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Africa

Methods

Analyzing Commission Records

The modules in Methods present case studies that demonstrate how scholars interpret different kinds of historical evidence in world history.

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Market in Southeastern Nigeria

This is an image of local women at a market in southeastern Nigeria in the 1930s. In the precolonial period, women in this society had a very strong role in the economy. They were, in fact, the major traders in palm oil.

Commission Hearing Excerpt
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Commission Hearing Excerpt

This is an excerpt from a commission hearing conducted in southeastern Nigeria in 1930 by British colonial officials. The hearing investigated a series of disturbances by local women following a rumor that the British were going to tax women. This excerpt is a statement by one of these woman.

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Egyptian Mummy Coffin

The same image can be valued differently over time and in different cultures. Take, for example, the long journey in time and space of images and hieroglyphic writing that cover the surfaces of the coffins of mummies from Egypt.

Gulhane Proclamation thumbnail image
Methods

Analyzing Official Documents

The modules in Methods present case studies that demonstrate how scholars interpret different kinds of historical evidence in world history. In the video below, historian Dina Khoury analyzes two official proclamations by the government of the Ottoman Empire.

Written representation of the music from the dance mabo thumbnail
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Mabo Song

This is a written representation of the music from the dance mabo, BaAka music is complex. It is polyphonic (many voices) and polyrhythmic (many rhythms).

BaAka Women Dancing the Hunting Dance thumbnail image
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BaAka Women Dancing the Hunting Dance, Ndambo

This is an image of female BaAka dancers from the southwestern Central African Republic in the rainforest region dancing a hunting dance called Ndambo. Music and dance are important in BaAka culture.

BaAka Women Dancing the Hunting Dance thumbnail image
Methods

Analyzing Music

The modules in Methods present case studies that demonstrate how scholars interpret different kinds of historical evidence in world history.

Source

Kuttab, or Primary Level Qur’an School

This public building of Mamluk Cairo in Egypt has two functions. Its lower level housed a sabil, or fountain, for dispensing water to thirsty travelers and denizens of the city, and its upper level was a public primary school for the teaching of Qur'an, called a kuttab.

Thumbnail of fanoos making father and son
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Child in Ramdan Lantern Family Workshop

In the weeks and months before the start of Ramadan, the ninth lunar month when Muslims fast, traditional workshops like the one on Ahmad Maher Street in the medieval quarter of Cairo, turn recycled tin cans into glittering lanterns.