Podcast
New Books in African Studies
Episodes — page 9
- Les Sosnowski and Monique Sosnowski, "Operation Crevette: Benin, Mercenaries, and the Survival of a New State" (Lexington Books, 2024)
Freshly out from under French colonial rule in 1960, the West African nation of Dahomey (now Benin) became home to the largest number of coups d’état in history, earning the reputa…
- Katherine Hallemeier, "African Literature and US Empire: Postcolonial Optimism in Nigerian and South African Writing" (Edinburgh UP, 2024)
African Literature and US Empire Postcolonial Optimism in Nigerian and South African Writing (Edinburgh UP, 2024) demonstrates how African literature grapples with the enforced opt…
- Tycho van der Hoog, "Comrades Beyond the Cold War: North Korea and the Liberation of Southern Africa" (Hurst, 2025)
North Korea was an important player in the decolonisation of Africa. Freedom fighters across the continent received vital assistance from Pyongyang, and almost all southern African…
- William Blakemore Lyon, "Forged in Genocide: Migrant Workers Shaping Colonial Capitalism in Namibia, 1890-1925" (de Gruyter, 2024)
Forged in Genocide traces the early history of colonial capitalism in Namibia with a central focus on migrants who came to be key to the economy during and as a result of the Germa…
- Arwen P. Mohun, "American Imperialist: Cruelty and Consequence in the Scramble for Africa" (Chicago UP, 2023)
This biography of “African explorer” Richard Dorsey Mohun, written by one of his descendants, reveals how American greed and state power helped shape the new imperial order in Afri…
- Alexander Smalls and Nina Oduro, "The Contemporary African Kitchen: Home Cooking Recipes from the Leading Chefs of Africa" (Phaidon Press, 2024)
The Contemporary African Kitchen: Home Cooking Recipes from the Leading Chefs of Africa (Phaidon Press, 2024) is an elegant collection of 120 home cooking recipes from Africa’s mos…
- Philip A. Martin, "Strong Commanders, Weak States: How Rebel Governance Shapes Military Integration after Civil War" (Cornell UP, 2025)
In Strong Commanders, Weak States: How Rebel Governance Shapes Military Integration after Civil War (Cornell University Press, 2025), Dr. Philip A. Martin investigates a fundamenta…
- Kara Cooney, "Recycling for Death: Coffin Reuse in Ancient Egypt and the Theban Royal Caches" (American U in Cairo Press, 2024)
Today I talked to Kara Cooney about Recycling for Death: Coffin Reuse in Ancient Egypt and the Theban Royal Caches (American U in Cairo Press, 2024). The book is a meticulous study…
- Rhiannon Stephens, "Poverty and Wealth in East Africa: A Conceptual History" (Duke UP, 2022)
In Poverty and Wealth in East Africa: A Conceptual History (Duke UP, 2022), Rhiannon Stephens offers a conceptual history of how people living in eastern Uganda have sustained and…
- Lindsay O'Neill, "The Two Princes of Mpfumo: An Early Eighteenth-Century Journey Into and Out of Slavery" (U Pennsylvania Press, 2025)
In 1716 two princes from Mpfumo—what is today Maputo, the capital of Mozambique—boarded a ship licensed by the East India Company bound for England. Instead, their perfidious capta…
- Samar Al-Bulushi, "War-Making as Worldmaking: Kenya, the United States, and the War on Terror" (Stanford UP, 2024)
Since Kenya's invasion of Somalia in 2011, the Kenyan state has been engaged in direct combat with the Somali militant group Al-Shabaab, conducting airstrikes in southern Somalia a…
- Raphael Chijioke Njoku, "Queen Elizabeth II and the Africans: Narrating Decolonization, Postwar Commonwealth, and Africa’s Development, 1947-2022" (Leuven UP, 2024)
The road to Queen Elizabeth II’s implementation of African reforms was rough, especially in the first two decades following her ascension to the throne. In Queen Elizabeth II and t…
- Frank Gerits, "The Ideological Scramble for Africa: How the Pursuit of Anticolonial Modernity Shaped a Postcolonial Order, 1945-1966" (Cornell UP, 2023)
In The Ideological Scramble for Africa, Frank Gerits examines how African leaders in the 1950s and 1960s crafted an anticolonial modernization project. Rather than choose Cold War…
- A. G. Hopkins, "Capitalism in the Colonies: African Merchants in Lagos, 1851–1931" (Princeton UP, 2024)
In Capitalism in the Colonies: African Merchants in Lagos, 1851–1931 (Princeton UP, 2024), A. G. Hopkins provides the first substantial assessment of the fortunes of African entrep…
- Rachel Marie Niehuus, "An Archive of Possibilities: Healing and Repair in Democratic Republic of Congo" (Duke UP, 2024)
In An Archive of Possibilities: Healing and Repair in Democratic Republic of Congo (Duke UP, 2024), anthropologist and surgeon Rachel Marie Niehuus explores possibilities of healin…
- Anooradha Iyer Siddiqi, "Architecture of Migration: The Dadaab Refugee Camps and Humanitarian Settlement" (Duke UP, 2023)
Environments associated with migration are often seen as provisional, lacking both history and architecture. As Anooradha Iyer Siddiqi demonstrates in Architecture of Migration: Th…
- Casey Golomski, "God's Waiting Room: Racial Reckoning at Life's End" (Rutgers UP, 2024)
Can older racists change their tune, or will they haunt us further once they're gone? Rich in mystery and life's lessons, God's Waiting Room: Racial Reckoning at Life's End (Rutger…
- Benjamin H. Bradlow, "Urban Power: Democracy and Inequality in São Paulo and Johannesburg" (Princeton UP, 2024)
Why some cities are more effective than others at reducing inequalities in the built environment. For the first time in history, most people live in cities. One in seven are living…
- Jonathan R. Beloff, "The Strategy to End the Genocide Against the Tutsi in Rwanda" (Lexington Books, 2025)
Utilizing Strategic Theory as a framework for warfare and incorporating the testimonies and experiences of eight genocide survivors as well as military personnel, Jonathan R. Belof…
- Caitlín Eilís Barrett, "Domesticating Empire: Egyptian Landscapes in Pompeian Gardens" (Oxford UP, 2019)
Domesticating Empire: Egyptian Landscapes in Pompeian Gardens (Oxford University Press, 2019) is the first contextually-oriented monograph on Egyptian imagery in Roman households.…
