First published in 1930, Mhudi was finished in 1920. The author, Sol Plaatje had trouble finding a publisher, and so the manuscript languished for a decade. Mhudi was a groundbreaking novel, approaching history from an Afro-Centric view rather than the more common European view. It was a radically different approach for the time, showing the …
It was a photograph of a terrifying new disease. Just some flowing strands of genetic material, strangely graceful in the micrograph. It was almost beautiful, not seeming at all like something that could condemn its victims to a bloody and brutal death within two weeks. It was the first look the world had of the …
On 10 September 1960, Abebe Bikila found that the new running shoes he had purchased in Rome were uncomfortable. Undeterred, he decided to run the marathon barefoot. He took the 1960 Rome Olympics gold medal. On 23 November 1915 the retreat from the World War I Serbian front began. Every male over the age of …
On 14 September 1960 Colonel Joseph-Désiré Mobutu seized power in the newly independent Congo in a bloodless coup. Ostensibly, as Mobutu claimed on his radio broadcast explaining the event, the coup was undertaken to break the impasse the Congolese government had reached. Mobutu characterized it as a “cooling off” period, in which the government would …
On 12 September 1974, Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia was deposed by the communist Derg. Emperor Selassie was the last of the Solomonic Dynasty to rule Ethiopia, a reported 225 generations from his biblical ancestors the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon. Selassie would last just less than two years before being murdered, and when …
In 2018, just under half of the world’s new HIV infections, 800,000, appeared in South and Eastern Africa. There are some bright spots – currently 85% of people living with HIV in these areas are now aware of their status. Thanks to a sustained world effort and the United States PEPFAR program, 79% of those …
“Don’t compromise the future with hasty reforms, and don’t replace the structures that Belgium hands over to you until you are sure that you can do better. Don’t be afraid to come to us. We will remain by your side and give you advice.” With those most patronizing of words, King Baudouin I of Belgium …
The movie Zulu was more than just the breakout vehicle for Michael Caine – it was an account, albeit the movie version, of a war that defined the British Scramble for Africa and yet was hidden behind the complete and overwhelming shadows of the two World Wars. Even the movie Zulu itself still obscures the …
Samuel Maharero was born in 1856. It was the beginning of a time of massive upheaval in South West Africa. His father, paramount chief of the Herero, had consolidated Herero rule in the area over the Nama and Orlam people by 1861. The latter stages of that struggle was marked by the usage of much …
Cetshwayo’s name is not as well known as that of his uncle Shaka. Shaka had managed to turn the small Zulu tribe into the powerful Zulu nation before being assassinated by his brothers. Cetshwayo, who officially ruled from 1873 to 1879, was confronted with the might of the British Empire and history records him as …