The SSL ‘Book of the Month’ feature highlights a book in our collection that has been chosen by one of our Subject Consultants. This may be a recent addition to our stock or an existing item that we would like to share with you.

December’s book of the month was selected by Sarah Rhodes, Subject Consultant for International Development, Forced Migration, African and Commonwealth Studies.

Global Africa: into the twenty-first century

Edited by Dorothy L. Hodgson and Judith A. Byfield

University of California Press, 2017

Available in hard copy at          HC 800.GLO 2017

Why was it chosen?

It was chosen to remind the reader that Africa continues to ‘offer complex and insightful explanations, strategies for solutions, and inspiration for the future’ (p.2).  A view more pertinent than ever today as the world struggles to contain the global pandemic.

Book Overview

Global Africa is a striking, original volume that disrupts dominant narratives that continue to frame our discussion of Africa, complicating conventional views of the region as a place of violence, despair, and victimhood. The volume documents the significant global connections, circulations, and contributions that African people, ideas, and goods have made throughout the world, from the United States, South Asia, Latin America, Europe, and elsewhere. Through succinct and engaging pieces by scholars, policy makers, activists, and journalists, the essays provide a wholly original view of a continent at the centre of global historical processes rather than on its periphery. Global Africa offers fresh, complex, and insightful visions of a continent in flux.

Reviews

‘The rich variety of contributions to Global Africa points to more diverse and complex ways of thinking about the importance and limitations of Africa’s connections to the rest of the world’.

Professor Frederick Cooper, New York University, author of Africa in the World: Capitalism, Empire, Nation-State

How can I access it?

This title is available in hard copy and is currently located on top of our New Book Display area, its shelfmark is HC 800.GLO 2017 and can be borrowed if you have borrowing priviledges.

What would your SSL Book of the Month be? Do you have a favourite book in our collection? If so, we would love to know what it is. Add a comment below or email us.