Chapter One Blog #1

        Week One: BLOG 1           African Studies and the State of the Art

  Part A

In chapter one it spoke of how the Young Generation of  Radical African Scholars, disagreed with their predecessors ideas behind that of African History. They argued that the ideas of the Africanist Historians was to conservative and irrelevant to solving the issues of Africa. Africanist Historians had taken on the Euro-centric approach oppose to the Afri or Afro-centric approach needed. The younger generation felt as though the studies of Africa should be conducted from a more ideological and objective standpoint. With the Euro-centric backing this only generalized the African society. Simply because they took the questions asked of one family or society and geared it towards all of Africa.

Of the number of individuals who has had interest in the study of Africa, the most credible would be the anthropologist. They sympathized with the groups that peaked their interest  and demanded change on their behalf. Although the younger radicals accepts the path that had been created by their predecessors, they still desired to make changes in how the African societies were viewed.  Determined not to follow in the foot steps of those before them, the criticism that had been done was taken into consideration and worked out for their good.

Two most prominent scholars are Temu and Swai, they pointed out that ideology and methodology cant be separated because it would destroy the objectivity. They and others such as them have found ways to work around the bad name that has been created for Africa to create new history for them, and provide other disciplines that are relevant to Africa's actual needs.

Part B

For my first article I chose, "Moroccan single moms cope with hostility, shame"

In this it speaks of how women are shunned, scorned, frowned upon, and not having their own voice. They have to seek approval from the men to do just about anything. Much like Hamilton's article, women are viewed as incompetent, and are always receiving the worse of every situation. The women are often lied to and told they are the inferior to men or "second class citizens" (http://worldfocus.org/blog/category/specials/women-in-islam). The Moroccan's are predominantly a Political Islamic society, where the women are trying to create a name for themselves. By this the women are creating a group that is based upon religion as well as assisting women in knowing their rights to become more liberal. The men of the Islamic world of Morocco dictate what women can and can not do. Although these women fight for equality and their rights, its till very hard for them to change the views of society as well as their cultural norms.