scholarly journals “Like Wringing Water from a Stone!” Information Extraction from Two Rock Graffiti in North Kharga, Egypt

Heritage ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 2253-2260
Author(s):  
Nikolaos Lazaridis
Keyword(s):  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Western Desert ◽  
Rock Outcrops ◽  
American University ◽  
Survey Team ◽  
The North ◽  
Sandstone Rock ◽  
Kharga Oasis ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Types Of Information

In the course of the last ten years, the North Kharga Oasis–Darb Ain Amur Survey team, led by Salima Ikram (American University in Cairo), has been exploring a network of interconnected desert paths in Egypt’s Western Desert, known as Darb Ain Amur. These marked paths run between Kharga Oasis and Dakhla Oasis, linking them to Darb el-Arbain, a notorious caravan route facilitating contacts between Egypt and sub-Saharan Africa since prehistoric times. Ancient travelers using the Darb Ain Amur spent several days in the midst of the Western Desert and were thus forced to use areas around sandstone rock outcrops as makeshift stopovers or camping sites. During these much-needed breaks, ancient travelers identified accessible, inscribable surfaces on the towering sandstone massifs and left on them their personalized markings. In this essay, I examine two short rock graffiti carved by such travelers in a site north of Kharga Oasis, focusing on the types of information one may extract from such ancient epigraphic materials.

scholarly journals CONTINENTAL MUSICOLOGY: DECOLONISING THE MYTH OF A SINGULAR “AFRICAN MUSIC”

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 177-193
Author(s):  
Thomas Mathew Pooley
Keyword(s):  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Power Dynamics ◽  
Musical Structure ◽  
African Music ◽  
Popular Imagination ◽  
Ideal Types ◽  
Musical Identity ◽  
The North ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
And Function

The musical identity of the African continent is sustained in the popular imagination by the idea of its unity. This identity emerges from a constellation of ideas about Africa’s distinctiveness constructed by generations of scholars who have diminished its diversity to substantiate the claim that shared principles of musical structure and function in sub-Saharan cultures can be read as ideal types for the continent as a whole. The idea of a singular “African music” is predicated on the notion that African “traditional” music of precolonial origin in sub-Saharan Africa possesses a set of distinctive features that are essential to its identity. Musical cultures as diverse as Aka, Ewe, Shona, Yoruba, and Zulu are subsumed within a singular frame of reference; others that do not possess these features are, by implication, excluded. To make sense of this myth of a singular “African music” we must reckon with the universalising impulse that sustains it. This means interrogating the discursive formations out of which it has been fashioned. Whose interests does it serve? Taking a decolonial perspective on the power dynamics that structure global south-north relations in the academy, this article points to the ways in which the north perpetuates its authority and dominance over the south by subsuming others within its cultural and intellectual ambit. Decolonising “African music” means dismantling the hegemony of “continental musicology” and the myth of a singular “African music” that is its creation.

scholarly journals Towards Inclusive, Quality ICT-Based Learning for Rural Transformation

2017 ◽  
pp. 107-125 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vinayagum Chinapah ◽  
Jared O. Odero
Keyword(s):  
Rural Areas ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Formal Structure ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Skills Development ◽  
Rural Transformation ◽  
The North ◽  
Future Challenges ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
The Impact

Information and communication technology (ICT) has emerged as a tool that can enhance flexible learning pathways. ICT has the potential to increase equitable access to quality learning, which is essential for skills development. Skills are required in technology-related nonfarm activities so as to improve livelihoods and achieve sustainable rural transformation. However, slow pace of the developing countries to utilize the benefits of the ongoing technological revolution in the North has resulted in the ‘digital divide’. Besides, it is still problematic to implement ICT programmes for educational development. The current and future challenges of providing ICT-based learning desperately call for the reengineering of education to move out of the formal structure of teaching and learning, towards building a more practical and realistic approach. By means of a literature review, this paper examines and discusses why it is important to provide inclusive, quality ICT-based learning, particularly in the rural areas of Asia and sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). It recommends that diverse ICT-based solutions be adopted to promote skills development and training within non-formal and informal settings. More comparative studies are also required to understand the impact of ICT-based learning in rural areas. 

Soil-transmitted helminthiasis among mothers and their pre-school children on Unguja Island, Zanzibar with emphasis upon ascariasis

Parasitology ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 135 (12) ◽  
pp. 1447-1455 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. R. STOTHARD ◽  
E. IMISON ◽  
M. D. FRENCH ◽  
J. C. SOUSA-FIGUEIREDO ◽  
I. S. KHAMIS ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Child Health ◽  
School Children ◽  
Negative Relationship ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
The North ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
And Child Health ◽  
Soil Transmitted Helminthiasis

SUMMARYSoil-transmitted helminthiasis (STH) is a scourge to the health and well-being of infants and pre-schoolchildren throughout many parts of sub-Saharan Africa. To improve maternal and child health, regular de-worming is recommended and often delivered from mother and child health (MCH) clinics, yet there have been few studies monitoring the progress and impact of interventions on local levels of disease. A cross-sectional parasitological survey, supplemented with questionnaires, was therefore conducted across 10 Ungujan villages examining mothers (n=322) and their pre-school children (n=359). Within children, mean prevalence of ascariasis, trichuriasis and hookworm was 8·6% (95% CI 5·5–11·8), 18·9% (95% CI 14·5–23·4) and 1·7% (95% CI 0·2–3·5) while in mothers mean prevalence was 6·7% (95% CI 3·7–9·7), 11·9% (95% CI 8·0–15·8) and 1·9% (95% CI 0·2–3·5), respectively. There was, however, significant spatial heterogeneity of STH by village, 2 villages having much elevated levels of infection, although general access to anthelminthics and utilization of village MCH clinics was good. Levels of parasite aggregation (k) were determined and a multilevel logistic regression model identified access to a household latrine [OR=0·56 (95% CI 0·32–0·99)] and having an infected household member [OR=3·72 (95% CI 2·22–6·26)] as observed risk factors. To further investigate worm burdens of Ascaris lumbricoides, adult worms were expelled using Combantrin® and measured. A negative relationship between mean worm burden and mean worm mass was found. Villages in the north of Unguja represent locations where there is elevated prevalence of both ascariasis and trichuriasis and it appears that local factors are particularly favourable for transmission of these helminths. From a perspective of control, in such locations, intervention efforts should be stepped up and greater efforts placed upon improving household sanitation.

scholarly journals Did They or Didn't They Invent It? Iron in Sub-Saharan Africa

2005 ◽  
Vol 32 ◽  
pp. 41-94 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stanley B. Alpern
Keyword(s):  
Present State ◽  
Present Knowledge ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Iron Production ◽  
African History ◽  
African Origin ◽  
The North ◽  
Iron Smelting ◽  
Iron Technology ◽  
Sub Saharan

Judging from a number of recent publications, the long-running debate over the origins of iron smelting in sub-Saharan Africa has been resolved… in favor of those advocating independent invention. For Gérard Quéchon, the French archeologist to whom we owe very early dates for iron metallurgy from the Termit Massif in Niger, “indisputably, in the present state of knowledge, the hypothesis of an autochthonous invention is convincing.” According to Eric Huysecom, a Belgian-born archeologist, “[o]ur present knowledge allows us … to envisage one or several independent centres of metal innovation in sub-Saharan Africa.”Hamady Bocoum, a Senegalese archeologist, asserts that “more and more numerous datings are pushing back the beginning of iron production in Africa to at least the middle of the second millennium BC, which would make it one of the world's oldest metallurgies.” He thinks that “in the present state of knowledge, the debate [over diffusion vs. independent invention] is closed for want of conclusive proof accrediting any of the proposed transmission channels [from the north].” The American archeologist Peter R. Schmidt tells us “the hypothesis for independent invention is currently the most viable among the multitude of diffusionist hypotheses.”Africanists other than archeologists are in agreement. For Basil Davidson, the foremost popularizer of African history, “African metallurgical skills [were] locally invented and locally developed.” The American linguist Christopher Ehret saysAfrica south of the Sahara, it now seems, was home to a separate and independent invention of iron metallurgy … To sum up the available evidence, iron technology across much of sub-Saharan Africa has an African origin dating to before 1000 BCE.

scholarly journals Return Migrants Reintegration Projects in West Africa: Critical Notes on the Sahel

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 158-181
Author(s):  
Elieth Eyebiyi ◽  
Eugène Allossoukpo
Keyword(s):  
Human Mobility ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Return Migrants ◽  
The Public ◽  
The North ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Union Governance ◽  
Migration And Development ◽  
European Migration

Migration issue is more than ever on the agenda of global concerns, particularly with regard to Africa, even though human mobility remains essentially internal on the African continent and rooted in centuries-old circulatory traditions. While a large literature emphasizes the criminalization of migration from the South to the North, but also the policies of outsourcing borders and the control of flows, the links between migration and development are still poorly studied, particularly with regard to the returnees, expelled and other categories (re) integration. However, return migrants are often at the heart of different logics and realities in tension, especially in the context of various reintegration projects, with mixed results. This paper contributes to rethink critically the public policies of reintegration of return migrants in Sub-Saharan Africa as a component of the European Union governance of migration, and in a context of regional free movement promotion. It is based on a combined analysis of some projects implemented as part of the transfer of European migration governance policies and measuring the scope, but also their inconsistencies.

Sura Headings and Subdivisions in Qur'an Manuscripts from Sub-Saharan Africa: Variations and Historical Implications

2013 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 232-252
Author(s):  
Constant Hamès
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Perspective Taking ◽  
The Other ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Local Identities ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Types Of Information ◽  
Local Traditions ◽  
Sahelian Zone

Sura headings, and the information they convey, were formulated well after the Qur'anic revelation itself. Furthermore, they were not determined by authoritative, standardising decisions, as was the case for the Qur'anic text, which has come down to us ne varietur. Given the geographical extension attained by the Islamic world in the course of its history, and in the absence of normalisation due to the disappearance of a centralised power, local variations in sura headings are only to be expected. This is, in effect, the case for Africa. The sampling of Qur'an manuscripts considered here is compared to the standard Egyptian edition of 1923, and reveals differences not only in the titles of the suras but also in the other types of information associated with them, such as indications concerning the place of revelation and the number of verses in each sura. In addition, in some areas, headings are not usually committed to writing, whereas in other local traditions, they may be quite long and contain multiple elements of information. Though these variations may appear to be minor, they are of interest in a comparative perspective, taking into account different zones and eras – especially so if one seeks to discern local identities in the presentation of Qur'an manuscripts. The ones analysed here all come from the Saharo-Sahelian zone: Mauritania (2), Mali (1), Chad (2) and Somalia (1). They are dated to the nineteenth century, with the exception of one early twentieth-century manuscript.

African History in the United States

1967 ◽  
Vol 10 (01) ◽  
pp. 51-56
Author(s):  
Leonard M. Thompson
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
African History ◽  
American University ◽  
Howard University ◽  
Northwestern University ◽  
History Of ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
History Department

The growth of the study of the history of Africa south of the Sahara is an interesting example of contemporary intellectual developments. Until the mid-1950's African history was ignored by the historical profession in the United States even more completely than in Europe; and if an American historian had paused to consider why this was so, he would probably have anticipated Trevor-Roper's well-known verdict that the history of sub-Saharan Africa is undiscoverable (on the ground that it is not documented) and that, even if it were discoverable, it would be devoid of intellectual significance (on the ground that traditional African societies were barbarous and static). No professor with tenure at an American university was designated as a historian of sub-Saharan Africa; American publishers had produced very few books or articles dealing with African history, and Americans generally knew scarcely anything about it. There were, however, several pioneer activities which were on the periphery of African history. At Howard University there were long-established courses on Negro history, inspired by W. E. B. DuBois and Carter Woodson, which included some West African material, but the American historical establishment paid little attention to this work. William L. Hansberry, who lectured on precolonial African history for some years, was never given tenure by the Howard authorities and was eventually excluded from the faculty. At Northwestern University, Melville Herskovits founded a program of African Studies in 1947. He invited historians to attend the seminars conducted under the program, and he himself published a book on the kingdom of Dahomey and was interested in questions of change as well as structure in African societies. Nevertheless, Herskovits was by training and status an anthropologist, and the history department at Northwestern did not provide lecture courses or seminars on African history before 1958.

Expat anxieties: Risk and safety in Cape Town, South Africa and Santiago de Chile

2021 ◽  
pp. 136754942110138
Author(s):  
Nicky Falkof
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Latin America ◽  
High Risk ◽  
Cape Town ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
The North ◽  
Santiago De Chile ◽  
Two Cities ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Discursive Constructions

This article considers ‘expatriate’ discourses about security in Cape Town, South Africa and Santiago de Chile. The cities themselves have reputations as desirable, beautiful, civilised, modern and welcoming, in contrast to lurid ideas about poverty, crime, filth and corruption that often characterise northern imaginings of the developing world. Yet, their locations within sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America, respectively, nonetheless mark them out as potential spaces of high risk for migrants from the north. In this article, I am interested in the way in which lifestyle migrants to these cities negotiate fears about risk and safety within their new homes. In order to consider this question, I discuss posts on the online messageboards dedicated to these two cities within the popular InterNations ‘expat forum,’ as well as a series of interviews with people who use the forum. I use these respondents’ discursive constructions of safety, threat, otherness, belonging and the unknowability of the global south city to consider some of the affective underpinnings of this form of privileged migration.

scholarly journals Estimated incidence of noma “A biologic indicator of poverty” in north central Nigeria: A retrospective cross-sectional study

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Seidu A. Bello ◽  
John A. Adeoye ◽  
Ifeoluwa Oketade ◽  
Oladimeji A. Akadiri
Keyword(s):  
Multinomial Logistic Regression ◽  
Central Zone ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
North Central ◽  
Period Prevalence ◽  
The North ◽  
Surgical Mission ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
North Western

ABSTRACTBackgroundNoma is a spreading and devouring disease which is believed to be native to Sub-Saharan Africa over the last decade due to poverty. Within this noma belt, most epidemiological reports regarding the disease have emanated from the north western region of Nigeria. However, our indigenous surgical mission encountered a substantial number of cases noteworthy of epidemiological representation in north central Nigeria.MethodsAll facial cleft and noma cases encountered within the 8 year study period were included into this study. Estimated incidence of the noma in the zone was calculated using the existing statistical model of Fieger et al (2003), which takes into account the expected differences based on age and location of the two patient groups using the multinomial logistic regression analysis. Period prevalence of noma was also calculated by simple division considering the population at risk of the disease in the zone.FindingsA total of 770 subjects were included in this study (orofacial cleft – 692, noma – 78). The incidence estimate of noma in the north central zone was 3.2 per 1000 with a range of 2.6 – 3.7 per 1000. The period prevalence of noma was1:125,000 children. The median age of noma patients was comparatively higher than the median age of facial cleft patients. The mean age of onset of noma was 5.9 ± 8.08 years which was lower than the average age of individuals in the noma group - 29.6 ± 18.84 years.ConclusionAlthough noma may be more prevalent in the north western region of Nigeria; substantial number of cases is still being encountered in the north central zone which calls for urgent attention of relevant health stakeholders regarding the management and rehabilitation of individuals affected.AUTHOR SUMMARYNoma, a devouring facial disease, is commonly associated with poverty and impoverished regions of the world especially Sub-Saharan Africa which is being termed the noma belt region of the world. Although literature established that noma is indeed a neglected disease, the degree of this neglect in north central Nigeria compared to other sub-regions is in fact alarming, as no report on the disease burden have been published till date. In this light, a retrospective, cross-sectional was conducted to provide epidemiological representation to the cases encountered within an eight year period at the Cleft and Facial Deformity Foundation (CFDF), an indigenous surgical mission. The incidence of noma was estimated from the known incidence of orofacial cleft using an existing multinomial logistic regression model while the period prevalence was calculated considering the population living below poverty line in the sub-region. This study extrapolates an incidence of 3.2 per 1000 and a period prevalence of 0.05 per 1000 persons. Notable is the finding that most individuals with noma were above thirty years of age and suffered varying degree of facial disfigurement resulting from the acute phase of the disease which started in their childhood. Therefore, we advocate public awareness on the disease presentation, risk factors and sequelae in the sub-region and identify the need to bolster the efforts of existing health facilities and indigenous surgical missions in the management and rehabilitation of individuals affected.

scholarly journals Estimation of Levels and Trends of Under-Five Mortality in Sub-Saharan Africa: Evidence from Summary of Birth Histories of Currently Married Women

2020 ◽  
pp. 17-27
Author(s):  
C. O. Okoro ◽  
U. C. Ikediuwa ◽  
F. U. Mgbudem ◽  
B. Uwabunkonye ◽  
B. Osondu
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Sustainable Development Goals ◽  
Married Women ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Live Births ◽  
Under Five ◽  
The North ◽  
Average Probability ◽  
Development Goals ◽  
Sub Saharan

This present study has discussed the levels and trends of under-five mortality in sub-Sahara Africa. This study aims to estimate under-five mortality using Summary of Birth Histories (SBH) of currently married women which may provide valuable information for assessing the interventions and measures already in place to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (especially goal 3). The Trussell variant which is the modified version of the Brass model was adopted to derive under-five mortality from SBH of currently married women. The result shows that the index for under-five mortality ( ) implied by the north family of the Coale–Demeny model life tables ranges from 65.8 deaths per 1000 live births in Zambia (2018 ZDHS) to as high as 132.9 deaths per 1000 live births in Nigeria (2018 NDHS) respectively. The average estimate of under-five mortality for the countries is about 107.9 deaths per 1000 live births for currently married women and 108.4 deaths per 1000 live births for the entire women in the surveys. While the average probability of a newborn baby surviving to age 5 is about 0.8921 for currently married women that of the entire women is about 0.8915.

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