In contemporary African history, most narratives revolve around the year 1960. But what if I say, 1957? what do you say? Independence of the first sub-Saharan African country, Ghana? Yes, that’s right. Anything else? Let’s listen to the answers by Prof. Elisa Prosperetti, History professor, specializing in modern African and world history in Massachusetts, where she teaches a range of courses on African history. Her research focuses on the connected narratives of development, education and...

This is a special episode to start this new season. An episode to ask you my listener; How are you doing? Is everything around you fine despite the current pandemic? To you.. You who wrote to me during this summer just to say THANK YOU. You who sent words of encouragement to keep up with the PODCAST You who asked for a third season – And here we are. You who sent suggestions for topics to be covered in future episodes. You who offered to co-write in future episodes.

Hello dear friends! What are you doing this Saturday July 4th around 9pm Nairobi time? Whatever your plans, if you have 10 min on Saturday evening, then you will be delighted to learn about the latest addition to the “My African Clichés” family: My African Clichés THE QUIZ NIGHT

While France, UK, US, are hiding,, isn’t the real question we the Africans in this debate about the representation of history in public space? Shouldn’t we be questioning why so many cities are still named after settlers and weirdos involved in the scramble for Africa and its enslavement? In 2020, how many avenues cities, hospitals, squares and schools are still named after British Queen Victoria, after French General Charles de Gaulle? Or after Portuguese missionaries?

Malcolm X's words sound even better in 2020: "Their problem is our problem”. Ask Mrs. Kadiatou Diallo, the mother of the young Guinean Amadou Diallo, a 23-year-old boy, who had just announced to his mother who stayed in Guinea, that he had now worked enough to finally pay for his expensive university studies in America. Outside his home, unarmed, he was shot dead by New York police, riddled with 41 bullets. A year later, the 4 police officers who allegedly took his wallet for a firearm were...

The UK treasury claiming that British taxpayers helped “buy freedom for slaves” was a huge big lie, and here is why: The people who ended slavery, the real heroes of abolition, were first and foremost, the slaves themselves who revolted countless times everywhere in multiple slavery locations.That was the case of Mulato Solitude and Louis Delgres in French Caribbean, Toussaint Louverture in Haiti, Carlota Lucimi known as La Carlota Negra in Cuba, the Ghanain Breffu in the Danish West Indies....

Welcome to the last part of the trilogy on Africans who have transformed the world with their courage. I present an extraordinary story of African captives, who by refusing slavery and submission, fought adversity, powerful states and American courts, only for one reason: to return to Africa. With this mutinous act they contributed indirectly to the birth of a major moment in the fate of America today.

My African cliché of the day, is a question: where do we see Amin’s legacy today? How many times do you think Amin turns in his grave when he sees Senegalese people buying groceries from French-owned brands such as Auchan or Carrefour, buying fuel at Total gas stations, buying phones plans from Orange, and reach their homes from work, paying roadtoll to Sénac… all are French companies, but none established in Senegal.

From Amadou Mbow ( UNESCO) to Tedros Gebreyesus ( WHO): Same battle? My African cliché of the day is a vision, M’Bow’s vision of UNESCO. He saw UNESCO as a means to create a world order based on justice, dignity for all, equity, respect for diversity and the preservation of culture heritage. How many African leaders today still have a vision and stand for it?

What is your definition of beauty? “Is it a combination of qualities, such as shape, colour, or form? Obviously, it varies across countries, cultures, religions and language. In an African context, it takes on a more complex meaning, particularly with regard to history, colonialism and slave trade interacting with patriarchy to perpetuate white western standards of beauty. This is known as colourism, ‘Africa’s colonial hangover, “shadism”, skin tone bias, pigmentocracy or the colour complex.

“The United States government did something that was wrong — deeply, profoundly, morally wrong, it was an outrage to our commitment to integrity and equality for all our citizens. . What was done cannot be undone. But we can end the silence. We can stop turning our heads away. We can look at you in the eye and finally say on behalf of the American people, what the United States government did was shameful, and I am sorry.” President Bill Clinton, issuing an apology, on May 16, 1997,

” You need to read to open up your world” is a phrase I often heard when I was a child. But in the era of so-called social networks, the supremacy of WhatsApp, fake news and Facebook pages, it seems that fewer and fewer adults are reading books. And this observation is even more striking for the younger generation. Do young Africans still read books? What do they read? Which African authors do they read? Where do they read or find the books?

FOR AFRICAN FEMALE WRITERS My African cliche of the day is a Bantu saying which says I quote: "Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu",which means in French: "A human is human because of other humans".It essentially means that Our humanity depends on the humanity of our fellow humans. No individual, no group can be human all alone. We rise together above the animal, or not at all. This saying is one of the favorites of an African writer, a great African intellectual. Prof Chinua Achebe.

After having explored the history of this African accessory, the turban, here we are now ready to experience a concrete use of it, thanks to our captain, she, who made it a way of life for the last 10 years, and who shares her experience through her brand and her fabulous headwraps on Instagram. Hello everyone and welcome to this headwrap workshop

Cultural appropriation refers to when a dominant culture appropriates the codes of a dominated culture, either the colonized peoples or the oppressed minorities My African cliché of the day is question to you: do you think that if a White American white lady chooses to wear a headwrap, it is cultural appropriation? Is it paying tribute? Is it respect? Is it free advert for that culture? 

My African cliché of the day is a great African woman rights fighter: Huda Sha’arawi. She created the first Egyptian Philanthropic Society for women, in addition to being the founder and head of the Egyptian Feminist Union. Most unapologetic woman in recent history. Despite all her accomplishments, she refused to be singled out as Egyptian. Here is what she said on that topic: “Men have singled out women of outstanding merit and put them on a pedestal to avoid recognizing the capabilities of...

My African cliche of the day is a quote from our captain, about her favorite black heroine, Harriet Tubman. What can I say after the powerful words of a woman as impressive as Harriet Tubman? NOTHING. And nothing is already much like Jacques Brel said. See you next Monday on Sankofa for our third heroine of the month of March.

My African cliche of the day is a duty, what I could call "the duty of curiosity", a kind of minimum service that each African and Afro-descendant must perform, to help himself, and help to to make known a counter history of Africa.

My African cliché of the day is a wonderful quote from the American writer Rebecca West, I quote: “I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is: I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat, or a prostitute.”

Welcome to this series of special Sankofa flights, chartered by the office of the UN Special Envoy for the Great Lakes region. As announced before, this special series, broadcasted in parallel with your usual podcast episodes, will last the whole month of March to honor women from different countries who talk about their battles.

If I had to choose a quote to summarize our heroine of this day, I would choose like French resistant Lucie Aubrac, to say that The verb "To Resist" must always conjugate in the present tense" because, Odiri, this UK-born daughter of Africa, of Nigerian origin, does not spare no effort to connect ethically, Africa and its diaspora. Support her different projects: - Kori Youth Charity ( www.kori.org.uk) - Daughters of Africa ( www.daughtersofafrica.info) - The Vessel UK - The Daigo proje

If I had to choose a quote to summarize our heroine of this day, I would choose like French resistant Lucie Aubrac, to say that  The verb "To Resist" must always conjugate in the present tense" because, Odiri, this  UK-born daughter of Africa, of Nigerian origin, does not spare no effort to connect ethically, Africa and its diaspora. Support her different projects: - Kori Youth Charity ( www.kori.org.uk)  - Daughters of Africa ( www.daughtersofafrica.info) - The Vessel UK - The Daigo proje

This month, we are celebrating 4 ordinary African heroines, who fought in their own way, drawing inspiration from the past to inform the present and try to create another future for themselves and others.  4 very different profiles, but so similar in their determination and strength of character. I hope to inspire all the little African girls around the world, so that they remember above all, that the rights they enjoy today have been acquired at the cost of the lives of hundreds of women.

My African cliché of the day is a symbolic reparation, of the amount of $ 1 that each American citizen and each French citizen could pay into a fund for Haiti. Some will respond promptly, that the West is already providing development assistance. Is this aid really benefiting the children of the Haiti Heroes? True reparation is what the Australian aborigines have just obtained for the destruction of their culture by the British colonists.

My African cliche of the day is a word, a myth, which is called “The West”. If hearing this word did not make you blink during this episode, it is because you consider this word as the name of a precise geographical space, which represents a more progressive part of the world. And the evil is so deep, that it would take a kind of collective purging to make people, , aware that the West does not designate the same part of the world, depending on whether one is in Japan, in Pakistan or Cape Town.