Cities in Contemporary Africa

Cities in Contemporary Africa
Author: M. Murray
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 325
Release: 2007-01-08
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0230603343

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This book explains how and why cities on the African continent have grown at such a rapid pace, how municipal authorities have tried to cope with this massive influx of people, and how long-time urban residents and newcomers interact, negotiate, and struggle over access to limited resources.

The Social Infrastructure of City Life in Contemporary Africa

The Social Infrastructure of City Life in Contemporary Africa
Author: AbdouMaliq Simone
Publisher: Nordic Africa Institute
Total Pages: 34
Release: 2012-02
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9789171066787

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The growth of cities is one of the most significant aspects of the contemporary transformation of African societies. Cities in Africa are the sites of major political, economic and social innovation, and thus play a critical role in national politics, domestic economic growth and social development. They are also key platforms for interaction with the wider world and mediate between global and national contexts. Cities are variously positioned in global flows of resources, goods and ideas, and are shaped by varied historical trajectories and local cultures. The result is a great diversity of urban societies across the continent. Cities in Africa are not only growing rapidly but are also undergoing deep political, economic and social transformation. They are changing in ways that defy usual notions of urbanism. In their dazzling complexity, they challenge most theories of the urban. African cities represent major challenges as well as opportunities. Both need to be understood and addressed if a sustainable urban future is to be achieved on the continent. The Urban Cluster of the Nordic Africa Institute, through its research, seeks to contribute to an understanding of processes of urban change in Africa. This discussion paper by Professor AbdouMaliq Simone, commissioned by the Urban Cluster, is a valuable contribution to shaping the research agenda on urban Africa.

Reflections on African Cities in Transition

Reflections on African Cities in Transition
Author: Purshottama Sivanarain Reddy
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 330
Release: 2020-09-15
Genre: Law
ISBN: 3030461157

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This volume describes African cities in transition, and the economic, socio-political, and environmental challenges resulting from rapid post-colonial urbanization. As the African continent continues to transition from urban configurations inherited from colonial influences and history, it faces issues such as urban slum expansion, increased demands for energy and clean water, lack of adequate public transportation, high levels of inequality among different socio-economic population strata, and inadequate urban governance, planning, and policies. African cities in transition need to reconsider current policies and developmental trajectories to facilitate and sustain economic growth and Africa’s strategic repositioning in the world. Written by an international team of scholars and practitioners, this volume uses case studies to focus on key issues and developmental challenges in selected African cities. Topics include but are not limited to, smart cities, changing notions of democracy, the city’s role in attaining the SDGs, local governance, alternative models for governance and management, corruption, urbanisation and future cities.

For the City Yet to Come

For the City Yet to Come
Author: Abdou Maliqalim Simone
Publisher: Duke University Press
Total Pages: 314
Release: 2004-10-07
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780822334453

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DIVA study of how colonial and postcolonial legacies manifest in African cities and African urban planning./div

Urbanization as a Social Process

Urbanization as a Social Process
Author: Kenneth Little
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 167
Release: 2013-11-05
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1136531297

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Urbanization is probably the most important process taking place in African countries. This book provides a lucid and informative study of the significance of urbanization for social change in sub-Saharan Africa, which has vital implications for all developing regions. Originally published in 1974.

The African City

The African City
Author: Bill Freund
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 199
Release: 2007-03-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 1139459554

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This book is comprehensive both in terms of time coverage, from before the Pharaohs to the present moment and in that it tries to consider cities from the entire continent, not just Sub-Saharan Africa. Apart from factual information and rich description material culled from many sources, it looks at many issues from why urban life emerged in the first place to how present-day African cities cope in difficult times. Instead of seeing towns and cities as somehow extraneous to the real Africa, it views them as an inherent part of developing Africa, indigenous, colonial, and post-colonial and emphasizes the extent to which the future of African society and African culture will likely be played out mostly in cities. The book is written to appeal to students of history but equally to geographers, planners, sociologists and development specialists interested in urban problems.

Globalization and Urbanization in Africa

Globalization and Urbanization in Africa
Author: Toyin Falola
Publisher: Africa World Press
Total Pages: 310
Release: 2004
Genre: History
ISBN: 9781592211937

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In this book scholars present new interpretations of African cities, from the pre-colonial to the modern, set in the context of national and international economy, politics and culture. While providing insights into the evolution of African cities, they also raise issues of vital importance to the survival of African cities. The chapters capture the mixed legacies of colonialism and the lingering consequences of neo-colonialism in a so-called age of globalisation.

Living the City in Africa

Living the City in Africa
Author: Brigit Obrist
Publisher: LIT Verlag Münster
Total Pages: 305
Release: 2013
Genre: History
ISBN: 3643801521

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Research on cities worldwide still takes its cue from cities in Europe and the US, which are seen as the standard model. However, cities in the global South are undergoing a much more rapid transformation, including multiple interlinked transitions, with Africa featuring the highest urbanization rates world-wide. Scholars therefore call for a new approach to urban studies which examines cities from a more global comparative perspective. This book discusses the new approach, which pays added attention to the role that societal creativity plays in processes of urbanization, instead of concentrating exclusively on expert-driven planning and intervention. Especially in fast-growing cities with weaker institutional capacity for interventions, the interplay between intervention and invention, between expert and societal agency, becomes more tangible and all the more significant. (Series: Swiss African Studies / Schweizerische Afrikastudien / Etudes africaines suisses - Vol. 10)

African Cities

African Cities
Author: Professor Garth Myers
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 389
Release: 2011-04-14
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1780321333

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In this groundbreaking book, Garth Myers uses African urban concepts and experiences to speak back to theoretical and practical concerns. He argues for a re-visioning - a seeing again, and a revising - of how cities in Africa are discussed and written about in both urban studies and African studies. Cities in Africa are still either ignored - banished to a different, other, lesser category of not-quite cities - or held up as examples of all that can go wrong with urbanism in much of the mainstream and even critical urban literature. Myers instead encourages African studies and urban studies scholars across the world to engage with the vibrancy and complexity of African cities with fresh eyes. Touching on a diverse range of cities across Africa - from Zanzibar to Nairobi, Cape Town to Mogadishu, Kinshasa to Dakar - the book uses the author's own research and a close reading of works by other scholars, writers and artists to help illuminate what is happening in and across the region's cities.

Creating Africa in America

Creating Africa in America
Author: Jacqueline Copeland-Carson
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2012-03-13
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0812204263

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With a booming economy that afforded numerous opportunities for immigrants throughout the 1990s, the Twin Cities area has attracted people of African descent from throughout the United States and the world and is fast becoming a transnational metropolis. Minnesota's largest urban area, the region now also has the country's most diverse black population. A closely drawn ethnography, Creating Africa in America: Translocal Identity in an Emerging World City seeks to understand and evaluate the process of identity formation in the context of globalization in a way that is also site specific. Bringing to this study a rich and interesting professional history and expertise, Jacqueline Copeland-Carson focuses on a Minneapolis-based nonprofit, the Cultural Wellness Center, which combines different ethnic approaches to bodily health and community well-being as the basis for a shared, translocal "African" culture. The book explores how the body can become a surrogate locus for identity, thus displacing territory as the key referent for organizing and experiencing African diasporan diversity. Showing how alternatives are created to mainstream majority and Afrocentric approaches to identity, she addresses the way that bridges can be built in the African diaspora among different African immigrant, African American, and other groups. As this thoughtful and compassionate ethnographic study shows, the fact that there is no simple and concrete way to define how one can be African in contemporary America reflects the tangled nature of cultural processes and social relations at large. Copeland-Carson demonstrates the cultural creativity and social dexterity of people living in an urban setting, and suggests that anthropologists give more attention to the role of the nonprofit sector as a forum for creating community and identity throughout African diasporan history in the United States.