The girl in the photograph is from the Asante peoples in Ghana. She is holding a purple plastic baby doll of a type that is frequently found in markets in Ghana. The doll is both imported from Taiwan and made domestically in Ghana. The modern plastic… [more]

One of the very first slave narratives, The Interesting Narrative of Olaudah Equiano (1745-1797), served as a prototype for the well-known slave autobiographies of the 19th century written by such fugitive slaves as Frederick Douglass and Harriet… [more]

Joseph Thomson traveled through Kenya Maasailand from 1883 to 1884 on a journey of exploration from the coast to Mt Kenya and Lake Victoria, under the auspices of the Royal Geographical Society. He was the second European to visit the area. Thomson… [more]

British colonialism in what became Kenya began officially in 1895 and lasted until 1963, but the Maasai themselves were not effectively under British rule until just before the First World War. This letter is one of a series concerning a riot at… [more]

British colonialism in what became Kenya began officially in 1895 and lasted until 1963, but the Maasai themselves were not effectively under British rule until just before the First World War. These excerpts come from longer interviews conducted in… [more]