire is well known to the specialists, there is no need to elaborate on it in this paper. Although sporadic information about Benin was reaching Europe as early as the end of the 15th Century, real interest was aroused only in the wake of the British ‘Punitive Expedition’ to Benin City in 1897. Few had suspected the existence of such a highly developed African culture with a range and volume of works of art which were brought to Europe as booty by the returning army. Initial investigations in Benin left many questions unanswered, and it was the late J.U. Egharevba (1934) who collected and published the surviving oral traditions as a framework for understanding the past. However, despite several attempts to construct a chronology, exact dates for some events, especially before the arrival of the first Europeans, are still uncertain.
African Studies Research in Mozambique
Authors: Munslow Barry
Published: April 2022

The Centro de Estudos Africanos (Centre of African Studies - henceforth CEA) was founded soon after Mozambique's independence in June 1975. It was set up under the directorship of Aquino de Bragança, who was formerly Secretary to the Conference of Nationalist Organisations in the Portuguese Colonies, that linked together all the lusophone liberation movements during the anti-colonial struggle. From its inception the C.E.A. had two high priorities - a committment to collective research and to studies vhich would te relevant to the needs of Mozambique in its attempt to build a socialist society. The latter was not seen simply in narrow nationalistic terms, but was placed firmly within the regional context. Hence, the first major study carried out was on the political economy of Zimbabwe as a background document to the Geneva talks of 1976.
Ethiopia: A selected military bibliography
Authors: Ofcansky Thomas P.
Published: April 2022

Ethiopia's military history dates to the dawn of recorded history. During the Aksumite Kingdom, which emerged at the beginning of the Christian era, there were numerous military campaigns to the east, south, and west of Aksum. In the 6th century AD, an Aksumite army invaded the southern tip of Arabia. During the 1527-43 period, Ethiopian soldiers fought against Ahmed ibn Ibrahim el Ghazi (1506-43), who also was known as Ahmed Grãn, the ‘left handed’. He was an Islamic zealot who had declared a jihad against Ethiopia's Christians. Shortly after Gran's defeat, Ethiopia embarked upon a series of campaigns against the Galla (now known as Oromo) people who were seeking to invade northern Ethiopia from their southern homelands.
Colonial Service biographical data: the published sources
Authors: Kirk-Greene A.H.M.
Published: April 2022

A consistent feature of contemporary research into the colonial period is the emphasis on personalities. The modern historian is increasingly aware of how cogently he may need to identify and interpret who was who before he can start to explain why was what. In support of this human approach, one may cite the view of the most recent historian of empire. “Personality not policy”, argues Martin Daly in the first volume of his history of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, Empire on the Nile (1986), “determined the course of the Condominium” (p.452). The same thesis underlay my own earlier profile of Africa's administrators: “Only when we are intimately acquainted with who the imperial administrators are can we proceed to a soundly-based study of imperialism” (The Sudan Political Service, 1982, 1). Robert Collins’ interpretation of the Sudan's administration was postulated on a similar hypothesis:

Without some understanding of the imperialists themselves, it is impossible to examine imperialism, to assess its impact, or to comprehend the social and political relationships, attitudes, and states of mind it created (African Affairs, 1972, 71, 293).
African Music in the International Music Collection at the British Library National Sound Archive
Authors: Fargion Janet Topp
Published: April 2022

It is widely accepted that the development of recording technology played an important role in the development of ethnomusicology as a discipline. For the first time, from late last century, music could be recorded for use in scientific comparison and analysis. Jaap Kunst once wrote that ‘ethnomusicology could never have grown into an independent science if the gramophone had not been invented’ (quoted in Seeger 1986:261). But the significance of recorded performance - the most objective way of capturing oral tradition - for the understanding of all aspects of culture must not be underestimated, particularly, but not exclusively, for non-literate societies. ‘Oral tradition should be central to students of culture, of ideology, of society, of psychology, of art, and…of history’ (Vansina 1985:xi). And sound archives should be perceived as essential to research, ‘equivalent to libraries in other disciplines insofar as their importance in research is concerned’ (Nettl in Seeger 1986:262).
The Special Collection on Publishing in Africa at Oxford Brookes University
Authors: Richardson Paul
Published: April 2022

In retrospect there was a certain inevitability that the Oxford Centre for Publishing Studies and Oxford Brookes University Library should establish a special collection on publishing in Africa, the first of its kind in Britain and perhaps anywhere in the northern hemisphere. There was the pre-existence in Oxford of powerful African publishing connections, represented on the one hand by two of the great houses which had helped to shape and develop and profit from publishing for and in Africa: Oxford University Press and Heinemann, and on the other by the parallel and equally important presence of specialist publishing operations and individuals with a focussed interest in publishing in the region: Bellagio and ABC, Hans Zell and Code Europe, James Currey Publishers and INASET.
National Herbarium [Ethiopia]: From Where to Where?
Authors: Teferra Damtew
Published: April 2022

Ethiopia is located in Eastern Africa and lies between 3° and 18° N and 33° and 48° E in what is usually called The Horn of Africa. It borders Sudan to the North, North West and West; Kenya to the South; Somalia to the South East and East and the Djibouti Republic and the Red Sea to the East and North East.

The Country enjoys great geographical diversity ranging from high and rugged mountains, flat topped plateaus, deep gorges to river valleys and lowland plains. The vegetation is also as varied: ranging from desert, tropical forest, alpine shrub to grassland. Ethiopia has a greater diversity of climate, topography and soils than almost any other African Country.
The University of Zimbabwe Library in a growing academic community
Authors: Kufa J.C.
Published: April 2022

The Library of the University of Zimbabwe is by far the largest research and the only academic library in the country. From its tiny beginnings in the original Baker Avenue (City Centre) premises, the Library has progressed through the temporary tenancy, first of lecture rooms in the Faculty of Arts block and then, for some time occupied the basement areas in the same block. It was not until 29th February 1960, when the Library achieved the occupation of the present building constructed specifically to house it. The Library building was built from a grant given by the Anglo-American Corporation, the Rhodesian Selection Trust and the British South African Company. The foundation stone was laid on 18 September 1958 by the late Lord Robins of Chelsea. It was designed to house 350,000 volumes and to seat 500 readers in two large reading rooms and five stack floors. It also had 26 private study carrels and a micro reader room.
Libraries and library automation in Zimbawbe: a brief overview
Authors: Hopkinson Alan
Published: April 2022

Zimbabwe has a rather old-fashioned British air about it to one arriving from England. One of the most common cars is still the Ford Anglia, and Woolworths in Harare has the distinctive shop front and the island counters from behind which assistants serve their customers, so familiar to those who can remember the store in the 1950s. Many street names and the names of suburbs reflect the names of people and places with English connections, so one feels very much at home.

The libraries are under-resourced and have to improvise, but they are not old-fashioned. The National Archives is the national library, having the right of copyright deposit, and the public records office as it keeps the archived records of central government, local authorities and parastatals. It also houses splendid displays of documents illustrating the history of the country and includes statues of important leaders.
The Index to South African Periodicals (ISAP) on the South African Studies (SAS) CD-ROM as an example of database publishing
Authors: Kotze Antoinette
Published: April 2022

Database publishing is an important element in the flow of information.

With its introduction in 1972 (Gurnsey, 1985), online database publishing offered a technical solution to the problem of keeping up with the massive increase in literature, and of providing online access and retrieval of information for a mainly technical user market. In most developed countries, online database publishing now forms a fundamental part of the information infrastructure. Unfortunately, the lack of such infrastructure in developing countries is increasing the gap in information flow between the information rich and information poor.

Today CD-ROM, with its potential for high density storage, user friendly interface and versatile application, is regarded as an appropriate solution for database publishing in support of cost-effective online access, and also for facilitating wider exposure to databases to reach an extended user market.
The Royal Geographical Society expedition to Zanzibar
Authors: Thurston Anne
Published: April 2022

In June of this year, the Royal Geographical Society will be sending a team led by John Walford, head of modern records at the Public Record Office, to examine the condition of the Zanzibar Government Archives and to make recommendations for their future care. Mr. Walford carried out a similar UNESCO sponsored survey of the Kenya National Archives last year. This year he will be looking at documents which not only push back by several decades the period for which records are available for East Africa as a whole but which present different technical problems. The records themselves constitute a small collection, totalling about a thousand linear feet, but their size bears little relation to their importance.

Zanzibar, with the rest of the East African littoral, was part of a declining Arab empire when, toward the close of the fifteenth century, the Portuguese began their conquest of the area.
Providing and Sustaining Environmental Information Services Through Resource Sharing in Botswana: A Proposal
Authors: Badisang Bobana E.G.
Published: April 2022

The Seminar on Accessing Information in Southern Africa (SAIRSA) National and Subregional Bibliographic Control, held in Johannesburg in 1996, recognised among others the crucial role of information in national development; the importance of making optimal use of indigenous information; that a system for comprehensive and up to date bibliographic control of the national output is a prerequisite in each country for utilizing information for development; and that the efforts of individual nations can be reinforced through regional cooperation. Recommendations of the SAIRSA committed the Southern African Development Community (SADC) to support efforts to establish national legislation for national bibliographic control agencies and legislation for legal deposit. Country reports showed lack of understanding on the part of most governments of the role of national bibliographic control and its support of socioeconomic development.
Nigerian journals as major sources of information to researchers in Nigeria
Authors: Apeji E. Adeche
Published: April 2022

Researchers are concerned with the discovery of new truths and the expansion of new frontiers of knowledge. This is in realization of the fact that development — in whatever form — invariably depends on the growth of available stock of useful information and knowledge. New information and knowledge may be disseminated through such graphic formats as monographs, journals, theses etc. This study examines the extent Nigerian researchers use journals based in Nigeria in their research efforts.

Specifically, this study will try to:

(1) Determine the extent to which journals are used by researchers in Nigeria.

(2) Determine the extent to which journals used by Nigerian researchers are Nigerian based.

(3) Identify, discuss and suggest solutions to the problems that minimise the use of Nigerian journals as sources of information by Nigerian researchers.
Writings on African Archives. London, Zell, 1996: First Supplement
Authors: McIlwaine John
Published: April 2022

As promised in the published volume, this is the first of what it is hoped will be regular supplements, identifying material not included in the original compilation. The majority of the following items were published in the 1990s, but some earlier references, missed in the published volume, have now been identified and are included. Any additional references from readers will be very welcome.

The arrangement follows that of the original work, and references are to numbered items in that work.

Guides, collections and ancillary materials to African archival resources in the United States, comp. J.B. Howell & Y. Scheven, (Electronic journal of Africana bibliography, no.l). URL: http://www.lib.uiowa.edu/proj/ejab/index.html. (A most important source of information on ‘guides to the archives of Africa’ (Preface) but including also guides to African-related archives in Europe.
‘For better or for verse’: A Colonial Service retrieval project
Authors: Kirk-Greene Anthony
Published: April 2022

I have been invited to talk about a Colonial Service (CS) retrieval
project undertaken with the anointment of John Pinfold at Rhodes House
Library and the blessing of Terry Barringer of the Royal Commonwealth
Society Library (despite her emigration lock, stock and barrel to
Cambridge). I launched it in October 1996 in the pages of the
Overseas pensioner (giving me immediate
access to some 5,000 readers). The collection closed in March 1998.
Application of Information Technology (IT) In the Management of Court Records in the Supreme Court of Nigeria
Authors: Abioye Abiola
Published: April 2022

Information technology (IT) being crucial to the management of records in all sectors, the study investigated the level of awareness and application of IT to court records management in the Supreme Court of Nigeria. It examined the facilities available, use, constraints and prospects. The research instruments adopted for data collection were interview and observation. The results showed that there is high level of awareness of the importance of IT. The technology is used mainly for record creation and distribution. Constraints include poor funding and lack of well-trained staff in the use of IT for records management. The study concluded and made necessary recommendations for the improved use of IT for court record management in the Supreme Court of Nigeria.
The Photographic Collection of the Foreign & Commonwealth Office Library
Authors: Hannam Harry
Published: April 2022

The collection owes its origin to the steps taken by the Colonial Office in the middle of the nineteenth century to acquire photographic material relating to Britain's overseas dependencies. Two dispatches, dated 29 and 30 November 1869 respectively, from the Secretary of State for the Colonies to the Governor of British Colombia, request that ‘photographic views of noteworthy buildings and scenery be transmitted to the Colonial Office’, together with ‘photographs of individuals of various races peculiar to the colony’. Many of the volumes of early photographs of public buildings in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Malaya and South Africa were sent to the Colonial Office in response to this or similar circulars, to be followed before the turn of the century by collections from the West Indian and tropical African territories. Anthropological material was received principally from the African colonies.
The South African Public Library: Its African Collections in 1881
Authors: Jones Huw
Published: April 2022

The History of the Colony of the Cape of Good Hope by the Hon. Alexander Wilmot and the Hon. John Centilivres Chase was published in Cape Town by J.C. Juta in 1869. In his South African Bibliography (London 1910), Mendelssohn commented that “This was the first regular and consecutive history of the Cape Colony”. He drew attention to George McCall Theal's comment in his History of South Africa, vol. IV (1834-1854) (London 1893) that “It is now out of print and it is rarely met with”. In his own Catalogue of Books and Pamphlets Relating to Africa South of the Zambezi (Cape Town, S.A. [1912]) published two years later, Theal added that “Before 1892 there was not a copy even in the South African public library at Capetown”.
Conservation of Nigerian archives
Authors: Enwere J.C.
Published: April 2022

Between 1914 and 1938 the Colonial Office in London sent out three circular letters on the care and preservation of the records of the various administrations in the colonies. In some colonies these circular letters eventually resulted in the establishment of archival institutions by the Colonial administration. In Nigeria, however, the establishment of national archives came about as a result of the activities of the late Professor KO. Dike who, when he was preparing the thesis for a PhD, had to undertake field work in Nigeria. At this time he was shocked at the deplorable condition in which he found the non-current official records of the government. On his return to Nigeria he offered his services free of charge to rescue these records. He was commissioned in 1951 by the Nigerian government to undertake a survey of all government records in the country.
Manuscripts relating to Nigeria in Rhodes House Library, Oxford
Authors: Bell A.S.
Published: April 2022

Rhodes House Library is a dependent institution of the Bodleian Library, the principal library of the University of Oxford. It is housed by the Rhodes Trustees, but does not receive regular financial support from them. Founded in 1929 on the basis of the university's existing collections, it specialises in the history, government, etc., of the non-Indian Commonwealth (the Indian sub-continent is the province in Oxford of the Indian Institute Library), of Africa south of the Sahara, and also of the United States of America. Its extensive manuscript collections, which run to some 15000 storage units (volumes, boxes, etc.) are therefore held alongside the printed holdings of a large specialist academic library whose statutory claim material (under the Bodleian's privileges deriving from British copyright acts) has been systematically developed by the acquisition by purchase or deposit of overseas publications.
The Royal Commonwealth Society
Authors: Barringer T.A.
Published: April 2022

The Royal Commonwealth Society (previously known successively as the Colonial Society, the Royal Colonial Institute and the Royal Empire Society and now linked with the Victoria League in Commonwealth Trust), was founded in 1868 and from its early days has maintained a library which now consists of 250,000¢ items, classified geographically; a substantial proportion of this is concerned with Africa. The small library of the Royal African Society was embodied in it in 1949. Subjects covered include all but purely technical ones, ranging from history, geography and politics to art, literature and natural history.

The literature of exploration and discovery is particualarly extensive and there are original editions of nearly all the significant books in this field. The Library is also strong in general accounts of voyages and travels, collected voyages, and the publications of the major relevant societies; much material on Africa appears in this form.
West African archives at the Main Library, University of Birmingham
Authors: French T.
Published: April 2022

Collections of African material at the University of Birmingham in part reflect links with Cadbury's whose gifts of land helped to establish the University on its Edgbaston site, and whose involvement in the early West African cocoa track is well-known; the Library's collections of Africana have however been particularly developed over the last thirty years or so, since the establishment of the Centre of West African Studies here in 1963. All relevant library and archive materials are kept in the Main Library not at the Centre.

The most notable archive is that of the Church Missionary Society (CMS), which is on deposit at the University Library. This archive is in three sections: early papers up to 1880; 1881-1934; and 1935-49. Later material has been retained at CMS. The archives cover many African countries, including Nigeria, and all other countries in which the CMS has worked.
Nigerian Natural History Archives, Linnean Society of London
Authors: Douglas G.
Published: April 2022

The Society's manuscript holdings date back to those of Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778) and among those of his pupils, Thunberg, Sparrman, Solander, and Osbeck all travelled down the West Coast of Africa en route to India, the Far East and Australia. Afzelius was the only one to explore the natural history of West Africa, landing in Sierra Leone, but there is no known material recorded from Guinea. The only specific reference in the Linnaean archives is an undated hand-written note with a description of a monkey “…ex Costa Guinea”.

The Society was founded in 1788 and holds the papers of its precursor: the Society for the promotion of Natural History. These include an account of the Harmattan by Henry Smeathmam. His account of the Tarantula is among the Linnean Society papers, but both probably refer to Sierra Leone where Smeathmam collected.
The Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine: Archives and Manuscripts relating to Nigeria
Authors: Hall L.
Published: April 2022

The Wellcome Institute was created by Sir Henry Wellcome (1853-1936), founder of the international pharmaceutical company, the Wellcome Foundation Ltd (formerly Burroughs Wellcome). He was a wide-ranging collector of materials of all kinds relating to the history of medicine. His collections continue to be administered under the provisions of his will by the Wellcome Trust, which also funds medical research. The library underwent some reduction after his death, largely to restrict it more closely to the history of medicine and science and to reduce it to manageable bulk. In World War II the company headquarters at Snow Hill were bombed, and the firm moved into the Euston Road Building originally intended to house the Wellcome Research Institution.
Birds of Africa: A 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 is concerned with sources relating to the ornithology of Africa.

In the ornithological context, ‘reference material’ has been deemed to comprise the following major categories:

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.). These need to be updated regularly both as knowledge of bird distribution increases, and as taxonomists make new decisions regarding bird relationships, with consequent changes in scientific names. Local decisions in the latter area naturally reflect world decisions, and so some of the standard world lists are also cited. Standard lists of popular names in English, other European languages and African languages are also required.
Imaginative Knowledge: Scottish Readers and Nigerian Fictions
Authors: Smith Andrew
Published: April 2022

I must admit that my initial reaction on seeing the book was a sinking feeling. I felt that of all the books chosen that was the one I really had no inclination whatsoever to read. It may sound insular, but I am not interested in Africa.

This paper is based upon the responses of a group of Scottish readers to Chinua Achebe's novel, Things Fall Apart (1958). For almost all of the readers this represented their first encounter with African fiction. As the preceding quotation makes clear, it was not one that they had solicited and for some at least, it was not one that they relished.

The encounter came about as part of a pre-access course taught under the auspices of the Adult Education Department of Glasgow University. The course ran on two occasions in Stranraer and on one occasion in the Gorbals, a residential area on the south side of the Clyde.
Headaches and Brainwaves: Libraries, Evidence and Research Across the Disciplines
Authors: Cramer Christopher
Published: April 2022

Once upon a time, my brother was working in the Dominican library in Paris. This was in the early 1980s and he was doing research for his PhD - on the subject of baptism in the ninth to twelfth centuries. Another man often worked there and they would talk now and then but they never actually introduced themselves. The other man sometimes gave my brother a lift across town when they left the library. He seemed rather authoritative. One day he asked my brother, ‘Who are you working with?’ and my brother said ‘Jacques le Goff’, a very renowned medieval historian. ‘Ah, le Goff, yes, he's very astute’, the man said, and my brother thought my goodness, who is this man to pass judgement so confidently on le Goff. Another day, when the news was full of the Pope, John Paul II, coming to Paris, my brother asked the man if he was going to see the pope.
Uncovering UCLA Library Special Collections Information Resources for Researchers: The Pre-Independence Socio-political Landscape in Zanzibar from the Michael Lofchie Collection
Authors: Kaaya Janet , Bachli Kelley Wolfe
Published: April 2022

After more than four decades of obscurity, a collection of historical African newspapers and other materials is now being made widely accessible to researchers due to the efforts of Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) Postdoctoral Fellow Janet Kaaya and the Center for Primary Research and Training in the Charles E. Young Research Library, Department of Special Collections, at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA). The Michael Lofchie Collection contains primarily pre-independence newspapers and other materials from Zanzibar, a Tanzanian island in the Indian Ocean off the coast of East Africa. The collection holds about 120 volumes, covering 22 newspaper titles in various languages, including English, Swahili, Gujarati, and Arabic. In addition, the collection includes bulletins, journals, monographs, manuscripts, booklets, information sheets and minutes of meetings. The collection's depth and breadth reflect the socio-cultural, economic and political environments that prevailed in Zanzibar over the timespan of the collection, from 1909 to 1965.
National Libraries in Africa: Roles and Challenges
Authors: Alemna Anaba
Published: April 2022

This paper attempts to discuss the concept of national libraries and the state-of-the-art in Africa. The role of national libraries and the challenges facing them are also analysed. It has been found out for example, that a majority of national libraries in Africa are found in the French-speaking countries. Other libraries such as public and university libraries are performing this role in the English-speaking countries. It is argued that although there is no alternative to a national library, African countries should make adaptations to suit their circumstances.
Current issues in African Moving Images and their Preservation
Authors: Convents Guido
Published: April 2022

Preservation policies for moving images made in Africa by Africans was, for a long time, not an issue for most librarians and archivists in Europe with an interest in Africa. They thought of ‘African moving images’ as moving images made on that continent (mostly by non Africans). But in recent years they have become aware that there is a (huge) amount of audiovisual production by Africans, and that makes a difference. For studying and understanding Africa, these are important sources. But it is not easy to find them, or to get to them and to know where and how they are preserved. This issue is of course linked to the state of archives and libraries on the African continent. It has to be said that for most people the definition of an African film is a film made by an African.
Travels with Helen
Authors: Helly Dorothy O.
Published: April 2022

When Helen Callaway and I began our travels in search of Flora Shaw, our very first encounter was with a man who threatened to set his dogs on us. We carried on, however, for our model was Flora Shaw, herself an adventurous traveller as well as the highly influential Colonial Editor for The Times in the 1890s. Like Flora Shaw, Helen was also a widely travelled woman of high spirits.

Before I talk about my “Travels with Helen,” I want to thank Maria Jaschok, director of the International Gender Studies Centre (aka Centre for Cross-Cultural Research on Women) for inviting me to give this talk and to thank all the members of the Centre for their warm hospitality to me for over twenty years. This has been my Oxford “home.”
Viewing Cotonou From a Helicopter
Authors: McBean Bridget
Published: April 2022

Finding the most worthwhile information for one's purpose today is no easy task. An array of information providers has exploded. The Internet, twentyfour hour television channels, numerous magazines and journals provide facts and opinion. But which source is more credible? How can one formulate one's own opinion or position, especially when working with nuanced or topical subjects? It is believed that specialised research requires a different approach to accurate information gathering.

The role of information managers and providers is paramount. They have the ability to search and structure interesting resources for use of a range of users. This paper maps some of the principle sources of information about the Cotonou Partnership Agreement, including the core texts such as the Agreement, and also sources supplying analysis; facts and comments on the content, process and progress of the Agreement.
Book Aid International: 50 Years of Sharing Information (1954-2004)
Authors: Temu Williams Nelly , Coll Sandrine
Published: April 2022

2004 marks the 50th anniversary of Book Aid International (BAI), the major UK support for libraries in sub-Saharan Africa.

Since 1954, BAI has reached out to readers in some of the world's poorest countries, creating learning opportunities for millions of adults and children. Book Aid International's work demonstrates the power of books in making a significant practical difference to improve people's lives. The charity provides short-term solutions to crisis situations - sending out English language books to help fight illiteracy. Book Aid International is equally committed to longer-term, sustainable solutions and works with communities worldwide to build up local publishing and bookselling projects.

One of the biggest challenges facing BAI now is ensuring that adequate resources are supplied to keep up with the huge expansion in education that is taking place around the world.
Access to Records and Archives in Kenya
Authors: Mnjama Nathan
Published: April 2022

According to Ketelaar (1992:5) “archives - well preserved and accessible to the people - are as essential in a free democracy as government of the people by the people, for the people. Because archives are not only tools of the government, not only sources for historical research, access to public archives gives the people the possibility to exercise their rights and to control their governments, its successes, its failures.” The Dictionary of Archival Terminology defines access as “the availability of records or archives for consultation as a result of legal authorization and the existence of finding aids”. The same Dictionary defines privacy as “the right to be secure from unauthorized disclosure of information contained in records/archives relating to personal or private matters.” McCauseland (1993) on the other hand defines access to include “the terms and conditions of availability of records or information maintained by archives for examination and consultation by researchers”.
A Game for the Good?: Football, youths and the Liberian civil conflict
Authors: Collison Holly
Published: April 2022

Africa's first republic was founded in the mid-19th century by recently freed American and Caribbean slaves originally stolen from Central and West Africa. This West African nation became fittingly known as Liberia or “Land of the Free”. In 1847 the Declaration of Independence of the Republic of Liberia written by Baptist Minister Hilary Teage was signed by representatives of the major counties, Liberia adopted a constitution based on the American model and until the 1980s was considered a beacon of stability in Africa. Shortly after this date the small West African nation was a global byword for atrocity, carnage and child soldier militias. The execution of President William Tolbert on the 12th April 1980 in a military coup d'etat fronted by Sergeant Samuel Doe and supported by the Peoples Redemption Council represented the end of the Americo-Liberian “settler” political dominance and reflected the indigenous people's desire for change.
African studies in the West Indies
Authors: Cobley Alan
Published: April 2022

From the eighteenth century onwards a handful of the millions of Africans who had been caught in the transatlantic slave trade and transported to the Americas began to set down their experiences of enslavement, and of the African societies they had left behind. The writings of individuals such as James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw, Ignatius Sancho, Ottobah Cugoano and Olaudah Equiano were among the first to attempt, to present the western world with a view of the African continent not coloured by racial prejudice or avarice. Thus it can be argued that the origin of the modern discipline of African Studies lies in the black Atlantic world. From that time on, products of the African diaspora from the Caribbean have played a key role in developing both a scholarly understanding and a politicised consciousness of the African continent and its peoples.
Support local industry? Book buying patterns in the University of Botswana Library (UBL)
Authors: Badisang B.E. , Dintwe M.N.
Published: April 2022

The academic library under review controls a sizable budget per annum out of which it acquires about 20,000 volumes per year arid serves more than 10,000 users. The Collection Development Policy provides for acquisition of single copies of foreign materials and five copies of materials from Botswana and from countries of the Southern African Development Community (SADC). It does not provide textbooks since that is taken care of by the University of Botswana Bookshop. Since its establishment/the UBL has been sourcing the bulk of its materials through overseas booksellers, and with the declining value of the local pula currency/the number of books purchased has decreased: A number of reasons contribute to this state of affairs. As Paul Brickhill observes, ‘with the notable exception of particular bookshops, bookselling and particularly the special area of library supply is weak throughout Africa’.