Journal of West African History

“The Customs of the Place”: Interracial Sexual Relationships and the Politics of Intimacy in the Colony of Sierra Leone, 1806-1888

2024-09-24T17:10:21-04:00

This article examines the formation of interracial social events such as dances and balls that fostered sexual relationships and the social practices of Europeans bequeathing inheritances to their mixed-race progeny in the Colony of Sierra Leone between 1806 and 1888. The practice of interracial sexual relationships in colonial Sierra Leone during the early to middle nineteenth century reveals the complexities of interracial sexual relationships across empire where raced and gendered hierarchies were reinforced but also undermined by these relationships. Although an abolitionist colony, the bequeathment of inheritances and interracial balls in colonial Sierra Leone paralleled social practices in coastal West Africa but also closely mirrored these social practices in plantation economies such as in the British Caribbean and the southern United States. This article assesses the importance of social practices in transgressing racial and social boundaries and underpinning sexual encounters between European men and colonial women across the Atlantic World and empire.

Missions and Indigenous Chiefs in Nineteenth-Century Yorubaland

2024-09-03T18:43:55-04:00

European missionaries are known to be among those who primed Africa’s precolonial societies for their entry into modernity. What is not often appreciated is that change was already underway among some of the people they worked with. Yet, their success at amplifying change where it was underway as in the nineteenth-century Yoruba country was not guaranteed. The restive nature of the Yoruba country threw up various warlords whose ambitions, belligerence, and mutual animosities shaped the outcomes of mission exploits. Indeed, the missionaries functioned in a charged environment of ruthless local politics, no thanks to the warlords. Comparing two centers of mission activities in the country, Ijaye and Oyo, this essay indicates that the success of mission endeavors hinged on the characters of the hosting chieftains. Subject to the whims of the despotic leader of the Ijaye settlement, the decade-long efforts exerted there suffered from the constraints imposed by Aarẹ Kurunmi and nearly perished in the eventual destruction of the town and their impossible ruler. On the other hand, after several decades of missionary association with the steady but roguish establishment in Oyo, missions took root at the center of Yoruba tradition. The different outcomes flowed from the differences between the crass autocracy of the Ijaye warlord and the flawed but sustained patriarchal tradition reinstituted in the new Oyo.

Transcending Colonial Impositions: Continuity, Social Transformation and the Centrality of Women in Yoruba Cultural Festivals

2024-11-15T11:07:03-05:00

This study examines how Yoruba cultural festivals transcended colonial impositions by maintaining continuity while facilitating social transformations, with women occupying a central role. Analyzing the impacts of colonialism on gender dynamics and indigenous institutions, it reveals how the colonial encounter paradoxically empowered Yoruba women amidst broader institutional destabilization. Focusing on the Gelede festival, the study demonstrates its resilience in retaining core political structures despite the "colonial tsunami." Archival evidence highlights how the Gelede cult's veneration of Awon Agbalagba Obirin (deified elderly women) subverted patriarchal narratives, reflecting precolonial traditions of feminine spiritual authority. As Yoruba festivals persisted, women assumed centrality, preserving cultural continuity while catalyzing transformations that challenged rigid gender constructs. This contradicts narratives of wholesale imposition of colonial patriarchy and African cultural stasis. Ultimately, this work elucidates the complexities of colonial encounters, illuminating the fortitude of Yoruba cosmology and centrality of women's traditions in navigating continuity and change.

Private and Public Selves: Emotions in the Life and Political Career of Kwame Nkrumah

2025-01-06T10:22:57-05:00

The emerging field of the history of emotions has opened the door to how historians can assess the role of emotions in the processes of political and social change and how emotions themselves have changed over time and space. Those close to Nkrumah commented on his temperament, his mercurial moods, and the power of his charisma. But studies of Nkrumah have primarily focused on his public figure. Nkrumah held strong personal beliefs about organized religion, money, and women; beliefs formed in his years abroad and that informed his decisions as a politician in Ghana and as head of state. I examine the context in which these beliefs emerged and how they came to shape his political decisions in Ghana, especially his interactions with what he described as Africa’s “triple heritage”: Christianity, Islam, and African indigenous religions.

Thinking about African Studies

2025-03-15T12:44:22-04:00

Sovereignty Without Power Book Review

2025-02-06T10:08:07-05:00

REVIEW - Understanding Colonial Nigeria

2025-07-08T13:07:14-04:00

BOOK REVIEW: Imagine Lagos (Ohio UP, 2024)

2025-07-08T14:27:42-04:00

Review of Ademide Adelusi-Adeluyi, Imagine Lagos: Mapping History, Place, and Politics in a Nineteenth-Century African City (Ohio UP, 2024), by Dr. Folarin Ajibade

BOOK REVIEW Nti review of Duerksen - Waterhouses

2025-07-15T18:07:47-04:00

Speaking with Richard Rathbone [Preliminary title]

2025-05-13T14:01:07-04:00

Dr. Richard Rathbone, FRHistS, was a pioneering historian of Africa whose work had a profound impact on many, whether of his own generation or those that have succeeded it, his formal students and many who have learned from him informally. In 2021, three historians of Ghana – Jennifer Hart, Tony Yeboah, and Trevor Getz – conducted an interview with him via Zoom. Richard connected from his home in Wales, to which he had retired. We present the transcript of that conversation below, along with a biography from his friend, co-author, and colleague John Parker. The transcript was lightly edited by Richard prior to his passing on November 111, 2024, and small corrections have been made. This interview was, in many ways, Richard’s last scholarly work.

Speaking in Our Own Tongues

2025-08-29T09:35:24-04:00

Alternative Futures through West African Agency in the Past

2025-08-27T11:24:31-04:00