Tiyambe Zeleza Research Articles

Editorial

As explained by Paul Tiyambe Zeleza, the development of post-independence African universities – and therefore also the progress of African Studies in Africa – went through three phases. The “golden era”, which lasted from the 1950s to the 1970s, saw the triumph of African nationalism, the building of new universities and the expansion of existing ones, and “vigorous efforts [...] to decolonize the disciplines”.

3 - The Turbulent 2010s: A Historical Draft


 
 
 The 2010s was an exceptionally turbulent decade characterised by complex and contradictory changes at local, regional and global levels. The changes encompassed all spheres from the political to the economic, as well as the social, cultural, and environmental dimensions of global society. This article identifies and analyses six key trends in the historical trajectory of the period. First, the decade was marked by intense political polarization in many countries; second, was the democratic recessions and resistance in some climes; third, was the rising economic inequalities and disequilibrium; fourth was the shift in global hierarchies and hegemonies; fifth, was the emergence of surveillance capitalism; and the final one was the rebellion of nature as evident in extreme weather conditions and global struggles over climate change. In analysing these key trends the article seeks to make sense of the messy complexities, mind boggling contradictions and massive changes of the various historical conjunctures of modernity.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Paul Tiyambe Zeleza, Vice Chancellor, United States International University – Africa, Nairobi, Kenya. Email: pzeleza@gmail.com
 
 

“Daughterly texts”: fathers and their daughters in Zoë Wicomb’s You Can’t Get Lost in Cape Town and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun

This article analyzes how the relationship between fathers and daughters is portrayed in Zoë Wicomb’s You Can’t Get Lost in Cape Town and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun. The paper observes that in these texts, daughters occupy spaces, both in and outside the home, that are usually considered reserved for sons who are often groomed as heirs to their fathers’ worlds. Drawing on discourse on women, history and the nation, particularly the work of Tiyambe Zeleza and Elleke Boehmer, among other scholars, this paper argues that by placing daughters in spaces often thought to be for sons, both Wicomb and Adichie challenge the marginalization of women in history and narratives of the nation. The paper further shows that instead of perpetuating their fathers’ legacies, daughters in the two texts chart for themselves paths that divert from their fathers’ aspirations. In that way, the daughters’ lives become counter-texts not only to their fathers’ lives and aspirations but also to the general patriarchal imaginings of history and the nation that the fathers represent.

‘Taming untamed pests’: Representing female sexualities in Tiyambe Zeleza’s <i>Smouldering Charcoal</i> and James Ng’ombe’s <i>Sugarcane with Salt</i>

In this article, I explore a range of intersections between the ideological-material legacies of a dictatorial regime and representations of female sexuality in Malawian fiction. I am particularly interested in using literary narratives to examine how fiction writers explore the congruencies and disjunctures amongst outright political dictatorship and the impact on bodies and behaviours of state-inflected institutions such as ‘the family’, along with discourses such as gender, culture and religion that are commonly mobilised in the service of national identity. Focusing on Tiyambe Zeleza’s Smouldering Charcoal and James Ng’ombe’s Sugarcane with Salt, I investigate how the authors’ portrayal of female sexuality contest at the same time as they reproduce received, normative ‘truths’ about female sexualities. By focusing on female sexual agency, desire and pleasure, this article also examines class-inflected intergenerational differences between women’s conceptualisations of female sexualities as a construct that can be negotiated.

‘Abagyenda bareeba. Those who Travel, See’: Home, Migration and the Maternal Bond in Doreen Baingana’s Tropical Fish

ABSTRACTDoreen Baingana’s Tropical Fish explores the migratory experiences of the main narrator-focalizer, Christine Mugisha, as she travels from Uganda to the United States of America. Although the analyses of home, exile, and migration by writers like Edward Said and Paul Tiyambe Zeleza tend to be ungendered; Baingana seems to elaborate on these concerns by reflecting on the gendered experience of travel. As Carole Boyce Davies has argued, the act of travelling and migration opens up new spaces and possibilities for black women writers as they come into contact with multiple places and cultures. In their encounters with migration, black women are able to negotiate and re-negotiate their identities. This article focuses on how Tropical Fish, interrogates complex, contradictory, ambiguous and often conflicted questions of home and migration with their concomitant issues of belonging and alienation/ estrangement and how they are intimately tied to the maternal bond. The article argues that Tropical Fish theorises the gendering of travel by trying to think through the mother-daughter relationship in terms of the daughter who abandons the home and how her diverse experiences of travel and migration contribute to the formation of an individual sense of self. In other words, it enables us to ask, why do the daughters travel; what difference does it make when daughters travel; what happens when the daughter returns to the mother; when the mother speaks to the returning daughter?

The humanism of reconstruction: African intellectuals, decolonial critical theory and the opposition to the ‘posts’ (postmodernism, poststructuralism, postcolonialism)

This article traces the mixed fortunes of what intellectuals like Paul Tiyambe Zeleza refer to as the ‘posts’ (poststructuralism, postmodernism and postcolonialism) in African studies. It documents the historical processes and intellectual developments that, starting from the 1980s, laid the ground for an integration of deconstructive elements in the thought of African scholars. Despite the support garnered from scholars like Achille Mbembe, the ‘posts’ have encountered in African studies a high degree of opposition, if not outright hostility. Deconstructionism was perceived by many theorists to dangerously depart from the pressing ethico-political concerns and humanistic imperatives of the African intellectual agenda. Mbembe's concept of Afropolitanism is similarly being criticized for magnifying some of the theoretical prejudices and weaknesses of which the ‘posts’ (and particularly postcolonial studies) had already been accused. The article concludes by discussing some theoretical solutions put forward by African scholars to move away from rigid conceptions of cultural essentialism while retaining a notion of identity stable enough to be mobilized politically and ideologically.

African Studies: New Directions, Global Engagements

African Studies: New Directions, Global Engagements Jamie Monson The Cosmopolitan Origins of African Studies: Back to the Future? In 1997, Paul Tiyambe Zeleza wrote as president of the African Studies Association that the field of African studies had been plagued by perpetual crisis since its institutionalization in the 1950s. The crisis had its roots in deeply embedded historical structures of race and hierarchy, on the one hand, and institutional power over the production of knowledge on the other. He wrote that scholars in the field were working in “unyielding solitudes” and “bitter contestations” that divided African American from European American and from African scholars. Until these solitudes could be transcended, the field would continue to founder. He went further in his challenge: he suggested that the crisis of the 1990s could lead African studies “back to the future,” as cold war–era strategic concerns declined and a return could take place to transcontinental scholarship that was both intellectually rigorous and socially responsible.1 Sandra E. Greene, speaking as president of the African Studies Association the following year, made a similar argument, stating that the crisis in the field would continue so long as Africanist scholarship from the North continued to play a gatekeeping role and remained detached from African realities. Greene stated that the time had come for a strong bridge between Africanist and African scholars, as a necessary precondition for the field to flourish, stating that it was imperative that African studies address its uncompleted agendas and unacknowledged concerns.2 William Martin and Michael West wrote hopefully, in an article titled “A Future with a Past,” echoing Zeleza, that African studies during this time of crisis was moving into a post-Africanist era. While powerful institutions may have been seeing their demise in the post–cold war world order, Martin and West were optimistic about the possibilities for an African studies centered in Africa and untethered from military funding and developmentalist paradigms. They anticipated that the field would diverge productively from “One Africa” to “Many Africas” without a single hegemonic paradigm.3 [End Page 66] These and other significant interventions in the 1990s sought to open a more global vision of African studies, one that left behind the narrow nationalisms of cold-war area studies and embraced its roots in African diasporic intellectual traditions, while bridging the conventional subdivision of the continent into sub-Saharan and Northern Africa. The end of area studies could allow not only for a return to a broader intellectual geography in African studies, but also the inclusion of multidisciplinary explorations that would no longer be restricted by the need to serve national strategic agendas. Nearly twenty years have passed since these debates about the crises confronting the field and hopes for a different future. Where do we stand in African studies? Has the field been transformed since the late 1990s?—and if so, how? Have we continued to suffer from “perpetual crisis”?—or have we built enduring bridges across continents, constituencies, and disciplines? Has the militarism and strategic developmentalism of the cold war given way to a more just and rigorous scholarship? All these questions need to be raised and debated as we consider the relationships among African studies, global studies, and the disciplines. The picture today is a mixed one. We still have much, much more work to do in order to build bridges between scholars and continents that will be sustainable and enduring, for despite these perpetual calls for partnerships and collaboration, efforts have continued to be piecemeal and often patronizing, originating from the needs and interests of Western scholars, donors, and institutions. And we have not yet fully extended our partnerships to African studies institutions or stakeholders in the parts of the world characterized as rising powers such as Brazil, India, and China, preferring to study their activities on the continent, rather than to engage with them in knowledge production. And our energies are distracted as we deal with a new crisis facing African studies today, the critical crisis of resources. The precipitous fall in financial support from traditional foundation and government sources over the last decade has affected research on African languages and in the humanities and social sciences. Yet...

Ekebete Marriage in the Historiography of Pawnship and Female Abduction in East Africa, 1890-1945

Introduction In the 1960s Jan Kuhanen, Mary Douglas, and Helge Kjekshus and more recently Paul Lovejoy and David Richardson, PhilipsCurtin, Toyin Falola, and Tiyambe Zeleza have shed light on the institution of debt bondage, pawnship and abduction in Africa. These studies illustrated how in precolonial Africa individuals were held as collateral—usually by members of the same family—in lieu of debts that had been incurred. These studies concluded that such practices exposed dependents to the p...

Book Review: "The Roots of African Conflicts: The Causes and Costs"

Title: The Roots of African Conflicts: The Causes and Costs Editors: Alfred Nhema & Paul Tiyambe Zeleza Publisher: OSREA, Addis-: Ababa/ Oxford, James Curry, 2008

Alfred Nhema and Paul Tiyambe Zeleza (Eds), The Roots of African Conflicts: the causes and costs. Addis Ababa and Oxford: OSSREA and James Currey (pb £17.95 – 978 1 84701 300 2). 2008, xii + 244 pp. - Alfred Nhema and Paul Tiyambe Zeleza (Eds), The Resolution of African Conflicts: the management of conflict resolution and post-conflict reconstruction. Addis Ababa

Alfred Nhema and Paul Tiyambe Zeleza (Eds), The Roots of African Conflicts: the causes and costs. Addis Ababa and Oxford: OSSREA and James Currey (pb £17.95 – 978 1 84701 300 2). 2008, xii + 244 pp. - Alfred Nhema and Paul Tiyambe Zeleza (Eds), The Resolution of African Conflicts: the management of conflict resolution and post-conflict reconstruction. Addis Ababa and Oxford: OSSREA and James Currey (pb £17.95 – 978 1 84701 302 6). 2008, xvi + 207 pp. - Volume 79 Issue 4

The Roots of African Conflicts: The Causes and Costs. Alfred Nhema and Paul Tiyambe Zeleza, eds.

<i>The Roots of African Conflicts: The Causes and Costs</i>. Alfred Nhema and Paul Tiyambe Zeleza, eds.

Human Rights, The Rule of Law, and Development in Africa &amp; Human Rights Under African Constitutions: Realizing the Promise for Ourselves

Paul Tiyambe Zeleza &amp; Philip J. McConnaughay,eds., Human Rights, The Rule of Law, andDevelopment in Africa&amp;Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na’im, ed., Human RightsUnder African Constitutions: Realizing the Promise forOurselves

African intellectuals: rethinking politics, language, gender and development

* 1. Introduction - Thandika Mkandawire * Intellectuals, Pan-Africanism and nationalism * Culture and African intellectuals * Africa and Its Diaspora * Autonomous Intellectual Spaces * 2. African Intellectuals and Nationalism - Thandika Mkandawire * The Protagonists * Non-Organic intellectuals * Deafening Silence or Silent Struggle? * The Age of Delusion * The Decade of Extremes: Renaissance or Resignation? * The New Agenda? * 3. Pan-Africanism and the Intellectuals: Rise, Decline and Revival - Ali A. Mazrui * Pan-Africanism and the Intelligentsia * Erosion of Solidarity, Decline of Intellectualism * Towards a New Intellectual Revival * Pan-Africanism: Sub-Saharan and Trans-Saharan * Who Are the Afrabians? * Globalising the Dual Diaspora * Between African Americans and American Africans * 4. Intellectuals, Nationationalism and Panafricanism: A Testimony - Joseph Ki-Zerbo * Nationalism * Pan-africanism * The role of intellectuals in generating the binomial driving force of the african renaissance * 5. Gender Studies for Africa's Transformation - Amina Mama * The Growth of Gender and Women's Studies in Africa * Gender Politics and Developmentalism * Shifting University Landscapes * Gender Politics in African Universities * Feminist Studies in Africa * Strengthening Gender Studies for Africa's Transformation * Challenges * 6. The character and formation of intellectuals within the ANC-led South African liberation movement - Raymond Suttner * Who are intellectuals in the context of the ANC-led South African liberation struggle? * ANC intellectuals - from a variety of sources * The Liberation movement as 'collective intellectual' * The ANC-led National Liberation Movement as creator of intellectuals * Intellectual role and processes of intellectual formation * Party/National liberation movement as 'collective intellectual' * The ANC acting as 'collective intellectual' through its strategy and tactics document of 1969 * Consensus and contestation in producing an intellectual product * New conjuncture after 1990 and again after 1994 * 7. Europhone or African Memory: The Challenge of the Pan-Africanist Intellectual in the Era of Globalization - Ngugi wa Thiong'o * 8. The Language Question and National Development in Africa - Beban Sammy Chumbow * The Politics of Development and Underdevelopment * Development * Education, Language and National Development * The Use of African Languages in Education * The Language Factor in the Development of Science and Technology * African Languages and Inter-African Co-operation * Prospects and Perspectives * 9. Historians, Nationalism, and Pan-Africanism: Myths and Realities - Hannington Ochwada * African Historians and the Past at Independence * Critique of Nationalist Historiography: Which way Forward? * 10. The Academic Diaspora and Knowledge Production in and on Africa: What Role for CODESRIA? - Paul Tiyambe Zeleza * Defining and Debating African Diasporas * Contextualising the Academic Diasporas * Historicising Diasporic Academic Production and Linkages * Tendencies of the Contemporary Academic Diaspora * Conclusion: What Role for CODESRIA?

Human Rights, the Rule of Law, and Development in Africa edited by Paul Tiyambe Zeleza and Philip J. McConnaughay Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004. Pp. 302, £32.50.

Human Rights, the Rule of Law, and Development in Africa edited by Paul Tiyambe Zeleza and Philip J. McConnaughay Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004. Pp. 302, £32.50. - Volume 44 Issue 2

The End of Africanist Economic History? Considerations on Tiyambe Zeleza's A Modern Economic History of Africa, Vol. 1 the Nineteenth Century

The End of Africanist Economic History? Considerations on Tiyambe Zeleza's <i>A Modern Economic History of Africa, Vol. 1 the Nineteenth Century</i>

Women, Landed Property, and the Accumulation of Wealth in Early Colonial Lagos

Previous articleNext article No AccessWomen, Landed Property, and the Accumulation of Wealth in Early Colonial LagosKristin MannKristin Mann Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Signs Volume 16, Number 4Summer, 1991Women, Family, State, and Economy in Africa Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/494699 Views: 16Total views on this site Citations: 16Citations are reported from Crossref Copyright 1991 The University of ChicagoPDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Marcia Wright Gender, Women, and Power in Africa, 1750–1914, (Nov 2020): 415–430.https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119535812.ch25Jane Hooper “A mere business affair”?Women in the social and commercial worlds of nineteenth-century Madagascar, Canadian Journal of African Studies / Revue canadienne des études africaines 54, no.33 (Jun 2020): 437–457.https://doi.org/10.1080/00083968.2020.1749096Mariana P. Candido Understanding African women’s access to landed property in nineteenth-century Benguela, Canadian Journal of African Studies / Revue canadienne des études africaines 54, no.33 (Aug 2020): 395–417.https://doi.org/10.1080/00083968.2020.1749095Tom Goodfellow, Olly Owen Thick claims and thin rights: Taxation and the construction of analogue property rights in Lagos, Economy and Society 49, no.33 (Jul 2020): 406–432.https://doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2020.1730587Mariana P. Candido The Expansion of Slavery in Benguela During the Nineteenth Century, International Review of Social History 65, no.S28S28 (Mar 2020): 67–92.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0020859020000140Omolade Adunbi (Re)inventing development: China, infrastructure, sustainability and special economic zones in Nigeria, Africa 89, no.44 (Nov 2019): 662–679.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972019000846Michael Attah Divorcing Marriage from Marital Assets: Why Equity and Women Fail in Property Readjustment Actions in Nigeria, Journal of African Law 62, no.33 (Sep 2018): 427–446.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0021855318000207Temilola Alanamu Church Missionary Society evangelists and women's labour in nineteenth-century Abẹ́òkúta, Africa 88, no.22 (May 2018): 291–311.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0001972017000924Tom Goodfellow, Oliver Owen Taxation, Property Rights and the Social Contract in Lagos, SSRN Electronic Journal (Jan 2018).https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3120572Mariana P. Candido Engendering West Central African History: The Role of Urban Women in Benguela in the Nineteenth Century, History in Africa 42 (Apr 2015): 7–36.https://doi.org/10.1017/hia.2015.16Mojúbàolú Olúfúnké Okome Gendered States: Women’s Civil Society Activism in Nigerian Politics, (Jan 2013): 109–155.https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137324535_5Paul Tiyambe Zeleza Discriminations de genre dans l’historiographie africaine, (Jan 2010): 355–374.https://doi.org/10.4000/books.iheid.5908Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch De la ville en Afrique noire, Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales 61, no.55 (May 2017): 1085–1119.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0395264900039949Marjorie K. McIntosh The Diversity of Social Capital in English Communities, 1300–1640 (with a Glance at Modern Nigeria), The Journal of Interdisciplinary History 29, no.33 (Jan 1999): 459–490.https://doi.org/10.1162/002219598551788Barbara M Cooper Gender, Movement, and History: Social and Spatial Transformations in 20th Century Maradi, Niger, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 15, no.22 (Nov 2016): 195–221.https://doi.org/10.1068/d150195Lisa A. Lindsay ‘To return to the bosom of their fatherland’: Brazilian immigrants in nineteenth‐century Lagos, Slavery & Abolition 15, no.11 (Jun 2008): 22–50.https://doi.org/10.1080/01440399408575114