News & Events

On 14 June 1995, Congolese novelist, short-story writer, playwright, and poet Sony Labou Tansi, born Marcel Ntsoni, died at the age of 47 in Brazzaville. Tansi was born on 5 July 1947, in the village of Kimwaanza, just south of Kinshasa in modern day Democratic Republic of the Congo. Read the Library Weekly!

During the 2021 acquisition trip to Rwanda, the staff of the ASCL library received back copies of reports drawn up by the Cahiers du Bureau Social Urbain by the Catholic NGO Caritas. These copies offer a wealth of information on societal life in Rwanda from the end of the 1980s until 2002. They are the subject of our latest Library Highlight!

Rahmane Idrissa has been awarded the Ali A. Mazrui Senior Fellowship in Global African Studies at the The Africa Institute in Sharjah (United Arab Emirates). Idrissa will devote the Fellowship mainly to write a book on the Songhay Empire in the global context of the birth of modernity. 

The ASCL Library has compiled a reading list which gives background information on Africa-Ukraine and Africa-Russia relations, and on what the present war means for Africa. It contains articles, blogs, infographics, podcasts and videos.

On 10 June 2010, Cameroonian diplomat, politician and author Ferdinand Léopold Oyono died in Yaoundé at the age of 80. Writing in the 1950s, Oyono had a brief literary career, but his anti-colonialist novels are considered classics of 20th century African literature. Read the Library Weekly!

Are you interested in Africa and is your master's thesis on a related subject? If so, the African Studies Centre Leiden is offering you the chance to win € 500,- and have your thesis published in the African Studies Collection. Submission deadline: 31 August.

On 30 May 1933, Sultan Ibrahim Njoya, the 17th ruler of the Bamun, a large ethnic group located within what is now western Cameroon, died in exile in Yaoundé at the age of 66. He is foremost known for the invention of the Bamun script. Read the Library Weekly!

Apply for the Master or Research Master in African Studies at Leiden University! The Research Master is unique in continental Europe for its interdisciplinary approach and the six-months fieldwork. Apply before 15 June!

A new paper by Tycho van der Hoog explores the largely unknown history of North Korean development aid in Africa. In the twentieth century, Pyongyang was an important partner for recently liberated African countries and actively used development aid as a tool for its foreign policy, aiming to gain international recognition.

On 28 May 1989, Cape Verdean writer, poet, linguist and lawyer Baltasar Lopes da Silva died in Lisbon at the age of 82. With Manuel Lopes and Jorge Barbosa, he was the founder of the literary journal Claridade. Read the Library Weekly!