African History in Credo: Independence and After

From An African Biographical Dictionary
One of the most notorious contemporary dictators in modern African history.

From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia with Atlas and Weather Guide
Tunisian politician, president 1987–2011. He became prime minister in October 1987 and a month later deposed the president for life Habib Bourguiba in a bloodless coup.

From An African Biographical Dictionary
Steve Biko was the inspiration and intellectual leader of the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) and became its martyr.

From An African Biographical Dictionary
Dr. Joseph Kwame Kyeretwi Boakye Danquah, a major nationalist figure and a leader of opposition during the presidency of Kwame Nkrumah, was also a scholar and intellectual.

Zambian politician, president 1964-91. Imprisoned 1958-60 as founder of the Zambia African National Congress, in 1964 he became the first president of independent Zambia.

From An African Biographical Dictionary
Mzee Jomo Kenyatta was the first president of Kenya and the leading figure in his country's independence movement.

South African statesman; winner of the Nobel peace prize.

South African political leader. Mbeki was Mandela's choice as his successor as leader of the ANC, and he became the country's second postapartheid president after the ANC's landslide win in 1999.

Egyptian soldier and politician, president from 1981. He was vice-president to Anwar Sadat from 1975 and became president on Sadat's assassination in October 2001.

Zimbabwean politician, prime minister from 1980 and executive president from 1987.

Egyptian army officer and political leader, first president of the republic of Egypt (1956–70). A pan-Arabist and advocate of Third-World unity, Nasser was one of the most important Arab leaders of the 20th century.

African political leader, prime minister (1957–60) and president (1960–66) of Ghana. Under his leadership the Gold Coast achieved (1957) independence and, in 1960, became the Republic of Ghana.

Libyan political leader. Blending Arab nationalism, revolutionary socialism, and Islamic orthodoxy, Qaddafi proceeded to run Libya's government as a stridently anti-Western dictatorship.

From Chambers Biographical Dictionary
Egyptian soldier, politician and Nobel Prize winner

Emperor of Ethiopia (1930-36; 1941-74). He was born Tafari Makonnen, the son of a noted general and the grandnephew of Emperor Menelik II. During the Italian occupation of Ethiopia (1936-41), he lived in exile in England.

From The Encyclopedia of African History
21st president of the Republic of Liberia, plunged his country into a brutal seven-year civil war.

Nigerian writer, b. Albert Chinualumogu Achebe. A graduate of University College at Ibadan (1953), Achebe, an Igbo who writes in English, is one of Africa's most acclaimed authors. In 2007 he was awarded the Man Booker International Prize.

From Encyclopedia of African-American Writing
In the mid-1990s, Asante was enstooled as a king among the Akan of Ghana, partly in recognition for his work on Afrocentricity and for increasing our knowledge and awareness of the history and culture of Africa's people.He was bestowed the title Wanadoo of Gao in the Court of the Amiru Hassimi Maiga of Songhoy in 2012.

Writer and critic, born in Cape Town, SW South Africa. The political situation in his native country provides him with the base from which to launch his allegories and fables, attacking colonialism and demythologizing historical and contemporary myths of imperialism.

Frantz Fanon is probably the most well-known activist and theorist of the anticolonial independence movements of the post–World War II period.

In An African Biographical Dictionary
Pepé Kallé, one of the leading seminal figures in the soukous mainstream of Congolese popular dance music, was one of the few recording artists who refused to emigrate to Paris.

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Nigerian musician and political activist, b. Olufela Olusegun Oludotun Ransome-Kuti, studied Trinity College of Music, London. He was the originator of Afrobeat, an amalgam of West African traditional and pop music with American pop, funk, jazz, and blues strains. A saxophone and keyboard player and a charismatic singer, Fela formed his first band in 1961, and in 1969 toured the United States, where he met and was strongly influenced by members of the Black Power movement. On his return to Nigeria, he became more socially concerned, and protested the cruelties of Nigeria's military dictatorship in his music.

Senegalese author and film director who wrote and made films in French and Wolof, often regarded as the father of sub-Saharan African cinema.

Writer, born near Abeokuta, SW Nigeria. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1986.

From Culture Wars in America: An Encyclopedia of Issues, Viewpoints, and Voices
With the influence of Pan-Africanism in the early twentieth century, black intellectuals argued that African Americans are linked historically as well as culturally with people of color who are of African descent.

The Arab Spring is the wave of protests and revolutions throughout the Arab world, beginning in late 2010 and resulting in perhaps the most significant social change the region has seen in generations.

From Encyclopedia of South Africa
The Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) emerged in the mid-1960s in response to the political vacuum left by the banning and decimation of the major groups fighting apartheid, such as the African National Congress (ANC) and the Pan Africanist Congress.

[Western education is sinful], Nigerian Islamic fundamentalist militia, officially Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati Wal-Jihad [people committed to the propagation of the Prophet's teachings and jihad]. Boko Haram mounted its first attack in 2004, and since then the group has been responsible for thousands of deaths.

Gradual achievement of independence by former colonies of the European imperial powers, which began after World War I.

From Encyclopedia of African History
There are a number of versions of Islam extant in Africa, both north and south of the Sahara.

From Britannica Concise Encyclopedia
Militant Kikuyu-led nationalist movement of the 1950s in Kenya. The Mau Mau advocated violent resistance to British domination in Kenya. In response to actions by Mau Mau rebels, the British Kenya government banned the movement in 1950 and launched a series of military operations between 1952 and 1956.

From Dictionary of Race, Ethnicity & Culture
The term ‘negritude’ was coined to emphasize the view that, apart from skin colour and other ‘Negroid’ physical features, there are other values and characteristics which typify individuals, or peoples, with black skin.

General term for various movements in Africa that have as their common goal the unity of Africans and the elimination of colonialism and white supremacy from the continent.

Any rapid, far-reaching, or violent change in the political, social, or economic structure of society. Commonly used to refer to a sudden overthrow of the status quo and its replacement by an entirely different state of affairs.

Social media is a broad term incorporating blogs, wikis, Internet communities and online discussions. Community sites such as Facebook and Myspace are immensely popular with young people and business-oriented alternatives such as LinkedIn and ecademy are widely used in networking.

From Encyclopedia of African History
In many African countries that attained independence around 1960, art was seen to play an important role in celebrating the new nation, expressing a new postcolonial identity, unifying fragmented ethnic entities, and asserting traditional African culture and values

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Literary works of the African continent. African literature consists of a body of work in different languages and various genres, ranging from oral literature to literature written in colonial languages (French, Portuguese, and English).

From Encyclopedia of African History
Traditional music transcends age, gender, and social class. Popular music blends local and global influences and is most fashionable among urban youth.

A bat-and-ball team game of 11-a-side.

Form of football originating in the UK, popular throughout the world.

From Encyclopedia of African History
Since 1945, Africa has witnessed a range of wars, beginning with independence struggles against the colonial powers that often merged into postcolonial power struggles and civil wars, while after 1960 there have also been a number of wars between African states.

From The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Houghton Mifflin
The killing of more than 500,000 ethnic Tutsis by rival Hutu militias in Rwanda in 1994. The conflict between the dominant Tutsis and the majority Hutus had gone on for centuries, but the suddenness and savagery of the massacres caught the United Nations off-guard. U.N. peacekeepers did not enter the country until after much of the damage had been done.

South African political party, founded in 1912 as a multiracial nationalist organization with the aim of extending the franchise to the whole population and ending all racial discrimination.

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Former international organization, established in 1963 at Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, by 37 independent African nations to promote unity and development; defend the sovereignty and territorial integrity of members; eradicate all forms of colonialism; promote international cooperation; and coordinate members' economic, diplomatic, educational, health, welfare, scientific, and defense policies. The organization mediated several border and internal disputes and was instrumental in bringing about majority rule and the end of apartheid in South Africa, which in 1994 became the 53d nation to be admitted to the organization. The African Union replaced the OAU in 2002.