History: Africa Before Colonialism

Topics examining the history of Africa. May repeat for credit with different content. Topics vary by offering; periodic offering at intervals that may exceed four years. Prerequisite: Three hours of History.

Prereq: 3 hours History PACE students with permission and override

Welcome to History 2410! This course examines the history of Africa before formal European conquest. Our goal will be to explore, identify and explain the multiple ways complex societies and civilizations emerged, developed and changed and throughout Africa. We’ll try to answer a number of historical questions, with a focus on African lives and African experiences. For example, what kinds of states and political structures emerged over time? What kinds of economies did Africans create? What was slavery like in Africa? How did Africans organize food production? How did Africans understand ideas about belonging? About the supernatural? Why and how did economic and political inequality emerge and change over time? More broadly, key themes include the effect of environment, geography and migration on the African past, the agricultural and iron revolutions, the creation and nature of early African civilizations, the impact of Islam and Christianity, the nature of Africa’s participation in the “Atlantic” world, and the development of internal African slavery and the external slave trade. As a history class, we will be especially concerned with how and why these changes occurred and what kinds of impact they had on people’s lives and livelihoods. This course also aims to dispel colonial and post-colonial myths and mythologies about the African past and to provide a historical context for our own understanding of the possibilities and problems of Africa in the twenty-first century. A gentle word of warning: we will cover tremendous amount time, across a vast geographical space, be prepared to move through Africa rapidly! Many students find early African history courses difficult because they are unfamiliar with African names and places. The only cure for this is to throw yourself into the geography of Africa and commit to learning the contexts and names from a variety of African cultures and time periods. It is not easy work, but it will pay off in the end. No previous course work in African history is necessary or expected.

The format is mostly lecture based, with dedicated days for discussion of a variety of sources.

Small papers; Map Quiz; Final Exam; Final paper; Attendance and participation.