Marikana and the end of South African exceptionalism
South Africa’s problems are no longer specific to the apartheid legacy, but about more global issues of poverty and inequality.
6388 Article(s) by:
Fatima B. Derby
Fatima B. Derby is a Ghanaian feminist writer and queer activist.
It feels like 1980: On the fall of Mugabe
For Zimbabweans, we’re back where we started, then. Hope, no change. Still.
Everything happening to you is a wound
In a new film, five young Zulu women set off on a trek in Africa’s oldest nature reserve, as the latter is threatened by coal mines and rhino poachers.
Eritrea beyond the media fanfare
So far, the only real beneficiaries of the rapprochement between Ethiopia and Eritrea are Ethiopia and Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki.
The Rugby revolution is not being televised
Rugby in South Africa is generally understood to be a white sport, but contemporary statistics reveal that a great many more black people than white people play rugby there.
Taking a Mallett to SuperSport
When former Springbok Ashwin Willemse walked off a SuperSport TV set, he forced conversations on racism in South African rugby and its sports media.
Black skin, white ally
The complicated relationship of Jean -Paul Sartre and Frantz Fanon.
The US and France backs Cameroon’s reign of terror
When will the state-sanctioned violence in Cameroon be sufficient to cause Western nations to stop supporting President Paul Biya and his military?
Archiving Addis Ababa
Photography has a long history in Ethiopia. Today a team of archivers is using it to collect the memories of Ethiopians between the 1940s and 1980s.
Why governance will go from bad to worse in Zimbabwe
Recent events reveal the Mnangagwa administration in Zimbabwe will extend, if not intensify, the kleptocracy, corruption and repression of the Mugabe regime.
A tribute to Ron Dellums, radical
Former US Congressman and Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums, who passed away recently, played a leading role in the global fight against South African Apartheid in the 1980s.
The Nigerian way
The feature film, ‘Kasala,’ feels like a documentary film about the Nigerian condition and appeals to anyone who has ever been poor.
Time traveling with Manu Dibango
Manu Dibango has been here for centuries, and he ain’t goin’ away any time soon.
The hubris of western science
The tendency of science and research in the Western world to treat issues in isolation, as if one part has no relationship to larger webs of complex interconnection.
Bring Back Our History
Everyone but the Chibok girls–subjects of #BringBackOurGirls–and their families in Nigeria have moved on, but history does not march on for the victims.
Expropriation without compensation? Ask the British.
On the eve of Zimbabwe’s elections, it’s worth reflecting on the British government’s expropriation of Southern Rhodesia, and the mark that act left on the country 100 years later.
A Black queen in the Seattle Reign
Organized US Soccer is perceived as middle class and white. Seattle, Washington wants to break with that via its professional women’s team.
Back in the USSR
In 1978, exiled South African writer and leftist Alex La Guma traveled to the Soviet Union and wrote a book about it. A new, critical annotated edition is out now.
This is Congo
The state of politics in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and those working to build a new future there.
Thirty years after Cuito Cuanavale
A series of photos documenting the contemporary state of the site of perhaps the most decisive battle in the liberation of Southern Africa.