New Medieval Books: Great Kingdoms of Africa - Medievalists. net
The medieval era features prominently in this edited volume, which examines several of the most important states to emerge in pre-modern Africa. Its nine studies span regions across the continent.
Great Kingdoms of AfricaEdited by John ParkerThames & HudsonISBN: 978-0-500-29895-4The medieval era features prominently in this edited volume, which examines several of the most important states to emerge in pre-modern Africa. Its nine studies span regions across the continent. Excerpt:Great Kingdoms of Africaseeks to explore processes of dynastic state-building and understandings of the nature of kingship in the period before the European colonial conquest. The chapters that follow contribute to an emerging picture, which stresses the creative natureof political power, the ongoing dialogue between that power and the broader culture from which it emerged, and the coexistence of political hierarchies with other sources of authority. None of this means that Africa’s kingdoms are any less ‘great’. It means that African kingdoms need to be considered on their own terms. Indeed, their greatness might be seen to reside less in an ability to dominate and coerce than in their inventiveness in forging forms of statecraft able to secure legitimacy by more inclusive means. Neither is it to say that heroic histories of warrior kings, in which dynamic leaders emerge from the underlying structures of society to seize the political initiative, are nothing but invented traditions. There is ample evidence to demonstrate that dynastic politics – rather than generalized notions of ‘political culture’ – reshaped the destiny of African kingdoms and the peoples they sought to rule. Dynastic power, moreover, did not emerge and operate in a vacuum: if one of the faults of early anthropology was to consider African societies as self-contained ‘tribal’ communities, it is equally misleading to view the continent’s history in isolation from the broader global forces with which it interacted. The role of trans-Saharan connectivity in the rise and decline of medieval Sudanic empires is a crucial case in point. From the sixteenth century, globalized interactions increasingly included those with slave traders and other agents of an expansionist western Europe, whose arrival on the coasts of Africa disrupted existing economic circuits and shifted the dynamics of political power. Who is this book for?This book offers an introduction to indigenous African states that emerged from ancient times through to the nineteenth century. Three chapters focus on medieval states: the Sudanic empires of Ghana, Mali and Songhay; the Kingdom of Ethiopia; and the Yoruba and Benin kingdoms. A chapter on the Kingdom of Kongo also examines its history before 1500. Those interested in African history will find the volume a useful introduction to, and comparison of, the rise and fall of states across the continent. “Great Kingdoms of Africais well-illustrated, with two colour sections. Yet it sits firmly in that class of books in which the authors have restrained themselves from too much unexplained technical vocabulary, but possibly not enough to make the book readily accessible to the general reader. Though, as a contributed volume, it is inevitably sometimes repetitive, there is much that is insightful, new, and useful to commend this book. ” ~ review by Nigel Fletcher-Jones inMinervaThe EditorJohn Parkeris Senior Lecturer in the History of Africa at SOAS, University of London. He penned the Introduction and two of the chapters, while eight other historians contributed to this book. You canwatch this talk with John Parkerabout the book on the York Ideas’ YouTube page. You can learn more about this book from thepublisher’s website. You can buy this book onAmazon. com|Amazon. ca|Amazon. co. ukRelated PostsMap of Medieval AfricaMaps: Africa in the 14th centuryTrade Networks and Empires: African Art's Many Golden AgesPre-Colonial Criminal Justice In West Africa: Eurocentric Thought Versus Africentric EvidenceCosmic Foreordination and Human Commitment: The Tragic Volition in Three Kingdoms