Editor's note

Kenya and Somalia can’t settle a protracted dispute about the location of their maritime boundary. At stake is control over a 100,000 square km triangle in the Indian Ocean that’s got large deposits of oil and gas as well as lots of tuna. Christopher R. Rossi explains why colonial boundaries are part of what’s complicating the disagreement.

The Bushmen of colonial southern Africa had a complex and meaningful practice of dress, intimately related to subsistence, identity and how they lived their lives. This is a far cry from a colonial stereotype that’s persisted over time. Vibeke Maria Viestad sets out the research she’s done analysing Bushman dress in its various forms.

Julius Maina

Regional Editor East Africa

Top Stories

Somali president Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed (second left) and Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta (second right). EPA-EFE/Daniel Irungu

Kenya and Somalia row over offshore rights is rooted in the carve up of Africa

Christopher R. Rossi, University of Iowa

The legacy of colonialism's unfinished business has now migrated to the Indian Ocean.

Naron women and children wearing ordinary dress - the photograph was taken in 1919. Fourie collection/ Museum Africa

Debunking the colonial myth of the “naked Bushman”

Vibeke Maria Viestad, University of Oslo

Contrary to the colonial view, Bushmen of southern Africa had a complex and meaningful practice of dress.

Politics + Society

Letters reveal Africanist hero Robert Sobukwe’s moral courage, and pain

Derek Hook, Duquesne University

A collection of prison letters provides a peek into the suffering of South African liberation hero, Robert Sobukwe.

Protesters in Algeria use nonviolence to seek real political change

Ghaliya Djelloul, Université catholique de Louvain

Demonstrations against the current regime have opened up a space for debate and self-expression in Algeria, recalling the crucial need for a free and involved civil society.

From our international editions

How did reading and writing evolve? Neuroscience gives a clue

Derek Hodgson, University of York

Reading and writing may have evolved thanks to a natural ability of the brain's visual cortex to process geometrical shapes.

Margaret Atwood: The Handmaid’s Tale feels real in 2019, but the solution won’t come from novels

Camilla Nelson, University of Notre Dame Australia

Margaret Atwood's classic novel imagined a society where women had almost no power. Hundreds of people gathered in Sydney yesterday to hear Atwood speak about dystopias – fictional and otherwise.

En français

« La ruée vers l’Europe » n’est pas inscrite dans la démographie africaine

Yves Charbit, Université Paris Descartes – USPC

Quand la démographie devient l’explication par excellence, elle est purement et simplement instrumentalisée.

Où sur Terre y a-t-il le plus d’immigrés ?

Gilles Pison, Muséum national d’histoire naturelle (MNHN) – Sorbonne Universités

Dans quels pays les immigrés sont-ils les plus nombreux ? De quels pays sont-ils issus ? De façon plus générale, comment les immigrés se répartissent-ils à l’échelle de la planète ?

 
 
 
 

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