Zimbabweans go to the polls today in one of the country’s most contested elections since its independence in 1980. Not only are the stakes incredibly high in the first poll without Robert Mugabe, but voters also have a number of choices they have to make. These include who they want as president, who they want to represent them in parliament as well as a raft of local council positions. David B. Moore makes sense of it all.
Crate diggers collect rare or forgotten vinyl records, often building huge collections that bring past stories and experiences into society’s historical memory. A recent compilation album of 1970s/80s music from the Horn of Africa, “Sweet as Broken Dates: Lost Somali Tapes”, is a powerful example of this unseen cultural archaeology. Michael Shakib Bhatch, a digger himself, writes that the record allows us to experience the sound,
consciousness and ambience of forgotten times and places.
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MDC-Alliance supporters at a campaign rally addressed by the party leader Nelson Chamisa.
EPA-EFE/Aaron Ufumeli
David B. Moore, University of Johannesburg
Zimbabweans face a complicated array of choices at the polls.
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Mogadishu’s Waaberi Theatre Troupe back in the 1970s when Somalia was a cultural hub.
Supplied by Ostinato Records
Michael Shakib Bhatch, University of the Western Cape
A crate digger essentially builds a personal library of sonic texts that often can't be found on the internet or in official archives.
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Environment + Energy
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Muchazondida Mkono, The University of Queensland
The Cecil movement didn't lead to any deep-seated changes as trophy hunting persists in many parts of Africa.
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Science + Technology
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Peace A. Medie, University of Ghana; Alice J. Kang, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
The exclusion of scholars based in the global South undermines their work.
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From our international editions
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Joshua Habgood-Coote, University of Bristol
‘Fake news’ is a meaningless term that is used for anti-democratic propaganda. We should all stop using it.
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Ioannis Glinavos, University of Westminster
The fires tearing through the Athens region are not an act of God, but a direct result of corruption and systematic disregard for the law.
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Andrea Oelsner, Universidad de San Andrés (Argentina); Federico Merke, Universidad de San Andrés (Argentina)
How long can a rogue regime survive international sanctions, bankruptcy, humanitarian crisis and popular unrest? When it comes to Venezuela, President Maduro may cling to power for some time.
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