bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Popular Fiction and the Zimbabwe Controversy
Authors: Tangri Daniel 
Published: May 2006

The “Zimbabwe controversy” is a name by which disputes over the origins of the people who produced stone ruins and mines in southern Africa are known. Those disputes occurred between informed and lay opinion; informed opinion being represented by archeologists, and lay opinion by local cult archeologists and, at the turn of the century, explorers and excavators. One aspect of lay opinion that has seldom been discussed is the role of popular fiction. Popular novels are often mentioned in works on the Zimbabwe controversy as representing particular viewpoints, but there have been no detailed analyses of their role in that controversy. This paper will set popular novels into the context of the ideologies that influenced them, and gauge their influence on lay opinion and the degree to which they reflected viewpoints that were expressed in political disagreements over the site of Great Zimbabwe.There are four major nineteenth-century novels that are pertinent to the Zimbabwe controversy: H. M. Walmsley's The Ruined Cities of Zululand, and three works by H. Rider Haggard—King Solomon's Mines, She, and Elissa? The first novel was published in time to incorporate knowledge of recently-reported stone ruins and gold mines. In the 1820s and 1830s stone kraals were known to have been built by black people. By the 1860s, however, when other explorers “discovered” stone ruins, they argued that black people could not have built them. Their arguments were based on prevalent systems of classifying humanity. It was generally believed that races were tied to discrete levels of culture by their average intelligence and their blood. Consequently, races could be characterised in terms of a set number of items of culture. It was also generally accepted that the overall record of humanity was one of cultural progress, or step-by-step advancement toward ever better and more complex cultures. Racial characters were thought to set a limit on the level that each race could reach. It was argued, for instance, that black Africans had reached the limit of their potential progress, whereas Europeans were still undergoing advancement. Consequently, Europeans were seen to belong to the most advanced races in the world; other races were ranked below them, and were thought to represent primitive stages through which Europeans had already passed.
In Quest of Error's Sly Imprimatur: The Concept of “Authorial Intent” in Modern Textual Criticism
Authors: Henige David 
Published: May 2006

By common consent the constitution of an author's text is the highest aim a scholar can set before himself.It is not easy to imagine any historian advancing such a claim these days--or at least meaning it. In fact many historians might not even be sure what Burnet meant by it. Yet, if themétierof textual criticism in history has fallen on hard times, it might not be quite true that there is no place for it at all, even in African historiography. At first glance, to be sure, it might seem quite beside the point to discuss “constituting” any text, written or oral, that Africanists might use as a source, since it must most often seem as if these texts are quite straightforward existing in the state we chance upon them and in that state only.As is so frequently the case in the study of African history, for example, the only genuine sources for the life and activities of St. Patrick are two brief Latin texts he composed (or so it is widely believed), but which have survived only in versions committed to writing some two and a half centuries after his death. Well might we ask of materials like this: what text is to be “constituted” here? why is it necessary to engage in monotonous and time-consuming efforts to warrant the accuracy--that is, the verbal accuracy--of such texts? what is it possible to do anyway? and what is to be gained by doing it? As it happens, contemporary textual critics would have several answers to each of these questions, but here I want to deal only with a single facet of modern textual critical activity, its unending preoccupation with “authorial intent,” leaving the discussion of several other pertinent issues for another time.
Land, Politics, and Censorship: the Historiography of Nineteenth-Century Lesotho
Authors: Eldredge Elizabeth A. 
Published: May 2006

Violent territorial competition is one of the dominant forces in the history of southern Africa, and all historiography with reference to land has significant political ramifications to this day. Nineteenth-century sources in the history of the BaSotho reflect these political considerations, which were as salient then as they are today.In this paper I investigate the principal nineteenth-century sources for the history of land rights and land conflict affecting the BaSotho. On the basis of archival materials, I identify and assess the sources which early historians relied on. I also examine the background and orientations of these observers, in order to evaluate their interpretations of BaSotho history. The works with which I deal with are well-known to students of Lesotho history, and because they are so often used by modern scholars it is important that their origins, authenticity, and value be assessed.
“Gendered Narratives,” History, and Identity: Two Centuries Along the Juba River among the Zigula and Shanbara
Authors: Declich Francesca 
Published: May 2006

The argument that a process of “making tribes” has invested Africa from early colonial times has been used to explain the emergence of some ethnicities which appear not to have existed before colonialism. This emergence was often accompanied by the creation of written records of male historical discourse, thus not only giving them undue prominence but also suppressing female historical discourses which were not considered pertinent to “history.”Yet whenever history is recounted orally by either men or women, it contains messages directed to a “gendered” audience (i.e., an audience composed of people of both genders) whose participants perceive messages differently and reproduce separate but interacting discourses. Such diverse perceptions result from certain aspects in oral genres as well as small, coded markers which can evoke immensely potent but gender-specific experiences. Such instances may become public symbols and, along with more obviously historical narratives, greatly influence how people relate to their past. Thus men and women in the same audience, hearing the same story, can make connections between elements of a narrative which are obscure to outside researchers.Recently, it has become quite common for historians of Africa to deconstruct written historical sources on the basis of the agendas of both the original writer and his informants. These agendas are rarely explicit and thus hiddenly selective. Such deconstruction is a legitimate scholarly procedure; however, as female voices have rarely been recorded—the resulting analysis reinforces the omission of women's roles in the process of remaking history and creating identity.
“Central and Eastern Wangara:” An Indigenous West African Perception of the Political and Economic Geography of the Slave Coast as Recorded by Joseph Dupuis in Kumasi, 1820
Authors: Law Robin 
Published: May 2006

The mission of Joseph Dupuis, sent as British Consul to Kumasi, the capital of Asante, in 1820, is well known, principally through his own journal of it, published in 1824. In addition to his negotiations with the Asante authorities, Dupuis collected information on Asante history, and on the geography not only of Asante itself but also of neighboring and remoter countries in the interior—the latter presented in Part II of his Journal, entitled “On the Geography of Western Africa” [I-CXV]. His principal informants on both Asante history and West African geography were African Muslims whom he met in Kumasi, and with whom he was able to converse in Arabic. The geographical information was transmitted in part in the form of Arabic manuscripts, some (or perhaps all) of which Dupuis presented, in transcription and translation, in an appendix of “geographical documents” [cxxiv-cxxxv]; but supplementary information was obtained orally in conversations, some passages from which Dupuis purports to reproduce verbatim [XLII-XLIV].The information which Dupuis obtained can usefully be compared with similar (but, as regards the interior, generally less extensive) material collected by Edward Bowdich on an earlier mission to Kumasi in 1817. Dupuis himself was frequently critical of alleged inaccuracies and confusions in Bowdich's account, though not always with justification. It is noteworthy that he read over at least one section of Bowdich's account to his informants in Kumasi, to obtain their comments on it [XVIII]—an interesting illustration of the potential for interaction between written texts and oral information in Africa even in precolonial times, in a manner more complex than that of “feedback” from written into oral data most commonly discussed by historians.
South Africa and Land Ownership: What's in a Deed?
Authors: Feinberg H. M. 
Published: May 2006

The subject of African land ownership is and will continue to be a highly emotional issue of great importance in the new South Africa. Africans and Afrikaners alike have strong historical ties to the land. Thousands of Africans owned land outside the Reserves before 1948. These landowners included large numbers of Africans who purchased over 3,000 farms and lots between 1913 and 1936 in the Transvaal, Natal, and even the Orange Free State (plus uncounted African buyers in the Cape Province). Individuals, tribal groups, or people organized into partnerships owned land. In the 1990s Africans complain bitterly about land losses, especially after 1948 as a result of the apartheid policy of forced removals which aimed to eliminate the so-called “black spots” from white areas. In addition, some Africans point to the problem of land losses between 1913 and 1948, and others resent the severe restrictions resulting from the Natives Land Act, Act No. 27 of 1913, which prevented Africans from freely buying land in three of the four provinces of South Africa after 1913.On 8 November 1994 the South African Parliament passed the Restitution of Land Rights Act, a law which is intended to allow Africans to reclaim their lost land. Claims by former owners or their descendants will be buttressed by legal documents of one type or another. Some of these legal documents have an interesting and unintended use, however: historians can take advantage of them to build an understanding of African land ownership before and after apartheid began in 1948.
Deng Laka and Mut Roal: Fixing the Date of an Unknown Battle
Authors: Johnson Douglas H. 
Published: May 2006

The Gaawar Nuer recall a battle called Mut Roal which Deng Laka, the prophet of the divinity DIU, fought against the Twic Dinka and their “Arab” allies. In this battle the Dinka and the Arabs failed to coordinate their movements, were attacked, and were defeated singly. Deng Laka himself is said to have personally killed the “Arab” commander. A number of rifles were captured and placed in a hut at the Dinka shrine of Luang Deng, in recognition of the help received from both the divinity DENG and the Rut Dinka caretakers of the shrine (a number of Rut Dinka fought alongside the Gaawar in this, as in other battles). The battle was of a recent enough date to be recounted in some detail by Nuer and Dinka participants to those British officials who visited the Zeraf valley in the first three decades of this century. Though the name of the “Arab” leader involved was remembered and given, the British were uncertain about the date of the battle and the identity of the opponents, and frequently assumed that they were “slavers” from the days of the Turkiyya, the Turco-Egyptian period (1840-85).This seems to be confirmed by contemporary reports given by Casati and Emin Bey, who each recorded the annihilation of an Egyptian army patrol on the Bahr el-Zeraf (the Giraffe River) in 1885. There are some difficulties in reconciling this date with other evidence concerning floods and the opening of age-sets also mentioned by Gaawar and Dinka oral sources. In this paper I will examine the evidence contained in various orally based accounts collected between 1904 and 1982 and compare them with the few contemporary written accounts we have of battles near the Bahr el-Zeraf in the late nineteenth century. I conclude that the battle of Mut Roal was probably fought against the Mahdists in 1896, rather than against “slavers” in 1885. This conclusion in itself has further implications for our understanding of Arab-Nuer relations, and even Nuer-Dinka relations in the late nineteenth century.
“Elephants for Want of Towns:” The Interethnic and International History of Bulama Island, 1456–1870
Authors: Hair P.E.H. 
Published: May 2006

Bulama (otherwise Bolama) Island is the furthest inshore member of the Bissagos Islands, off the West African coast, in the present-day state of Guiné-Bissau. On the east side of the wide estuary of Rio Jeba, it stands near the mouth of Rio Balola. Small, low-lying, partly surrounded by sandbanks and swamps, often uninhabited, and considered by whites scenically attractive but very unhealthy, Bulama has appeared in historical records with disproportionate frequency. It may have been noted during the earliest stages of Portuguese “Discovery;” two centuries on, it was investigated by the French. It was later the locality of a disastrous British settlement, the proposed home for a colony of African-Americans, and for sixty years the site of a colonial capital; and it was the subject of a well-meant arbitration by a President of the U.S.A. Finally, it was the center for an international conference on its own past, held in 1990. That past, of little importance in itself, nevertheless provides a keyhole glimpse of much of the history of the western Guinea coast over four centuries.Our knowledge of the earlier history of the island of Bulama is slight and depends on European sources. The region of the estuary of Rio Jeba—or “Rio Grande” as it was originally known—was first visited by Europeans in the 1450s. The earliest Portuguese ship to arrive was probably the one on which a certain Diogo Gomes traveled, the date probably 1456. The account of this voyage, as edited by a contemporary scholar in the 1490s from the oral narrative of Diogo Gomes in old age, indicates that the Portuguese landed at a point along Rio Jeba and saw wild animals: deer, elephants, and crocodiles.
Violence Variously Remembered: The Killing of Pieter Oberholzer in July 1964
Authors: Ranger Terence 
Published: May 2006

In mid-1964 the Smith regime in Southern Rhodesia was moving towards a final ban on the African nationalist parties, ZAPU and ZANU. At the same time it was widely believed to be preparing for a Unilateral Declaration of Independence and the nationalist parties in their turn were trying to find ways to prevent this. Both chose to launch sabotage campaigns, so as to demonstrate African opposition. In late June 1964 there was a wave of sabotage in Chipinga and Melsetter in Rhodesia's eastern districts. Roadblocks were erected, the police camp was attacked, dynamite was laid at bridges. Notes were left at the scene of some of these actions purporting to come from “the Crocodile Gang.” On the early evening of 4 July 1964, a 45-year-old foreman at the Silver Streams Wattle Factory in Melsetter, Pieter Johannes Andries Oberholzer, was driving home with his wife and daughter along the Umtali/Melsetter road. He came to a low roadblock made of stones; he tried to ram it; the car turned over; Oberholzer was stabbed to death; his assailants dispersed when another vehicle approached. Police found two notes at the site of the attack. One read “Confrontation Smith. Crocodile Gang will soon kill all whites. Beware!” The other read: “Crocodile Group in Action. We shall kill all whites if they don't want to give back our country. Confrontation!”How are we to read the significance of July 4? The events have been described in five main sources and they look very different from these varying perspectives. “What is Truth?” asks Ndabaningi Si thole, in the earliest of the sources. The Crocodile Gang's killing of Oberholzer constitutes a historical equivalent to the famous old Japanese film, Rashomon, with its presentation of different but equally plausible narratives of a violent event.
Biography Writing in Swahili
Authors: Topan Farouk 
Published: May 2006

Any meaningful assessment of biography and autobiography writing among the Swahili as a historical source needs to take at least three factors into consideration. The first is the influence of Arab literary traditions on the emergence of the genre on the East African coast; the second is the relationship between literacy and orality, and its implication for writing and narration in an African context. The role of colonialism, and the introduction of the Western “mode” of biography and autobiography writing, forms the third factor. The aim of the paper is to survey these factors, not chronologically, but as part of a general discussion on the notion and status of the genre in the Swahili context.Swahili interface with Arabic as an essential ingredient of Islamic practice laid the foundation for the development of literate genres on the East African coast, among them the biographical and the historical. In the process, Swahili adopted styles of narrative expression which are reflected in the terms employed for them. The most common arehabari(from the Arabickhabar) andwasifu(fromwasf). In its original usage,khabardenoted a description of an event or events that were connected in a single narrative by means of a phrase such as “in that year.” It lacked a genealogy of narrators, and the form was stylistically flexible to include verses of poetry relevant to the events. In Swahili the current meaning of the wordhabariis “information” and “news” (and, hence, also a greeting) but, as a historical genre, it has been used in two ways. The first is in relation to the history of the city-states recounted through documents whose titles include the word,khabari/habari, (or the plural,akhbarin Arabic), usually translated as “chronicle(s).”
Afrika-Archiv: A New Series of the Frobenius Institute for the Purpose of Publishing Source Material
Authors: Heintze Beatrix 
Published: May 2006

“[D]as Wirkungsvolle wird gepflegt, die Gewissenhaftigkeit schwindet; an Stelle der Fähigkeit zu bergründen, der Kraft zu überzeugen, tritt die Sicherheìt im Behaupten.”[T]hat what impresses is cultivated, conscientiousness dwindles; the capability to explain, the power to convince are replaced by self-confidence in asserting.There is nothing more absurd—yet also nothing more common—than a scholarly lifetime of publishing based on materials to which no one else has access.The series “Afrika Archiv” (“Africa Archives”) was founded recently with the aim of publishing source material referring to the history and anthropology of Africa. In this connection the term “source material” shall be considered in a very broad sense. Thus, beside the usual library and other written sources, as well as written records of oral traditions, for instance, even editions of ethnographic collections or photographic documentation will be taken into consideration. African scholars will be able to publish material from their own countries to which we Europeans and Americans have only difficult access. Western scholars, on the other hand, could publish sources from public and private European or American archives, museums, or even widely dispersed articles in periodicals and newspapers on African history of the nineteenth century which are available only with great difficulty and expenditure of time. As a reviewer once commented, such source editions will still continue to be valued when contemporary interpretations have already long fallen into oblivion.Endeavors to record systematically varied sources on the history of the continent, the cultural and scientific history of Africa, and to make the essentials generally available to the scientific public still appear inadequate.
Requiem for the Use of Oral Tradition to Reconstruct the Precolonial History of the Lower Gambia
Authors: Wright Donald R. 
Published: May 2006

For the simple truth is that much oral tradition is mutually contradictory, biased, garbled, nonsensical, and essentially codswallop.In 1974—the same year I ventured into the field to begin collecting oral data for my doctoral thesis, a precolonial history of a Mandinka state at the mouth of the Gambia River—Robert W. Fogel and Stanley L. Engerman published their now much maligned work on African American slavery, Time on the Cross. With publication of the book, Fogel and Engerman did something few historians had done before or have done since: they made public their evidence—all of it, data and statistical methodology—so others could determine how they had arrived at their conclusions. Perhaps it was because their interpretation of slavery was so different from those preceding it that historians used Fogel and Engerman's published evidence to dismantle, piece by piece, their arguments and the way they had arrived at them.But making available otherwise inaccessible evidence seemed to me the right thing to do. So, in the field and afterward, I offered up my oral data. (The written evidence I used was already available, either published or in archives at various places on three continents.) I deposited copies of cassette tapes of my interviews, with copies of transcribed translations, in the Gambia and in the United States. Also, within a few years of finishing the dissertation I published two volumes of translated, transcribed, and annotated oral traditions from the collection in an inexpensive series that I thought would be accessible to most interested parties. If people wanted to test my hypotheses, attack my methods, or berate my conclusions, they at least had the materials for doing so.
The Ghana Public Records and Archives Administration Department-Tamale: A Guide for Users
Authors: Abdulai Iddirisu 
Published: May 2006

This department, which was until December, 1997 known as the National Archives of Ghana, takes care of documents from northern Ghana, and has served both local and international researchers since its establishment in 1960. The Ghana Public Records and Archives Administration department in Tamale has had quite a number of visiting researchers, but there are few descriptive guide for users. This paper is intended to serve as an introductory guide in this respect.Between 1950 and 1954, the Gold Coast Archivist undertook a survey of District records in the various district headquarters of what was then the Gold Coast Colony, Ashanti, and the Northern Territories. This led to the establishment of the National Archives of Ghana, offices at Kumasi on 3 August 1959. This was intended first to serve the Ashanti, Brong-Ahafo, and Northern Ghana areas. The office was housed on the premises of the Government Agent's office at Kumase. When the Tamale office was opened, it was also housed on the premises of the Regional Administration there. The space is very cramped and there have been constant calls on the department to look for their own accommodation.The archives opens at 8.00am, but requests for documents from the repository starts only at 9.00am and lasts until 3.00pm, except for a break between 12:30pm and 1:30pm, during which no documents can be requested. The visitors' book must always be signed.An international/foreign researcher is required to bring a letter of introduction from the Ghana Public Records and Archives Administraton headquarters in Accra.