HISTORY: Get Your Africa Read On - The Long & The Short Of It > For Unofficial Use Only

3 books for a

GOFO/CEO/Executive to read

about Africa or

Africa Starter Reading List

 First off, for the uninitiated I should address the term GOFO.  GOFO stands for General Officer Flag Officer and technically it should (in my opinion) spelled GO/FO but it typically is not.

I was once asked by a flag officer to recommend three books that he should read prior to being assigned to the Africa AOR (Area of Responsibility).  I don't remember exactly what I told him but I am sure I included a few of the 6 books below.  

 In recently updating my massive "THE Africa Reading List", I realized that its length can be overwhelming.  For the person newly assigned to Africa, it may as well be written in Chinese (or Swahili).  

 For the aspiring Africanist I have put together my completely biased starter list:  6 books that will not only inform and educate you but more importantly will pique your appetite to read more!

 
1. It Happened on the Way to War by Rye Barcott
Rye wasn't a FAO (he was HUMINT) but his work in Kenya is instructive of the potential wielded by well-informed, educated and locally-connected military officers.

 

2. Africa Since Independence by Paul Nugent
There is no riveting history of the entire continent of 55 countries out there but Nugent does a decent job. “Decolonization could never have simply been the negation of colonization.” I have pretty extensive notes on this book here that give the big ideas of many of the chapters: 13 Pages of Notes/Summary of Nugent's Book

  

 

3. The Zanzibar Chest by Aidan Hartley.  
This was the first book I ever read on Africa.  It was recommended to me by a POLAD at a State Department function.  Hartley's writing is superb and made me fall in love with the continent.

  

 

4. The Shadow of the Sun by Ryszard Kapuscinski.
Beautiful writing.  In the foreword to this book he writes: "Africa does not exist."

  

 

5. The Ultimate Weapon is No Weapon by Shannon Beebe and Mary Kaldor
He's got a great chapter on Africa that is challenging and thought-provoking.  Tragically, LTC Beebe died in a plane crash in August 2011.  

  

 

6. Getting Somalia Wrong by Mary Harper
Because everyone loves to talk about Somalia--now you will actually be able to speak intelligently on the subject.

 For reference only:
Africans: The History of the Continent by John Iliffe
His thesis is heavily tied to population growth as a major variable in overall history. He places a heavy emphasis on the role of of social organizations and horizontal structures. Extensive notes available on this book here: Notes on Iliffe

 

via fuuo.blogspot.com

 

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THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 2012

THE Africa Reading List


( This list is permanently hosted as a page on this blog as well: http://fuuo.blogspot.com/p/the-fao-africa-book-list.html )

I try to update this list and repost it a few times a year.

Am I missing one of your favorites?  Comment with your recommendations and I will add them.  


ATTENTION:  IS THIS LIST TOO OVERWHELMING?  I'VE PUT TOGETHER  A STARTER READING LIST HERE.
AFRICA- GENERAL

A Year in Marrakesh by Peter Mayne, 2003.  

Africa in Chaos by George B. Ayittey.  Recommended by Army FAO LTC W.

Africa: A biography of the Continent by John Reader.  Recommended by Army FAO LTC W.  


 
African Military History by John Lamphear.  This collection of essays on pre-colonial sub-Saharan African military history is drawn from a number of academic journals and includes some which are considered milestones in African historiographical discourse, as well as others which, while lesser known, provide remarkable insight into the unique nature of African military history. Selections were made so as to produce an introduction to the understudied field of pre-colonial African military history that will be useful to specialists and non-specialists alike. The volume also contains an introduction which presents one of the first significant reviews of pre-colonial African military historiography ever attempted.
 

Africa’s Armies: From Honor to Infamy, a History from 1791 to Present by Robert Edgerton, 2002.  Academic study of military trends on the continent.

Ambiguous Order: Military Forces In African States by Herbert Howe, 2004.   This book may get mixed reviews however Mr. Howe is a gifted and engaging lecturer.

 
Burton: A Biography of Sir Richard Francis Burton by Byron Farwell.
 

Devil on the Cross by Ngugi wa Thiong'o.

Elimination of Mercenarism in Africa edited by Sabelo Gumedze.   Good luck finding this one on Amazon, but if you email me I will send you a digital (pdf) copy that I have. 
Eminent Victorian Soldiers: Seekers of Glory by Byron Farwell.

 by Sir Laurens Van Der Post 

The best single volume multi-disciplinary look at the trans-Atlantic slave trade.  Pulitzer Prize winner.

Shah continues the story he began in his acclaimed memoir The Caliph's House, the tale of his family's move to Morocco, this time focusing on the traditional wisdom stories of Arabia, best known in the West through A Thousand and One Nights.

In the Heart of Africa by Duke Adolphus Frederick of Mecklenburg

It's Our Turn to Eat by Michaela Wrong.  Recounts the story of John Githongo, who as part of the anti-corruption agency of the Kenyan government, uncovered widespread corruption.

Kim by Rudyard Kipling.

Machete Season: The Killers in Rwanda Speak by Jean Hatzfeld, 2006.    This book features the testimony of 10 friends from the same village who spent day after day together, fulfilling orders to kill any Tutsi within their territory during the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

Man-Eaters of Tsavo by J.H. Patterson

Mr. Kipling's Army by Bryron Farwell

Politics and Society in Contemporary Africa by Naomi Chazan, et. al. Textbook covering political structures, social dynamics, ethnicity issues.

Prisoners of the Mahdi by Byron Farwell
Queen Victoria’s Little Wars by Byron Farwell, 1972.   Covers British military expeditions in Africa, Asia and China.  Excellent synopsis of interventions in South Africa and Ethiopia.   An entertaining read.

*States and Power in Africa by Jeffrey Herbst.  Will update with summary soon (11/15)

The Africans by  David Lamb, 1987.  Older classic, hilarious, insightful.

The Assassination of Lumumba by Ludo De Witte.  Recommended by Mr. Okata.  An account of Congo's sudden independence from Belgium and its rapid decent in chaos overseen by its colonial master. Recommend this book be read in conjunction with King Leopold's Ghost.  Read in conjunction with King Leopold’s Ghost  by Adam Hochschild.  

The Black Man’s Burden: Africa and the curse of the Nation-State by  Basil Davidson, 1992. Textbook covering nationalism and imposed statehood  issues

The Blue Nile by Alan Moorehead.

The White Nile  by Alan Moorehead.

The Dragon's Gift: The Real Story of China in Africa - Hardcover (Jan. 25, 2010) by Deborah Brautigam

The Famished Road by Ben Okri.  This one comes highly recommended!

Meredith

The French Foreign Legion: A Complete History by Douglas Porch, 1991.  Provides a background on French conquests of Benin and Madagascar.  Also illuminates the history and culture of an enduring major actor in African history and current affairs.

The Great War in Africa by Byron Farwell.

The House at Sugar Beach: In Search of a Lost Africa Childhood by Helene Cooper.  Recommended to me by a Navy Africa FAO.  

The Land of Zinj by Captain Stigand.

The Last Storytellers: Tales from the Heart of Morocco by Richard Hamilton, 2011.  Richard Hamilton has witnessed first-hand the death throes of this rich and captivating tradition and, in the labyrinth of the Marrakech medina, has tracked down the last few remaining storytellers, recording stories that are replete with the mysteries and beauty of the Maghreb.

The Lost World of the Kalahari by Sir Laurens Van Der Post 

The Man Who Presumed: A Biography of Henry M. Stanley by Byron Farwell.
The Palm-Wine Drinkard and My Life in the Bush of Ghosts by Amos Tutuola, 1993.   Drawing on the West African Yoruba oral folktale tradition, Tutuola described the odyssey of a devoted palm-wine drinker through a nightmare of fantastic adventure.

The Penguin Atlas of African History by Colin McEvedy, 1995.  Excellent reference work, good ethnic maps.

by Winston Churchill.  Operations in the Sudan against the Maahdists.

The Scramble for Africa: White Man’s Conquest of the Dark Continent from 1876 to 1912 by Thomas Pakenham, 1991.  Dry and long but an excellent explanation of the origins of colonial borders and colonial legacies.

*The Shadow of the Sun by Ryszard Kapuscinski

The Uganda Protectorate by Sir Harry Johnston
The Wretched of the Earth by Frantz Fanon

*The Zanzibar Chest by Aidan Hartley

*Things Fall Apart: A Novel by Chinua Achebe  1959. Classic fiction.

Through Masai Land by Joseph Thompson

Travels with a Tangerine by Tim Mackintosh-Smith.  This is a book about Moroccan traveler Ibn Battutah's 29-year pilgrimage from his native Tangiers to Mecca.

Warfare in Independent Africa by William Reno.  
Warlord Politics and African States by  William Reno, 1998. Political theory regarding collapsed states.

Wars of Imperial Conquest by Bruce Vandevort.  
Washing of the Spears by Donald Morris.  Recommended by Hoyawolf:
Fantastic account from both Zulu and British perspectives of the Zulu Wars in the late 1800s.  The definitive volume on the Zulu War. 

*What is the What by Dave Eggers.  Lost Boys of Sudan 'memoir.'

West Africa

A History of West Africa 1000-1800.  by Basil Davidson, 1977.  Textbook.   Useful reference.

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier  by Ismael Beah, 2007. Liberia, child soldier’s point of view.

Blood Diamonds  by Greg Campbell.  Nonfiction (thus unlike the movie).  History of Sierra Leone’s civil war.

Colonial Conscripts: The Tillailleurs Senegalais in French West Africa 1857-1960 by Myron Echenberg, 1991.  A must read if you’re assigned to French West Africa.

Educational Language Policy in Nigeria: A Critical Analysis  by James Ibekwe, 2008.  Recommended by SocioLingo Africa.

Segu by Maryse Conde.  Historical fiction, West African empires mid-1800’s.

The Mask of Anarchy  by Stephen Ellis, 1999. Liberia.  Part history, part socio-cultural study.

The Trouble With Nigeria  by Chinua Achebe, 1983.  African leadership crisis.

This Child Will Be Great: Autobiography of Ellen Johnson by Sirleaf, 2009. Liberia, Africa’s first female president.  Both insightful and an entertaining read.

This House Has Fallen: Midnight in Nigeria  by Karl Maier, 2000.  Anecdotal treatment of Nigeria.

Central Africa

A Plague of Caterpillars and the Innocent Anthropologist  by Nigel Barley, 1983.  British anthropologist in Cameroon, hilarious, insightful.

King Leopold’s Ghost  by Adam Hochschild, 1998.  Belgian Congo/Zaire, colonial horrors.  Read with The Assassination of Lumumba by Ludo De Witte.

Shake Hands with the Devil by Romeo Dalliare. UN Force Commander’s account of the Rwandan genocide.  Explains dynamics of UN C2 during crises and illuminates the genocide from the point of view of someone who was vainly trying to stop it.   Depressing, but a must read nonetheless.

The White Man of God   by Kenjo Jumbam, 2003 (African Writer’s Series).  A Cameroonian village reacts to the arrival of missionaries.

The Wonga Coup  by Adam Roberts, 2006.  True story from Equatorial Guinea, reads like a spy thriller.

We wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families by Philip Gourevitch. Anecdotal treatment of Rwandan genocide.  Influential book for Rye Barcott, author of It Happened on the Way to War: A Marine's Path to Peace. (Part I, page 25)

East Africa


Commando: A Boer Journal of the Boer War by Deneys Reitz and JC Smuts A classic.

The Rise and Fall of the Zulu Nation by Laband. 

Darfur: The Long Road to Disaster by  Burr and Collins, 2006.  Explains the interplay between Chad, Libya and Sudan.   A necessary read if you’re going to one of those three countries.

Imperial Reckoning: the Untold Story of Britian’s Gulag in Kenya  by Caroline Elkins, 2005.   Very good history of the Mau-Mau rebellion.  From a contributor:  "This book has been panned by many scholars as providing figures that are at best suspect and at worst simply made up. This being said the book is read in East Africa so a knowledge of what it says and the allegations that it makes is perhaps a good thing even if the facts may or may not be correct. I am not saying that horrible things did not happen during the rebellion, read Baldwin's Mau-Mau Manhunt if you want evidence of excesses (even though that was not necessarily the intent of the author), I am simply saying that the allegations are that Imperial Reckoning evidenced shoddy research."

Infidel  by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, 2007.  Somali-born woman, refugee in Kenya, runs away from a forced marriage in Europe, becomes Dutch parliamentarian and outspoken critic of Islam’s treatment of women.  Easy read and highlights many relevant issues.

Modern History of the Somali  by I. M. Lewis.  Recommended by Hoyawolf:
Probably one of the only Somali speaking white American historians who personally knew Siad Barre and most of the post-communist leadership/warlords.


Rogue Ambassador: An African Memoir  by Smith Hempstone, 1997. Kenya.

Something of Value by Robert Ruark

Southern Africa

Angola's Last Best Chance For Peace by Paul Hare.  Recommended to me.  

Birth by Peter Harris.   A gripping account of the turbulent days preceding the first democratic elections in 1994 in South Africa. 

Cry, Beloved Country by Alan Paton.  In search of missing family members, Zulu priest Stephen Kumalo leaves his South African village to traverse the deep and perplexing city of Johannesburg in the 1940s. With his sister turned prostitute, his brother turned labor protestor and his son, Absalom, arrested for the murder of a white man, Kumalo must grapple with how to bring his family back from the brink of destruction as the racial tension throughout Johannesburg hampers his attempts to protect his family. 

Fighting for Justice by Jay Naidoo.  Jay Naidoo was a tireless anti-apartheid campaigner in the 1980s, serving as the first General Secretary of Coastu, South Africa's largest union federation and the backbone of the internal mass struggles against apartheid. In 1993, he stepped down to lead twenty leaders from Cosatu into parliament on an ANC ticket, and was asked by Nelson Mandela to work as the Minister responsible for the Reconstruction and Development Programme, and then as the Minister of Communications. In 1999 Jay moved away from politics and entered the world of business, setting up the J&J Group, an investment and management company. 

Long Walk to Freedom.  Autobiography of Nelson Mandela, 1994.   It’s tough being an Africanist if you don’t know anything about South Africa or its greatest hero.

Mukiwa: A White Boy in Africa  by Peter Godwin.  Growing up during the Zimbabwean war for independence.

Rebels and Robbers: Violence in Post-Colonial Angola by Assis Malaquias, 2007.  I know Assis personally and he is not only a gifted scholar and teacher but a great person.  Book is about the political economy of violence in post-colonial Angola. This book provides the first comprehensive attempt at analyzing how the military and non-military dynamics of more than four decades of conflict created the structural violence that stubbornly defines Angolan society even in the absence of war. The book clearly demonstrates that the end of the civil war has not ushered in positive peace.

Pamwe Chete: The Legend of the Selous Scouts by LTC Ron-Reid Daly.  Recommended by Army FAO LTC W.  He said: This is by far, the best primer on counter-insurgency. A lucid, detailed, well written and accurate history of the formation and history of, arguably, the best counter-insurgency unit ever fielded by a Western military (albeit by Rhodesians in Africa).  Also check out the website: http://www.theselousscouts.com/index2.php

Rags of Glory by Stuart Cloete.
From contributor: A novel of the Boer War; a good read and something that offers the Boer perspective on the war.
The Boer War  by Thomas Pakenham.   Definitive work on the topic.  Thus it’s a bit long.
 The Great Betrayal: The Memoirs of Ian Douglas Smith by Ian Smith
From contributor: Written by the former Prime Minister of Rhodesia,  this book offers a splendid overview of the Rhodesian War, especially its latter years, albeit from the view of the minoritygovernment .
When A Crocodile Eats the Sun  by Peter Godwin, 2006.  Anecdotal account of Zimbabwe falling apart, 2000-2005.

Culture and Religion-ISLAM
Foreign Aid/Peacekeeping/Piracy

 African Christianity: Its Public Role by Paul Gifford, 1998.  Recent rise of Christianity,

African Religions and Philosophy  by John Mbiti, 1990. Best overview of traditional religions and world view, Ugandan author.

Frontline Diplomacy: Humanitarian Aid and Conflict in Africa  by John Prendergast, 1996.  Describes pitfalls in humanitarian aid.

History of Islam in Africa by Levtzion and Pouwels. 

Into Africa: Intercultural Insights  by Richmond and Gestrin, 1998. Best overview of socio-cultural framework, guidebook for living and working with Africans.

Lords of Poverty: Power , Prestige, and Corruption in the International Aid Business by  Graham Hancock, 1989.  Older classic, still gives insight into aid dynamics.

Mozambique: UN Peacekeeping in Action, 1992-94 by Richard Synge. Recommended to me. 

Oxford History of Islam by John Esposito.  Recommended by Hoyawolf:
The standard on Islam in English by my former professor at Georgetown

The Bottom Billion by Paul Collier.  Oxford press, 2007.   Fascinating policy prescription for US approach to Africa.  This will help you understand the debates swirling around in State and USAID.

The Development of Islam in West Africa  by Mervyn Hiskett, 1984.

The Failure of Political Islam  by Olivier Roy, 1994.   Fundamentalism, integrisme, and extremism. political influence.

Travels with a Tangerine by Tim Mackintosh-Smith.  This is a book about Moroccan traveler Ibn Battutah's 29-year pilgrimage from his native Tangiers to Mecca.