DIVThe discursive construction of Africa under colonialism, with an emphasis on the part played by African writers themselves./div

Regarded as «Cuba's most mysterious poet», Juan Francisco Manzano continues to intrigue scholars across disciplines. Using a postcolonial approach, this book breaks new ground by exploring the poet's connection with the Irish civil rights champion, Richard Robert Madden. Drawing on previously untapped sources, Gera C. Burton takes a fresh look at the relationship between these two extraordinary individuals to reveal facts considered critical in achieving an understanding of their association, with particular resonance for postcolonial studies. What emerges, regardless of their ambivalence, is the creation of a strategic alliance forged by the two writers in opposition to the colonial powers. Scholars in the fields of Latin American, postcolonial, and Diasporic studies, along with specialists in Cuban and Irish studies will welcome this significant contribution to the body of work on «la gente sin historia» - the people without a history.

Probes the relationship between the conditions of colonial "modernization" and the methods of anthropological knowledge

This volume provides an essential key to understanding the issues which characterize post-colonialism, explaining what it is, where it is encountered and why it is crucial in forging new cultural identities. As a subject, post-colonial studies stands at the intersection of debates about race, colonialism, gender, politics and language. In the language of post-colonial studies, some words are new, others are familiar words charged with new significance. Among over 100 entries, this book includes definitions of: diaspora Fanonism hybridity imperialism Manicheanism mimicry miscegenation negritude orientalism settler-colony subaltern trans-culturation There are suggestions for further reading at the end of each entry and a comprehensive glossary with extensive cross-referencing. The bibliography of essential writings in post-colonial studies is in an easy-to-use A-Z format.

In analyzing the obstacles to democratization in post- independence Africa, Mahmood Mamdani offers a bold, insightful account of colonialism's legacy--a bifurcated power that mediated racial domination through tribally organized local authorities, reproducing racial identity in citizens and ethnic identity in subjects. Many writers have understood colonial rule as either "direct" (French) or "indirect" (British), with a third variant--apartheid--as exceptional. This benign terminology, Mamdani shows, masks the fact that these were actually variants of a despotism. While direct rule denied rights to subjects on racial grounds, indirect rule incorporated them into a "customary" mode of rule, with state-appointed Native Authorities defining custom. By tapping authoritarian possibilities in culture, and by giving culture an authoritarian bent, indirect rule (decentralized despotism) set the pace for Africa; the French followed suit by changing from direct to indirect administration, while apartheid emerged relatively later. Apartheid, Mamdani shows, was actually the generic form of the colonial state in Africa. Through case studies of rural (Uganda) and urban (South Africa) resistance movements, we learn how these institutional features fragment resistance and how states tend to play off reform in one sector against repression in the other. Reforming a power that institutionally enforces tension between town and country, and between ethnicities, is the key challenge for anyone interested in democratic reform in Africa.