A Week of Hell
$19.99 USD $9.99 USD
While the Gambian president Sir Dawda Kairaba Jawara was out of the country on vacation, a band of twelve renegades and civilians slipped into the tiny country of the Gambia in West Africa. The gang of rebels took over the government and held the president’s wife and children, brother, government ministers, foreign diplomats, and expatriates hostage while releasing the country’s most dangerous prisoners to inflict a frenzy of carnage and chaos. After a week of hell for the Gambian residents, the Senegalese military crushed the uprising under its great strength, freeing the hostages and sending rebel leaders on the run in the wake of its victory.
Papa Faal
Paperback
350 pg
Beaver's Pond Press
Africa Is My Home: A Child of the Amistad
$17.99 USD
Inspired by a true account, here is the compelling story of a child who arrives in America on the slave ship Amistad and eventually makes her way home to Africa.
When a drought hits her homeland in Sierra Leone, nine-year-old Magulu is sold as a pawn by her father in exchange for rice. But before she can work off her debt, an unthinkable chain of events unfolds: a capture by slave traders; weeks in a dark and airless hold; a landing in Cuba, where she and three other children are sold and taken aboard the Amistad; a mutiny aboard ship; a trial in New Haven that eventually goes all the way to the Supreme Court and is argued in the Africans favor by John Quincy Adams. Narrated in a remarkable first-person voice, this fictionalized book of memories of a real-life figure retells history through the eyes of a child from seeing mirrors for the first time and struggling with laughably complicated clothing to longing for family and a home she never forgets. Lush, full-color illustrations by Robert Byrd, plus archival photographs and documents, bring an extraordinary journey to life.
by
al-Muhaddithat: the women scholars in Islam
$26.00 USD
This book is an adaptation in English of the prefatory volume of a 40-volume biographical dictionary (in Arabic) of women scholars of the Prophet’s hadith. Learned women enjoyed high public standing and authority in the formative years of Islam. For centuries thereafter, women travelled intensively for religious knowledge and routinely attended the most prestigious mosques and madrasas across the Islamic world. Typical documents (like class registers and ijazahs from women authorizing men to teach) and the glowing testimonies about their women teachers from the most revered ulema are cited in detail. An overview chapter, with accompanying maps, traces the spread of centres of hadith learning for women, and their eventual decline. The information summarized here is essential to a balanced appreciation of the role of women in Islamic society.
“...read today, when many Muslim women still don’t dare pray in mosques, let alone lecture leaders in them, Akram’s entry for someone like Umm al-Darda, a prominent jurist in seventh-century Damascus, is startling. As a young woman, Umm al-Darda used to sit with male scholars in the mosque, talking shop... She went on to teach hadith and fiqh, or law, at the mosque, and even lectured in the men’s section; her students included the caliph...” (New York Times)
“...replete with enlightening references... the standard introduction to the study of the women scholars of Islam.” (Muslim World Book Review)
By Mohammad Akram Nadwi
Mohammad Akram Nadwi (alumnus of Nadwat al-Ulama, Lucknow) has written extensively in Arabic and Urdu on hadith, fiqh, Islamic biography, and Arabic grammar; and recently in English: Madrasa Life (2007), Abu Hanifah (2010), two (of the five) volumes of al-Fiqh al-Islama (2007, 2012), and Abu l-Hasan 'Ali al-Nadwi (2013).
The cover shows the study journeys of Fatimah bt. Sa'd al-Khayr and her principal students. She moved from Valencia with her merchant-scholar father to China, then travelled back westward, settling longest in Baghdad. She taught thereafter in Cairo, where she died in 600 ah. (See ch. 3.)
Binding: Paperback
Pages: 314
Americanah
$16.00 USD - SOLD OUT
One of The New York Times's Ten Best Books of the Year
Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction
An NPR "Great Reads" Book, a Chicago Tribune Best Book, a Washington PostNotable Book, a Seattle Times Best Book, an Entertainment Weekly Top Fiction Book, aNewsday Top 10 Book, and a Goodreads Best of the Year pick.
A powerful, tender story of race and identity by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, the award-winning author ofHalf of a Yellow Sun.
Ifemelu and Obinze are young and in love when they depart military-ruled Nigeria for the West. Beautiful, self-assured Ifemelu heads for America, where despite her academic success, she is forced to grapple with what it means to be black for the first time. Quiet, thoughtful Obinze had hoped to join her, but with post-9/11 America closed to him, he instead plunges into a dangerous, undocumented life in London. Fifteen years later, they reunite in a newly democratic Nigeria, and reignite their passion—for each other and for their homeland.
By Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Binding: Paperback
Pages: 588
Publisher: Anchor Books
Capitalism and the Transformation of Africa
$10.00 USD
“In the decades of wars, economic crises, and explosive class battles that lie ahead, the weight of the toilers of Africa in shaping the future will be greater than ever before.”Reporting from Equatorial Guinea in central Africa, the authors focus on the social transformations unfolding, as revenues from offshore oil extraction are used to build infrastructure on which rising labor productivity, industry, and progress depend. Pulled into the world market as never before, both a capitalist class and a working class are being born.
Here also, in accounts of the work of volunteer Cuban medical brigades in Equatorial Guinea, is the living example of Cuba’s socialist revolution—made possible by workers and farmers who were led five decades ago to take power into their own hands.
Woven together, these seemingly disparate threads—the beginning transformation of production and class relations in Equatorial Guinea, and the proletarian course of the Cuban Revolution—show a future to be fought for today.
“Reliable basic information about contemporary Equatorial Guinea, information that would be of much value to any reader who is not familiar with the country.”—African Studies Quarterly
This book is part of a series, The Cuban Revolution in World Politics. Click to see the other titles or to order the entire series.
Introduction by Mary-Alice Waters, photos, maps, index.
Cultures of the World: Somalia
$47.07 USD
Desert Encounter
$14.55 USD - SOLD OUT
In this classic of travel writing, first published sixty years ago, a Danish journalist records his experience of life in North Africa under colonial rule. Driving through the Sahara in a battered Chevrolet, having converted to Islam and with a knowledge of Arabic, he leaves the beaten track to discover communities and landscapes shrouded in mystery for centuries. Brushes with magicians, cave-dwellers and Sufi mystics, however, prove less astonishing than the cruelties inflicted on the local populations by Mussolini s generals.
By Knud Holmboe
Fez, City of Islam
$34.99 USD
By Titus Burckhardt
Binding: Hardcover
Pages: 175
Publisher: Islamic Texts Society
For You Are a Kenyan Child
$17.99 USD
Imagine you live in a small Kenyan village, where the sun rises over tall trees filled with doves. You wake to the sound of a rooster's crow, instead of an alarm clock and the school bus. Your afternoon snack is a tasty bug plucked from the sky, instead of an apple. And rather than kicking a soccer ball across a field, you kick a homemade ball of rags down a dusty road. But despite this, things aren't that different for a Kenyan child than they would be for an American kid, are they? With so much going on around you, it's just as easy to forget what your mama asked you to do!
By Kelly Cunnane
Art by Ana Juan
Binding: Hardcover
Age: Children
Publisher: Atheneum
Forest of Thousand Daemons: a Hunter's Saga
$14.95 USD $10.95 USD
A classic work of African literature, Forest of a Thousand Daemons is the first novel to be written in the Yoruba language. First published in Nigeria in 1939, it is one of that country's most revered and widely read works, and its influence on Nigerian literature is profound, most notably in the works of Amos Tutuola.
A triumph of the mythic imagination, the narrative unfolds in a landscape where, true to Yoruba cosmology, human, natural, and supernatural beings are compellingly and wonderfully alive at once: a world of warriors, sages and kings; magical trees and snake people; spirits, Ghommids, and bog-trolls. Here are the adventures of Akara-ogun - son of a brave warrior and wicked witch - as he journeys into the forest, encountering and dealing with all-too-real unforeseen forces, engaging in dynamic spiritual and moral relationships with personifications of his fate, projections of the terrors that haunt man.
Distinguished Nobel Prize-winning author Wole Soyinka offers a supple and elegant translation and provides an essay on the special challenges of translating Fagunwa from the Yoruba into English, along with a glossary of Yoruba and unfamiliar words.
By D.O. Fagunwa
Translated by Wole Soyinka
Globalizing Somalia
$34.95 USD
This collection of essays demonstrates how chronic state failure and the inability of the international community to provide a solution to the conflict in Somalia has had transnational repercussions.
Following the failed humanitarian mission in 1992-93, most countries refrained from any direct involvement in Somalia, but this changed in the 2000s with the growth of piracy and links to international terrorist organizations. The deterritorialization of the conflict quickly became apparent as it became transnational in nature. In part because of it lacked a government and was unable to work with the international community, Somalia came to be seen as a "testing-ground" by many international actors.Globalizing Somalia demonstrates how China, Japan, and the EU, among others, have all used the conflict in Somalia to project power, test the bounds of the national constitution, and test their own military capabilities.
Contributed by international scholars and experts, the work examines the impact of globalization on the internal and external dynamics of the conflict, arguing that it is no longer geographically contained. By bringing together the many actors and issues involved, the book fills a gap in the literature as one of the most complete works on the conflict in Somalia to date. It will be an essential text to any student interested in Somalia and the horn of Africa, as well as in terrorism, and conflict processes.
Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide
$15.95 USD
From two of our most fiercely moral voices, a passionate call to arms against our era's most pervasive human rights violation: the oppression of women and girls in the developing world.
With Pulitzer Prize winners Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn as our guides, we undertake an odyssey through Africa and Asia to meet the extraordinary women struggling there, among them a Cambodian teenager sold into sex slavery and an Ethiopian woman who suffered devastating injuries in childbirth. Drawing on the breadth of their combined reporting experience, Kristof and WuDunn depict our world with anger, sadness, clarity, and, ultimately, hope.
They show how a little help can transform the lives of women and girls abroad. That Cambodian girl eventually escaped from her brothel and, with assistance from an aid group, built a thriving retail business that supports her family. The Ethiopian woman had her injuries repaired and in time became a surgeon. A Zimbabwean mother of five, counseled to return to school, earned her doctorate and became an expert on AIDS.
Through these stories, Kristof and WuDunn help us see that the key to economic progress lies in unleashing women's potential. They make clear how so many people have helped to do just that, and how we can each do our part. Throughout much of the world, the greatest unexploited economic resource is the female half of the population. Countries such as China have prospered precisely because they emancipated women and brought them into the formal economy. Unleashing that process globally is not only the right thing to do; it's also the best strategy for fighting poverty.
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Helen Suzman: The Biography
$28.95 USD $18.95 USD
Bright Star in a Dark Chamber
Helen Suzman was the voice of South Africa's conscience during the darkest days of apartheid. She stood alone in parliament, confronted by a legion of highly chauvinist male politicians. Armed with the relentless determination and biting wit for which she became renowned, Suzman battled the racist regime and earned her reputation as a legendary anti-apartheid campaigner. Despite constant antagonism and the threat of violence, she forced into the global spotlight the injustices of the country's minority rule.
by Robin Renwick
If You Knew Me You Would Care
$65.00 USD
If You Knew Me You Would Care represents a journey taken to find women who have survived wars, violence, and poverty in order to collect their stories. The stories go beyond tears and victimhood and reveal joy, love, and forgiveness.
If You Knew Me You Would Care is a collaboration between women's rights activist and Women for Women International founder Zainab Salbi and photographer Rennio Maifredi. Together they traveled to Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, and Bosnia and Herzegovina to seek out women who have been subject to the worst trials individuals must ever face, and yet overcame this adversity. Salbi conducted interviews with women about their definitions of war and peace, about their horrific and tragic pasts and their hopes for the future, and Maifredi photographed each of the women interviewed. The interviews and images together create a compelling, global, first-person account of what it means to be a powerful, female, survivor.
If You Knew Me You Would Care is a celebration of women's stories and strength worldwide.
"The women in this book are an inspiration to all of us who aspire to triumph over adversity. It is a personal peek at the most initimate stories as told by women who have survived war. It is a tribute to them, to their survival, their achievements, and their dreams. I hope people everywhere will take away the powerful message of survival this book inspires."
—Zainab Salbi
by Zainab Salbi
Photographs by Rennio Maifredi
Forewords by Meryl Streep, Annie Lennoz, Ashley Judd, Geena David
Binding: Hardcover
Pages: 143
Publisher: Powerhouse Books
Imagining the Past: Historical Fiction in New Kingdom Egypt
$78.00 USD $20.00 USD
Five hundred years before Homer immortalized the Trojan Horse, the ancient Egyptians had already composed a tale of soldiers hiding Ali Baba-like in baskets to capture a besieged city. Shortly after the rise to power of the warrior pharaoh Ramesses II, Egyptian authors began to write stories about battles and conquest. However, these stories were not set in the present, but in the past: they were the world's first works of historical fiction. These literary recreations of past events, which preserve fascinating mixtures of fact and fiction, provide unparalleled information about topics as diverse as ancient Egyptian historiography, religion, and notions of humor and wit.
Imagining the Past is the first volume to provide complete translations and commentary for the historical fiction composed during Egypt's New Kingdom. The four works includeThe Quarrel of Apepi and Seqenenre, The Capture of Joppa, Thutmose III in Asia,The Libyan Battle Story. An introduction explores Egyptian conceptions of the past, the universe of historical and literary texts in New Kingdom Egypt, and the definition of a new genre of Egyptian literature. Extensive commentary and new translations appear within each chapter, and a concluding analysis summarizes the audience and function of historical fiction as well as theology and historiography within the tales. Despite the fragmentary nature of the papyrus copies, the thorough research into the literary, political, and social context of each tale allows a modern reader to explore this forgotten literary subfield and appreciate the stories as works of historical fiction.
By Colleen Manassa
Binding: Hardcover
Pages: 339
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Jannah Jewels Book 6: Mystery In Morocco
$11.99 USD
In Book 6 of the Jannah Jewels Adventure Series, they travel to the city of Fes in Morocco. The Jannah Jewels learn about Fatima al-Fihri, the founder of the first university in the world, al-Qarawiyine. Can the Jannah Jewels solve the riddles to find the artifact in Fes before time runs out?
by Tayyaba Syed and Umm Nura
Jimmy Carter and the Horn of Africa: Cold War Policy in Ethiopia and Somalia
$39.95 USD $9.95 USD - SOLD OUT
When Jimmy Carter ascended to the U.S. presidency in 1977, he stepped into an office still struggling with the aftermath of the Vietnam War and the Watergate scandal. As president, he had to administer his foreign policy and fight the Cold War within the limits imposed by both. With the option of traditional military recourse essentially closed to Carter, he redirected American foreign policy to challenge the Soviet Union on a moral level, emphasizing regionalism and human rights. A careful examination of his policy shows that his approach was similar in other parts of the world. Particularly representative were his actions in Ethiopia and Somalia. This analysis of President Carter’s foreign policy in the Horn of Africa demonstrates Carter’s consistent approach to foreign affairs throughout his administration. It follows the president’s deliberate designing of his overall policy and his attempt to regain for the presidency the trust and confidence of the American people. It discusses the ways in which this policy dealt with such issues as human rights abuses, Cold War concerns including a strong Communist bloc presence, and the violation of international law. Finally, the book examines the changes that occurred at the end of Carter’s administration and the corresponding changes in policy—but not in motivation.
By Donna R. Jackson
Binding: Paperback
Pages: 230
Publisher: McFarland Publishing
Letters of a Sufi Master: The Shaykh ad-Darqawi
$14.42 USD
This book contains spiritual techniques taken from letters of Shaykh ad-Darqawi. Almost all these letters are concerned with the method and the operative aspects of the Way and are considered among the most direct instructions given on Sufic method to be found in all Sufi literature.
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Life and a Half: A Novel
$19.95 USD
Listed as one of the 100 best books on Africa, Life and a Half was Sony Labou Tansi’s response to the death of close friends during a bloody military and political crackdown in Congo. The novel takes place in an imaginary African country run by the latest in a series of cannibalistic dictators who has captured Martial, the leader of the opposition, and his family. Though shot, knifed, butchered, and bled, Martial’s spirit lives on to guide his followers in their fight against the dictators. Facing censorship, Tansi insisted that his book was a fable and that if he were ever given the opportunity to write about real events, he would be much more direct rather than follow the torturous paths of a novel. This crisp translation by Alison Dundy maintains the fast-paced action and bitingly satiric tone of the original.
By Sony Labou Tansi
Binding: Paperback
Pages: 134
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Mama Miti: Wangari Maathai and the Trees of Kenya
$18.99 USD
Through artful prose and beautiful illustrations, Napoli and Nelson tell the story of Wangari Maathai, who in 1977 founded the Green Belt Movement, an African grassroots organization, and in 2004 was the first African woman to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Full color.
Written by Donna Jo Napoli
Illustrated by Caldecott Honor Winner Kadir Nelson
Binding: Hardcover
Age: Children
Pages: 40
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Mint Tea to Maori Tattoo!
$15.95 USD $10.95 USD
One morning Carolina wakes up, determined to change something in her life. She has had enough of living her monotonous daily routine and craves something else, something unusual. How about a trip around the world? Her adventure takes her to the Middle East, Africa and Oceania. During her travels she encounters endangered mountain gorillas, walks with wild lions, and flirts with adrenaline boosting activities like bungee jumping. But what does this experience bring her spiritually? Does it awaken feelings which were lying dormant inside her; unreal some of the preoccupations she had about life; or simply bring her inner peace and satisfaction?
'Mint Tea to Maori Tattoo' is a travel story written by Carolina Veranen-Phillips, who traveled the world in 2002-2003. She went to the Middle East, Africa and Oceania; traveled through countries like Syria, Egypt and Zimbabwe way before these current political crisis. It eloquently blends travelogue with self-discovery as it charts a young woman's journey for cultural awareness and personal revelation. An altogether inspiring read.
Carolina Veranen-Phillips was born in Portugal, with a French mother and a Finnish father, and having lived in various countries around the world, including Portugal, France, the US, the UK, and currently Germany, Carolina has always been interested in the cultural differences embedded in our world. In her debut book, Carolina wants to share with you her personal adventure throughout the world, as a backpacker, as well as her love for the unknown, for meeting people and for self-discovery. She now lives in Munich, with her husband and their two boys.
Mufaro's Beautiful Daughters: An African Tale
$17.99 USD
Originally published in 1988 and now available in paperback, a version of an African folk tale in which a king learns about his daughters as he searches for a wife. When the king disguises himself he discovers the true nature of his daughters and decides which is fit to rule. Illustrated in full colour by the author.
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Mugabe: Teacher, Revolutionary, Tyrant
$16.95 USD $10.95 USD
by Andrew Norman
Binding: Paperback
Pages: 192
Murambi, The Book of Bones
$16.95 USD $10.95 USD
"[W]hat is true of Rwanda is true in each of us; we all share in Africa." —L’Harmattan
"[This novel] comes closer than have many political scientists or historians to trying to understand why this small country... sank in such appalling violence." —Radio France International
In April of 1994, nearly a million Rwandans were killed in what would prove to be one of the swiftest, most terrifying killing sprees of the 20th century. In Murambi, The Book of Bones, Boubacar Boris Diop comes face to face with the chilling horror and overwhelming sadness of the tragedy. Now, the power of Diop’s acclaimed novel is available to English-speaking readers through Fiona Mc Laughlin’s crisp translation. The novel recounts the story of a Rwandan history teacher, Cornelius Uvimana, who was living and working in Djibouti at the time of the massacre. He returns to Rwanda to try to comprehend the death of his family and to write a play about the events that took place there. As the novel unfolds, Cornelius begins to understand that it is only our humanity that will save us, and that as a writer, he must bear witness to the atrocities of the genocide.
From the novel:
"If only by the way people are walking, you can see that tension is mounting by the minute. I can feel it almost physically. Everyone is running or at least hurrying about. I meet more and more passersby who seem to be walking around in circles. There seems to be another light in their eyes. I think of the fathers who have to face the anguished eyes of their children and who can’t tell them anything. For them, the country has become an immense trap in the space of just a few hours. Death is on the prowl. They can’t even dream of defending themselves. Everything has been meticulously prepared for a long time: the administration, the army, and the [militia] are going to combine forces to kill, if possible, every last one of them."
By Boubacar Boris Diop
Translated by Fiona McLaughlin
Binding: Paperback
Pages: 181
Publisher: Indiana University Press
National Geographic Traveler South Africa
$25.95 USD
Active travelers trust National Geographic to deliver what they want in a guidebook: expert advice, insider tips, and the cultural feel of each destination not easily found online. These guides are pitch-perfect for today's experiential travel enthusiasts who want an authentic, enriching immersion.
From vibrant, beautiful Cape Town to the flower-bedecked Namaqualand plains, from history-filled Johannesburg to the wildlife-dotted lands of Kruger National Park, this guide covers all the best-known sights, and lesser-known ones as well. South Africa's rich cultural, historical, and contemporary highlights are featured prominently, such as treasure wrecks off its wave-thrashed shores, glorious seafood, and the "big five" animals that every safari-goer hopes to see. Experiential sidebars abound, such as how to consult a Sangoma or help build houses in Namaqualand. The book guides visitors on interesting excursions including a drive through winelands, a "history walk to freedom" in Cape Town, and a walk in the Bush.
By: Second Edition
Published by: National Geographic
Paperback
320 pages
Nelson Mandela
$17.99 USD
In this picture book biography, award-winning author and illustrator Kadir Nelson tells the story of Mandela, a global icon, in poignant free verse and glorious illustrations. It is the story of a young boy's determination to change South Africa, and of the struggles of a man who eventually became the president of his country by believing in equality for all people, no matter the color of their skin. Readers will be inspired by Mandela's triumph and his lifelong quest to create a more just world.
An author's note at the back retells the story of Mandela's fight against apartheid in simple prose, and takes the story further, including Mandela's Nobel Peace Prize. A short bibliography lists additional sources for readers who want to find out more.
This Coretta Scott King Honor Book supports the Common Core State Standards.
By Kadir Nelson
Binding: Hardcover
Age: Children
Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books
Nelson Mandela Speaks
$25.00 USD $15.00 USD
"Let us reconstruct South Africa in the vision of the Freedom Charter, as a country that belongs to all its people, black and white." -Nelson Mandela, February 1993
In February 1990 Nelson Mandela was freed after 27 years in apartheid's prisons; the 30-year ban on the African National Congress was lifted.
This book - in Mandela's own words - tells the story of the revolutionary struggles that have brought South Africa to the threshold of a political and social transformation. In speeches and interviews since 1990 - presented to audiences from Soweto to Cape Town; from the United States to Cuba, Britain, and Sweden - Mandela explains how the racist government was forced to bow to demands for the first one-person, one-vote nonracial elections in South African history.
In an effort to block a giant step toward democracy, the white minority regime and ultra rightist forces are resorting to bloody terror and intimidation. But Mandela explains why no one can close the doors being opened to equality in all aspects of life and work, nor halt ongoing fights for farmland, jobs, housing, education, and health care for all.
"When we, as one people, act together decisively, with discipline and determination," says Mandela, "nothing can stop us."
Old Mikamba Had a Farm
$17.99 USD
This fabulous version of the classic nursery song Old MacDonald” introduces children to a menagerie of African animals and their sounds. It is beautifully illustrated by Caldecott Honor winner Rachel Isadora, with her signature collage-style artwork.
Old Mikamba had a farm, E-I-E-I-O. And on this farm he had . . . a giraffe, a baboon, and an elephant! Meet Old Mikamba, who watches over a wide variety of animals on his game farm in the plains of Africa. Children will discover a whole new set of fun animal sounds as they are invited to sing along and roar with the lions, bellow with the rhino, whinny with the zebras, honk with the wildebeests, and more!
A wonderful introduction to African wildlife that is great fun to read aloud, this truly irresistible rendition of a beloved song includes a list of animal fun facts and gives children a huge variety of animal sounds to imitate as they pore over the detailed animals, landscapes and patterns in the stunning illustrations.
by Rachel Isadora
Papa, Do You Love Me?
$15.99 USD - SOLD OUT
This follow-up to the best-selling Mama, Do You Love Me? (over one million copies sold in 15 languages!) captures the universal love between a father and child. Set in Africa and featuring the Maasai culture, the beautiful watercolor illustrations, lyrical text, and enduring message are sure to make this another instant classic.
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Polygyny: What It Means When African American Muslim Women Share Their Husbands
$74.95 USD
This book features the voices of women who welcome polygyny, oppose it, acquiesce to it, or even negotiate power in its practices. Majeed examines the choices available to African American Muslim women who are considering polygyny or who are living it. She calls attention to the ways in which interpretations of Islam's primary sources are authorized or legitimated to regulate the rights of Muslim women. Highlighting the legal, emotional, and communal implications of polygyny, Majeed encourages Muslim communities to develop formal measures that ensure the welfare of women and children who are otherwise not recognized by the state.
Debra Majeed is professor of religious studies at Beloit College.
Binding: Hardcover
Pages: 192
Publisher: University Press of Florida
Servants of Allah: African Muslims Enslaved in the Americas, 15th Anniversary Edition
$25.00 USD - SOLD OUT
Slavery and Emancipation in Islamic East Africa: From Honor to Respectability
$95.00 USD
Examining the process of abolition on the island of Pemba off the East African coast in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, this book demonstrates the links between emancipation and the redefinition of honor among all classes of people on the island. By examining the social vulnerability of ex-slaves and the former slave-owning elite caused by the Abolition order of 1897, this study argues that moments of resistance on Pemba reflected an effort to mitigate vulnerability rather than resist the hegemonic power of elites or the colonial state. As the meanings of the Swahili word heshima shifted from honor to respectability, individuals' reputations came under scrutiny and the Islamic kadhi and colonial courts became an integral location for interrogating reputations in the community. This study illustrates the ways in which former slaves used piety, reputation, gossip, education, kinship, and witchcraft to negotiate the gap between emancipation and local notions of belonging.
by Elisabeth McMahon
Binding: Hardcover
Pages: 293
Somalis in Minnesota (People Of Minnesota)
$16.95 USD $6.95 USD
The story of Somalis in Minnesota begins with three words: sahan, war, and martisoor. Driven from their homeland by civil war and famine, one group of Somali sahan, pioneers, discovered well-paying jobs in the city of Marshall, Minnesota. Soon the war, news, traveled that not only was employment available but the people in this northern state, so different in climate from their African homeland, were generous in martisoor, hospitality, just like the Somali people themselves.
The diaspora began in 1992, and today more than fifty thousand Somalis live in Minnesota, the most of any state. Many have made their lives in small towns and rural areas, and many more have settled in Minneapolis, earning this city the nickname "Little Somalia" or "Little Mogadishu." Amiable guide Ahmed Yusuf introduces readers to these varied communities, exploring economic and political life, religious and cultural practices, and successes in education and health care. He also tackles the controversial topics that command newspaper headlines: alleged links to terrorist organizations and the recruitment of young Somali men to fight in the civil war back home. This newest addition to the People of Minnesota series captures the story of the state's most recent immigrant group at a pivotal time in its history.
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Songs from the Baobab: African Lullabies & Nursery Rhymes
$16.95 USD
Songs collected by Chantal Grosl̩ziat
Musical arrangements by Paul Mindy
Illustrations by Elodie Nouhen
Representing 11 languages originating from Central and West Africa and brought to life with lavish illustrations, this collection's rhymes and lullabies soothe babies to sleep as the songs travel from one country and one language to another. Lyrics are reproduced in the original language and translated into English, followed by notes on the origin and cultural context of each song. The accompanying CD features 29 songs from 10 countries - including Rwanda, the Ivory Coast, and Senegal - each one unique in language and sound, recorded with indigenous instruments and exquisitely performed by women, men, and children. This delightful, enchanting production captures the staccato rhythm of the children's rhymes and the poetry of the language as well as a sense of the heritage and tradition of each culture.
*CD inlcuded
South Africa's Brave New World: The Beloved Country Since the End of Apartheid
$27.95 USD
Critically analyzes the political and social climate of South Africa since Nelson Mandela’s triumphant 1994 inauguration, arguing that the apartheid-damaged nation was left with resources inadequate to its vast needs.
by R.W. Johnson
Binding: Paperback
Pages: 720
Publisher: Overlook Press
Swahili Chic: The Feng Shui of Africa
$50.00 USD
Swahili Chic unveils an exotic approach to gracious living from a 2,000-year-old culture rich in beauty and sophistication. In this gloriously illustrated book, world traveler and style expert Bibi Jordan introduces Swahili shule --the Swahili school of design, architecture, and graceful living that instills a sense of simplicity, sensuality, and spirituality to any interior. Travel from the coral atoll islands of East Africa to the warm trade winds of the Indian Ocean and discover the land where African kings, Arabian sultans, Chinese sailors, American whalers, and French pirates met to trade jewels,spices, and colorful fabrics.
Swahili Chic features the sensual coral palaces and historic traveler's inns of UNESCO world heritage sites Lamu and Zanzibar, as well as the romantic seaside cottages and eco-adventure resorts of Mombasa and Malindii. Individual chapters detail each region's rich culture and history, and highlight the most intriguing and inspirational aspects of the region's decor, making this an ideal book for the decorator, the armchair traveler, and the globetrotting adventurer. The final section features Bibi Jordan's expert guidance to integrating aspects of Swahili Chic into any decor, bringing the beauty, color, and grace of this timeless culture to the modern home, wherever in the world it may be.
Text and photography by Bibi Jordan and foreword by Richard Leakey
The African Caliphate: The Life, Works, And Teaching Of Shaykh Usman Dan Fodio (1754-1817)
$16.95 USD - SOLD OUT
This scholarly work focuses on the establishment in 1809, in what is today Northern Nigeria, of the celebrated Sokoto caliphate, which may well have been the last re-establishment, anywhere in the world, of Islam in its entirety, comprising all its many and varied dimensions.
As well as giving the biography of the Shehu and a comprehensive account of the history of his movement, the book also provides an in-depth examination of his teaching and literary works. These factors are all inextricably interwoven since, in a way scarcely equaled by any other historical figure, the Shehu’s writings sparing directly out of the exigencies and requirements of his immediate situation and were what drove his movement foreword and gave it its momentum. As will be seen, his sole inspiration and source of guidance in every instance were the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of his Messenger (pbuh) to such a point that he even died at exactly the same age. It is also astonishing how relevant the Shehu’s teachings are, in spite of the clear difference in both time and environment, to the situation of so many Muslims in the world today and the solution to many of the problems besetting Islam are clearly indicated within its pages.
Malam Ibraheem Sulaiman teaches law at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria, and is a research fellow at the University’s Centre for Islamic Legal Studies, where he was the director for a decade. He has attended seminars and conferences in many different countries and presented papers on Islam, Shari’a and political matters.
The Art of Egypt Postcard Book
$9.95 USD $7.95 USD
Thousands of years after its creation, the art of ancient Egypt holds a strong attraction for modern viewers. From the mysterious images of Egyptian funerary art, to the stylized depictions of the mighty god-kings, the pharaohs, to the elegant simplicity and craftsmanship of everyday Egyptian objects, the archaeological remnants of this ancient culture continue to inspire admiration and awe. These thirty masterworks are all from the Brooklyn Museum of Art's renowned collection of Egyptian antiquities. Pomegranate s books of postcards contain thirty top-quality reproductions bound together in a handy, artful collection. Easy to remove and produced on heavy card stock, these stunning postcards are a delight to the sender and receiver. Note: postcards are oversized and may require additional postage.
The Black Nile: One Man's Amazing Journey Through Peace and War on the World's Longest River
$16.00 USD $3.00 USD - SOLD OUT
"A supremely entertaining work, and also an important one." -David Grann, author of The Lost City of Z
Upon hearing the news of tenuous peace in Sudan, foreign correspondent Dan Morrison bought a plank-board boat, summoned a friend who'd never left America, and set out from Uganda, paddling the Nile on a quest to reach Cairo-a trip that tyranny and war had made impossible for decades. With the propulsive force of a thriller, Morrison's chronicle is a mash-up of travel narrative and reportage, packed with flights into the frightful and absurd. From the hardscrabble fishing villages on Lake Victoria to the floating nightclubs of Cairo, The Black Nile tracks the snarl of commonalities and conflicts that bleed across the Nile valley, bringing to life a complex region in profound transition.
by Dan Morrison
The Colour of Home
$9.95 USD - SOLD OUT
Hassan feels out of place in a cold, grey country so different from his colourful Somalian home, which he was forced to leave because of war. But gradually things change...
By Mary Hoffman & Karin Littlewood
Binding: Paperback
Age: Children
Publisher: Frances Lincoln Children's Books
the good braider: a novel
$9.99 USD
The Good Braider was selected as the 2013 Bank Street College of Education Best Book of the Year and a book of Outstanding Merit.
In spare free verse laced with unforgettable images, Viola's strikingly original voice sings out the story of her family's journey from war-torn Sudan, to Cairo, and finally to Portland, Maine. Here, in the sometimes too close embrace of the local Southern Sudanese Community, she dreams of South Sudan while she tries to navigate the strange world of America—a world where a girl can wear a short skirt, get a tattoo, or even date a boy; a world that puts her into sharp conflict with her traditional mother who, like Viola, is struggling to braid together the strands of a displaced life. Terry Farish's haunting novel is not only a riveting story of escape and survival, but the universal tale of a young immigrant's struggle to build a life on the cusp of two cultures.
The author of The Good Braider has donated this book to the Worldreader program.
By Terry Farish
Binding: Paperback
Pages: 221
Publisher: Skyscape
The Herd Boy
$17.00 USD
by Niki Daly
The Joys of Motherhood
$14.95 USD $10.95 USD
First published in 1979, this is the story of Nnu Ego, a Nigerian woman struggling in a rapidly chaining patriarchal society. After being cast away from her first marriage when she fails to conceive, Nnu moves to the modern city of Lago, just before World War II, where her dream of becoming a mother is fulfilled. As her family of eight grows, the values of her tribe, her people, and her country undergo bewildering changes, ultimately leaving her bereft of the pleasure that traditionally would be accorded her as a mother. Nnu must fiercely protect herself and her children as she finds herself abandoned by both her husband and her culture.
Pages: 224
The Kindness of Enemies: A Novel
$25.00 USD $15.00 USD
A versatile prose stylist... [Aboulela’s] lyrical style and incisive portrayal of Muslims living in the West received praise from the Nobel Prize winner J. M. Coetzee... [she is] a voice for multiculturalism.”New York Times
It’s 2010 and Natasha, a half Russian, half Sudanese professor of Islamic studies, is researching the life of Imam Shamil, the 19th century Muslim leader who led the anti-Russian resistance in the Caucasian War. When shy, single Natasha discovers that her star student, Oz, is not only descended from the warrior but also possesses Shamil’s priceless sword, the Imam’s story comes vividly to life. As Natasha’s relationship with Oz and his alluring actress mother intensifies, Natasha is forced to confront issues she had long tried to avoidthat of her Muslim heritage. When Oz is suddenly arrested at his home one morning, Natasha realizes that everything she values stands in jeopardy.
Told with Aboulela’s inimitable elegance and narrated from the point of view of both Natasha and the historical characters she is researching,The Kindness of Enemies is both an engrossing story of a provocative period in history and an important examination of what it is to be a Muslim in a post 9/11 world.
By Leila Aboulela
Winner of the Caine Prize
Binding: Hardcover
Pages: 338
Publisher: Grove Press
The Name of the Tree: A Bantu Tale
$18.95 USD $8.95 USD - SOLD OUT
A Bantu Tale Retold by Celia Barker Lottridge
Illustrated by Ian Wallace
When a drought spreads through the land of the short grass, the animals set out across the great plain to find food. Their only hope for survival is a tree with a variety of colorful fruit. The problem is its branches are too high. To reach them, the wise old turtle says, one must know the name of the tree, something only King Lion is privy to. In this Bantu folktale retold by Celia Barker Lottridge, the hero is not the most cunning or the strongest but the one that tries the hardest. Ian Wallace's striking illustrations of desert landscape and luscious fruit help bring this tale to life.
The Nile: A Journey Downriver Through Egypt's Past & Present
$27.95 USD $8.00 USD - SOLD OUT
A hypnotic journey in the company of one of the world's most acclaimed Egyptologists over the fabled river telling how the Nile continually brought life to an ancient civilization now dead and how it sustained its successors, now in tumult.
Renowned Egyptologist Toby Wilkinson leads us through space as much as time: from the river's mystical sources (the Blue Nile which rises in Ethiopia, and the White Nile coursing from majestic Lake Victoria); to Thebes, with its Valley of the Kings, Valley of the Queens, and Luxor Temple; the fertile Delta; Giza, home of the Great Pyramid, the sole surviving Wonder of the Ancient World; and finally, to the pulsating capital city of Cairo, where the Arab Spring erupted on the bridges over the Nile. Along the way, he introduces us to mysterious and fabled characters-the gods, godlike pharaohs, emperors and empresses, who joined their fate to the Nile and gained immortality; the adventurers, archaeologists, and historians who have all fallen under its spell. With matchless erudition and storytelling skill, through a lens equal to both panoramas and close-ups, Wilkinson brings millennia of history into view.
By Toby Wilkinson
Binding: Hardcover
Pages: 292
Publisher: Alfred a Knopf Inc
The Strength of Bone
$16.95 USD $12.95 USD
At the hospital in Blantyre, Malawi, Bryce is learning to predict the worst. Racing heart: infection, probably malaria. He'll send Iris for saline. Shortness of breath? TB. Another patient rolled to the ward. And the round swellings, the rashes with dimpled centres, the small rough patches on a boy's foot? HIV. Iris will make him comfortable. They'll move on.
Then there will be sleeplessness, rationed energy, a censuring of hope: the doctor's disease. Iris sees that one all the time.
Henry Bryce has come to Blantyre to work off the grief he feels for his old life, but he can't adjust to the hopelessness that surrounds him. He relies increasingly upon Sister Iris's steady presence. Yet it's not until an accident brings them both to a village outpost that Bryce realizes the personal sacrifices Iris has made for her medical training, or that Iris in turn comes to fathom the depth of Henry's loss.
The Strength of Bone is the story of a Western doctor, a Malawian nurse, and the crises that push both of them to the brink of collapse. With biting emotion and a pathological eye for detail, novelist and medical doctor Lucie Wilk demonstrates how, in a place where knowledge can frustrate as often as it heals, true strength requires the flexibility to let go.
By Lucie Wilk
The Tuner of Silences
$19.95 USD $10.95 USD
Mwanito was eleven when he saw a woman for the first time, and the sight so surprised him he burst into tears.
Mwanito has been living in a former big-game park for eight years. The only people he knows are his father, his brother, an uncle, and a servant. He's been told that the rest of the world is dead, that all roads are sad, that they wait for an apology from God. In the place his father calls Jezoosalem, Mwanito has been told that crying and praying are the same thing. Both, it seems, are forbidden.
The eighth novel by the internationally bestselling Mia Couto, The Tuner of Silences is the story of Mwanito's struggle to reconstruct a family history that his father is unable to discuss. With the young woman's arrival in Jezoosalem, however, the silence of the past quickly breaks down, and both his father's story and the world are heard once more.
The Tuner of Silences has been published to acclaim in more than half a dozen countries. Now in its first English translation, this story of an African boy's quest for the truth endures as a magical, humanizing confrontation between one child and the legacy of war.
By Mia Couto
Translated from the Portuguese by David Brookshaw
