Another month, another special Africa issue. This one is by French weekly newspaper Courrier International (part of Le Monde group), edited by Isabelle Lauze and Ousmane Ndiaye. Many of the articles have appeared elsewhere but are published here for the first time in French. Features and profiles include those on Congolese photographer Kiripi Katembo, Angola’s “indignados”, Senegalese collective […]
It is hard to underestimate the importance of pianist Bebo Valdés’ contributions to Cuban music. “Bebo”, who passed way at the age of 94 in Stockholm, Sweden yesterday, is considered to have been instrumental in “wedding traditional Afro-Cuban dance rhythms with the improvisational freedom of American jazz” (JazzTimes). His earliest performances were in rumba style but his […]
Not too long ago, a new video by Amadou & Mariam would have made a bigger splash. There’s no way denying their (?) questionable choice to get Bertrand Cantat on board for their latest record has somewhat tempered the global enthousiasm for their music. Which is regrettable — the end result is a fine record. […]
To my ear Achebe’s voice is always measured even at its most defiant.
Comparisons between Chinua Achebe and Nigeria's other great writer, Wole Soyinka, will increase, now Achebe has passed.
France's intervention never offered a real solution to any of Mali's problems, but created a set of problems to the ones this country would otherwise have faced.
Born in a small township near Gondar in northwest Ethiopia, Yityish Aynaw recently became the latest Miss Israel. And then made some dumb comments about Ethiopian heritage and beauty. (“We have these chiseled faces. Everything is in the right place,” she said. “I never saw an Ethiopian who was stuck with some big nose.”) Which […]
The New York Times, in its infinite wisdom (it comes with being The New York Times), decided that one of the paper’s reporters, one Brooks Barnes, should write what amounts to a fluff piece (it’s not actual reporting) splintered with quotes in the “Fashion & Style” section about actor Ben Affleck’s supposed maturity and all-round […]
Why Goodluck Jonathan's presidential pardons are a bad idea.
Why does black characters in Dutch TV commercial plays some exaggerated version of someone from the colonies? Can "normal" black people not sell a product?
The French national anthem is a pretty nasty song. It dreams, in one of its more memorable verses, that the “blood of the impure” will “irrigate our fields.”
An interview with the managing editor of "Daily News Egypt," two-years after the Egyptian uprising.