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Blitz the Ambassador, the Ghanaian-born, New York-based hip hop artist, didn’t just rap his way into US star Beyoncé’s latest mega project. He was a leading creative on Black Is King – as Blitz Bazawule. His journey in collaboration with African artists and with diaspora stars is a leading example of how Pan Africanism has evolved and taken new forms. In an essay on Blitz, Beyoncé and rapper Sampa the Great, Msia Kibona Clark considers how hip hop can inspire dynamic change in the Pan Africanist project that was established out of Africa’s struggle for freedom from colonialism and neocolonialism.
Trombonist and jazz legend Jonas Gwangwa was one of those cultural freedom fighters who defined the resistance to apartheid in South Africa. In a moving tribute, Gwen Ansell shares insights into Gwangwa’s role in shaping South African identity through the Amandla Cultural Ensemble – while also captivating world stages, film scores and hearts.
This week Ghana laid former president Jerry Rawlings to rest. Considered one of the most influential figures in the country’s modern history – albeit a controversial one – Rawlings led military uprisings in 1979 and 1981 and served as elected president from 1992 to 2000. He rarely gave interviews, but in 2018 and 2019 he agreed to talk to Rachel Ama Asaa Engmann. During the course of several conversations he set out how his views on tourism linked to the slave trade in Ghana and the country’s relationship with the African diaspora community evolved during his lifetime.
The question of reparations for the devastation caused to people and nations by the Trans-Atlantic slave trade is one that should not be abandoned, argues Rhoda E. Howard-Hassmann. She looks back at how the issue has been dealt with in the past, and traces a series of failures that have left the issue in limbo.
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Charl Blignaut
Arts, Culture and Society Editor
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Australian-born Zambian hip hop artist Sampa the Great.
Marc Grimwade/WireImage
Msia Kibona Clark, Howard University
The increased migration of Africans and the global growth of hip hop culture has seen a dynamic new generation of Pan Africanism emerge.
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Moeletsi Mabe/The Times/Gallo Images/Getty Images
Gwen Ansell, University of Pretoria
The revered trombonist, composer and cultural activist never wished to be 'the state composer' but remained political until the end, in service of the people.
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Rachel Ama Asaa Engmann, University of Massachusetts Amherst
In a rare series of interviews, the late Ghanaian leader spoke of how the country's slave trade was revisited as a vehicle for economic development.
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Rhoda E. Howard-Hassmann, Wilfrid Laurier University
The turn towards authoritarianism, xenophobia and racism in Western democracies makes it unlikely that former Western slave-trading nations will agree to reparations in the near future.
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Politics
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Tom Goodfellow, University of Sheffield; Paul Isolo Mukwaya, Makerere University
Museveni’s attempt to gain support in urban areas in the 2021 elections was not only about repression. But it still failed.
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Nic Cheeseman, University of Birmingham; Rebecca Gordon, University of Birmingham
Almost a third of legislatures had no direct oversight over the initial responses to the pandemic.
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Dirk Siebels, University of Greenwich
Sea piracy often grabs the headlines, but it is just one of many symptoms of insecurity at sea.
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Cati Coe, Rutgers University
In Ghana, adult children are straining to care for their aged parents and there is an increasing sense that government needs to step in.
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Health + Medicine
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Willem Hanekom, Africa Health Research Institute (AHRI); Tulio de Oliveira, University of KwaZulu-Natal
Scientists have observed that 501Y.V2 has quickly become "dominant" among multiple variants that have been circulating in the South African population.
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Monique Wasunna, Kenya Medical Research Institute
Many of these diseases cause tremendous suffering and death -- yet there's still a lack of effective tools to diagnose, treat, and prevent them.
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Featured events
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Hatfield , Pretoria, Gauteng, South Africa — University of Pretoria
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