Reading & Multimedia Resources

Routing Diaspora Histories

Reading

Books and Websites

History of Empires

  • Nubia: The Rise and Fall of African Empires, by Andre Antonio Samuels
  • The Mali Empire: A Captivating Guide to One of the Largest Empires in West African History and the Legendary Mansa Musa, by Captivating History

Myth and Legend

  • The Yoruba People: A Captivating Guide to the History of the Yorubas and Yoruba Mythology, by Captivating History
  • African Mythology: Captivating Myths of Gods, Goddesses, and Legendary Creatures of Africa, by Captivating History
  • African Myths and Legends, by J.K. Jackson and Sonia Owonibi 
  • Myth Literature and the African World, by Wole Soyinka 
  • Essential African Mythology, by Ngangar Mbitu & Ranchor Prime 
  • Kintu, by Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi

Cross Cultural Research and Methodology

  • Human Development in Cultural Context: A Third World Perspective, by A. Bame Nsamenang 

History of Africans on the continent and the people of African descent in the diaspora

  • The Destruction of Black Civilisation, by Chancellor Williams
  • If you want to learn Early African History START HERE, by Robin Walker
  • African History Extra is a site of research and writing on African history, with a focus on neglected parts of the continent’s heritage. Researched and written by Isaac Samuel.

African Studies and Analysis

  • Decolonising African Knowledge, by Toyin Falola 
  • Africa Is a Country is a site of opinion, analysis, and new writing on and from the African left. It was founded by Sean Jacobs in 2009.

African Philosophy

  • Ubuntu, Life Lessons from Africa, by Johann Broodryk 
  • The Healing Wisdom of Africa, by Malidoma Patrice Somé
  • Bu Me Be, Proverbs of the Akans, by Ivor Agyeman-Duah, Peggy Appiah, Kwame Anthony Appiah 

Travel Writing

Poetry

  • The Penguin Book of Modern African Poetry, edited by Gerald Moore and Ulli Beier
  • African Poems shares oral and written poetry from across the African continent. It includes audio recordings of poems and songs, along with vernacular texts and essays providing background for some of the material.

Autobiography

  • Aké: The Years of Childhood, by Wole Soyinka
  • Of Water and the Spirit. Ritual, Magic and Initiation in the Life of an African Shaman, by Malidoma Patrice Somé 

Post-Colonial Theory and Criticism

  • The Post-Colonial Studies Reader, edited by Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths, Helen Tiffin

Novels

  • Sozaboy, by Ken Saro-Wiwa

Cultural Studies / Diaspora Studies / Art History

  • Cultural Identity and Diaspora, by Stuart Hall
  • Decolonial Imaginings, by Avtar Brah
  • Exiles, Diasporas & Strangers, edited by Kobena Mercer
  • Afropean: Notes from Black Europe, by Johny Pitts 
  • Afropean is a multimedia, multidisciplinary journal. The website explores the social, cultural and aesthetic interplay of black and European cultures.
  • The Black Atlantic, by Paul Gilroy
  • Rewriting the African Diaspora: Beyond the Black Atlantic, by Paul Tiyambe Zeleza

Listening

Archival Audio Material

Recorded concert by the Black Archives Orchestra

https://archive.org/details/AM_1978_05_20

From a recording made on May 20, 1978, this is the debut concert by the Black Archives Orchestra under the direction of its founding conductor, Judith Williams. The concert, which was sponsored by the Oakland Museum Performing Arts Committee (John Patton Jr. coordinator), featured works by a number of composers of African descent, including Howard Swanson, Ulysses Kay, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, and William Grant Still. The Black Archives, which varies in size from a small ensemble to a fuller chamber orchestra, depending on the demands of each presented work, was composed of mostly local San Francisco Bay Area musicians.

 

“Meg Blane” a Rhapsody for Mezzo Soprano solo, Chorus & Orchestra by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor

https://archive.org/details/RCM-MS-4868/page/n23/mode/2up

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875-1912) was a Black British composer, whose father was from Sierra Leone. Coleridge-Taylor is considered a pioneer in classical music and an iconic figure in Black British history. The early 20th century saw the formal emergence of Pan-Africanism and Coleridge-Taylor’s music and career embody these influences. Coleridge-Taylor was the youngest delegate to participate in the First Pan-African Conference in 1900, when he was 25. He spent time abroad in both Africa and America, where he developed diasporic connections with leading thinkers and activists fighting for racial equality.

 

The Anglo Persians African Lament

https://archive.org/details/1930-USA-Archives-1930-09-27-The-Anglo-Persians-African-Lament-

 

Songs of the Slaves - rooted within African American communities and history.

Don Redman Orch Shakin the African

https://archive.org/details/1931-USA-Archives-1931-10-15-Don-Redman-Orch-Shakin-the-African

Black American Jazz Composer and Musician.

Watching

Artist-Curator Conversation

Artist-curator conversation between Bolanle Tajudeen, founder of Black Blossoms (Art School and Curatorial Platform dedicated to amplifying the practices of artists of colour) and Lara Grace Ilori, storyteller and co-founder of creative laboratory ILXIAH (who was working on her first full-length spoken word play, Runner Girl, at the time of filming).

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