Monthly Archives: November 2013
Comparative Approaches to Urban Africa
African Studies Association, Friday 4:45 p.m. “Past Perspectives, Future Vistas: Comparative Approaches to Urban Africa, pt. 2.” Session chaired by Stephen Marr. An interesting session highlighting a variety of current urban trends across Africa. Marr points out that this session is a sequel, but aspires to an “Empire Strikes Back” level rather than “Batman and […]
Cross-Dialogue for Strategies to Sustain Area Studies – Libraries, Archives and Scholarship
Continuing the thoughtful presentations relating to building collections in support of Area Studies scholarship. It’s great to have the perspective of those working in various world areas and with a focus on productive partnerships. Mary Rader, University of Wisconsin – Madison David Hirsch, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Judith Eckoff Alspach, Center for Research […]
Positioning African Studies to Thrive within Changing Research and Political Landscapes
Listening to a roundtable at African Studies Association, including 2 former ASA presidents, but the papers are available to all: Telling Our Story Part I: Positioning African Studies to Thrive within Changing Research and Political Landscapes Chuck Ambler, University of Texas at El Paso Ruby Bell-Gam, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Aili Mari Tripp, […]
Open Access Button Info Sheet
Originally posted on Open Access Button :
A Student Initiative to Put Denied Access to Research on the Map What is the button? ♦ A browser based tool that can map who is denied access to research ♦ The button creates a real time, worldwide, interactive picture of the problem. Using social media will make this…
Doris Lessing obituary
The New York Times today describes how the author in 2007 “approached her house in sensible shoes to find journalists gathered at her door waiting to tell her that she had won the Nobel Prize for literature. ‘Oh, Christ!’ she said upon hearing the news. ‘I couldn’t care less.’” “Among the major influences on her […]
Suit against Google Books dismissed
The decision is a “win” for Fair Use and researchers. There’s a good deal of quality news coverage available. PC Magazine has a good piece with some history and this: Judge Denny Chin, formerly of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, dismissed the author advocacy group’s 8-year-old copyright lawsuit against […]
Research jobs: livelihoods and land use change in Mozambique
Research jobs ACES is seeking to appoint 3 new team members who will be based mainly in Mozambique: 1) Two Post-Doctoral Research Associates, a) one in the field of tropical land use change; b) another in agriculture and rural development and; 2) One Impact Fellow. ACES is a research project funded by ESPA. It involves […]
Remembering ‘the war to end all wars’
In five years we’ll mark the end of hostilities in the ‘the war to end all wars‘ for the 100th time. It’s a sobering irony not lost on the generations of soldiers and their families since 1918 that the Great War did not end war, but in fact kindled the fire that swept across Europe (and […]
Elliot Skinner Book Award, 2013
The Association for Africanist Anthropology (AFAA) announced the winners of this year’s Elliot Skinner Book Award on November 5, 2013. They opted to award two prizes this year. Steven Feld’s book Jazz Cosmopolitanism in Accra: Five Musical Years in Ghana (2012, Duke University Press), is an ethnography documenting the importance of Ghanian musicians in relationship […]
Football in rural Africa
Nice piece from Friday, November 8, 2013 at CNN by James Masters “No grass, no shoes, pure pleasure: Football in rural Africa.” It highlights photographer Jessica Hilltout’s project, and includes some of her photos. She traveled across Africa capturing the role of football in society: Hilltout spent a total of nine months traveling throughout Africa, […]
African Studies library 