Africans: The History of a ContinentCambridge University Press, 1995 M08 25 - 323 pages In a vast and all-embracing study of Africa, from the origins of mankind to the South African general election of 1994, John Iliffe refocuses African history on the peopling of an environmentally hostile continent. Africans have been pioneers struggling against disease and nature, and their social, economic and political institutions have been designed to ensure survival and maximise numbers. These institutions enabled them to survive the slave trade and colonial invasion, but in the context of medical progress and other twentieth-century innovations the same institutions have bred the most rapid population growth the world has ever seen. This demographic growth has lain behind the collapse of colonial rule, the disintegration of Apartheid, and the instability of contemporary nations. The history of the continent is thus a single story binding living Africans to their earliest human ancestors. |
Contents
The frontiersmen of mankind | 1 |
The emergence of foodproducing communities | 6 |
The impact of metals | 18 |
Christianity and Islam | 37 |
Colonising society in western Africa | 62 |
Colonising society in eastern and southern Africa | 97 |
The Atlantic slave trade | 127 |
Regional diversity in the nineteenth century | 159 |
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Common terms and phrases
Africa London Afrikaner agricultural ancient Angola Arab areas Asante Bantu became Berber British Buganda Cambridge Cape capital cattle cent central chief chiefdoms chiefly Christian churches coastal Congo Côte d'Ivoire created crops cultivators culture decline demographic disease dominated East eastern economic Egypt Egyptian eighteenth century elite equatorial especially Ethiopia European expanded exports famine forest French Fulbe Ghana Gold Coast groups Hausa Ifriqiya Igbo important independence indigenous Islamic Kenya Khoikhoi kilometres king kingdom Kongo labour Lake land language later Mali military millennium missionaries modern Morocco Mozambique Muslim nationalist Niger Nigeria Nile nineteenth century North northern numbers organisation pastoralists peasants perhaps political polygyny population growth Portuguese probably regimes region resistance ritual rulers rural Rwanda savanna Senegal settlement Shambaa slave trade social society South Africa southern Africa southwards stateless sub-Saharan Sudan survived took towns traditions tropical urban Valley villages West Africa West African western Africa women Xhosa Yoruba Zambia