SAIS Tackles Kenya at 50 – PT 1: Historians’ Perspectives (and a startling claim on Kenyan-Somali Relations)

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Derek Peterson, Emma Hunter, Johnnie Carson, Kenya, Kenyan Somali relations, Kikuyu, Mau Mau, Mozella Brown, SAIS Kenya Conference, Syracuse University, Timothy Parsons, USAID

The ‘Historian’ Panel

As I’ll be presenting on a topic relating to Kenyan history at the 2013 meeting of the African Studies Association in November, I thought it prudent to pop in on the ‘Kenya at 50‘ conference taking place at SAIS today and tomorrow.

I just caught the majority of the first panel – ‘Historian’s Perspective’ (my MA is in history) and hope to make it back to at least one more conference event (hence the part I in the title of this post).

‘African Independence’ at the Goethe Institute Friday Night – Review

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African Independence, Benjamin Mkapa, China in Africa, cold war in Africa, Dedan Kimathi, FW de Klerk, John Kufuor, Jomo Kenyatta, Kenneth Kaunda, Mau Mau, Samia Nkrumah, Tukufu Zuberi

Zuberi speaking after the film

Yesterday, I attended the opening screening of the African Diaspora International Film Festival, which continues at the Goethe Institute in Chinatown through this weekend.  The first screening was ‘African Independence‘, a film by Dr. Tukufu Zuberi, a Professor of sociology at the University of Pennsylvania (who was in attendance).  I tend to view Americans with romantic notions of Africa in a weary manner (perhaps because I am very self-conscious about my own tendencies to do so), so I admit to having some preconceived thoughts as to how someone raised in Oakland with an adopted Swahili name would tackle the issue of African independence.