A wealth of excellent films from Africa is readily available for classroom use, even if much of Anglophone Africa remains poorly represented. African films can serve to challenge students' assumptions and to foster a critical examination of Western films set in Africa. Extending the scope of conventional “African” courses to North Africa adds a substantial body of notable productions, some of which address current concerns such as Islamic fundamentalism. African films have to be contextualized; even when they are examined as works of art and as examples of world cinema, full appreciation requires that they be considered in their historical and cultural contexts. When films are used to introduce students to Africa, critical examination is imperative—audiences that have little factual information about Africa all too readily assume that fiction and fact coincide.

Research with people in highly politicized research settings illuminates the gap between the images that most African governments strive to represent and the sociopolitical realities of everyday life. This article discusses the opportunities and challenges of doing research in postgenocide Rwanda and is a useful resource for researchers contemplating their own projects under such conditions, whether in Rwanda or elsewhere. It discusses the importance of creating personal relationships and meeting people on their terms, as well as such topics as the identification of the research site, building rapport and trust with respondents, safeguarding anonymity and confidentiality, and working with local research assistants and partners.

This article investigates issues of identity construction and public memorialization in postapartheid South Africa. It focuses on the Sunday Times Heritage Project, a unique private-sector initiative that involved the installation of thirty memorials throughout the country between 2006 and 2008. The article discusses the conceptualization and implementation of the project, pointing out important differences between this private initiative and the state-directed heritage effort. By interrogating the nexus between race, space, and memory in the construction of memorials, the article highlights the significance of placement and location in the formation of new identity discourses.

This article concerns Dr. Remmy Ongala, a Congolese-Tanzanian musician, and the making of postcolonial cosmopolitan music in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. It argues that Dr. Remmy's music is shaped by the postcolonial consciousness and conditions of contemporary Tanzania. It also shows Dr. Remmy's cosmopolitan citizenship in his songs that address political and social issues. Focusing on his involvement in worldbeat festivals, it argues that he, like other musicians, enters into the worldbeat system not as a fully autonomous individual but as a constituted postcolonial subject, compelled to shape his music in accordance with the demands of the worldbeat system.

In Mozambique and Cape Verde, writing in Portuguese by African women has directly engaged political reconstruction by denouncing colonial oppression and embracing national freedom. This article addresses the recent history of Lusophone African women's fiction, which has been pivotal in inscribing the intimate arena of sexuality and motherhood into power relations and has also revealed ways in which the domain of violence intersects with private lives. By focusing on two novels that exemplify this trend, this article demonstrates links between the political and the intimate. It also shows how Lusophone African authors contribute to healing social conflict through their narratives, and draws some conclusions about gender relations in the Lusophone African experience and across the continent.

This article examines the effects of the post-2002 sociopolitical crisis in Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire, on urban and peri-urban agriculture. Based on the case study of Abidjan, it argues for a conceptualization of sustainability that includes social as well as environmental dimensions and focuses on coping strategies of producers and merchants. In Abidjan, these strategies included internal migration within the city and its periphery, the use of organic fertilizers, and changes in market structure. The study illustrates how such strategies allowed producers to continue to supply produce to the market, despite the difficulties of war.

This article explores contemporary manifestations of the politicization of culture by the Christian clergy in the determination and resolution of political conflicts in Nigeria in general and Yonibaland in particular—against die backdrop of what has been called “the civilizational hegemony of Christianity.” The article approaches religion and the practices it enables as part of a cultural system through which we can capture the specific ways in which religious audiorities pursue political and ethnocultural interests to justify a particular social order.