The Search for Africa: History, Culture, Politics

Basil Davidson was a pioneering Africanist when the study of Africa, or at least from the perspective of Africans, was unfashionable even laughed at. This English socialist was on the front-line for over 50 years and nothing can take that away from him. This book is a selection of his writings and a good intro to Davidson. However, there are a few dissappointments. His prediction of what was to happen in SA was out (OK, predictions are a dangerous game). What really dissappointed me was his support for people like Bernal and Diop whose work has been exposed as inaccurate and wrong. This reluctance to "face facts" when it comes to the bad side of Africa means that Davidson exhibits an almost naive optimism in Africa that just doesn't square with happened/is happening. Nonetheless, Davidson was a great Africanist and this book should be read.

There is so much more to Africa than ever makes it to the news and the school books. This book is a survey of Davidson's main interests: Africa's rich pre-colonial history, the manufacture of the ideology of racism by European intellectuals to justify the atrocity of the Atlantic slave trade, and the courage and success of African freedom fighters against staggering odds.