Africa's Urban Past - by R J a R Rathbone (Paperback)

About the Book

Urbanization has been an important feature of Africa's history for over 2000 years.

Book Synopsis

Urbanization has been an important feature of Africa's history for over 2000 years.

Towns and cities have been arenas around which societies have organized themselves: as centres of trade and economic activity; as foci of political action and authority; as military garrisons; as sites of ritual power; and as places of refuge and collective security in troubled times. This collection reveals the depth of urbanization in African history.

Review Quotes

... will definitely be on my undergraduate African History reading list. ---David Dorward "ARAS"

I have seldom read a book which introduced me to so many new things - to so many fresh topics and to so much new research by scholars, many of them young, as well as by established figures such as John Thornton and Robin Law... I found this book almost a course in African Studies in itself. ---Terence Ranger "AFRICAN AFFAIRS"

The editors provide an excellent introduction which outlines the entire history of African urbanism in eight tightly-written pages, explains the rationale of the book in the context of the state of the art, and places the seventeen studies included here into their broader academic context. ---Anthony Lemon "ENGLISH HISTORICAL REVIEW"