News & Events

The African Studies Centre Leiden proudly presents its new logo! It depicts a frame through which the ASCL observes, researches and aims to understand diverse African realities. With the new logo comes a new website with a fresh look, which we will continue to work on in the coming months.

On 15 May 2002, Nigerian educationalist, writer and advocate for women’s education Lady Kofoworola Ademola (née Moore) died at the age of 88. She was the president of the National Council of Women Societies in Nigeria and was the head of the women's organisation from 1958 to 1964. Read the Library Weekly!

On the occasion of Jan-Bart Gewald’s selection as a fellow at Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study (STIAS), we interviewed him about the research project The 'Big Hole', Kimberley South Africa, 1870-1920 which he will conduct there. ‘Without “the Big Hole”, southern Africa wouldn’t exist as it is now.' 

In Jean-Marie Teno's latest film 'Chosen', Teno recounts his meeting with a woman whose life journey mirrors a generation of Africans: who left Africa one day and are now struggling to find their way back home. Read the Library Highlight!

The war in Ukraine also has an impact on Africa: 45 of the 54 African countries depend for more than a third on grain from Ukraine and Russia. Ton Dietz was interviewed about the consequences of this war on the African continent, in the 'Africast' podcast.

When ASCL researcher Stephen Ellis died in July 2015, African Studies lost one of its most prolific, provocative and celebrated scholars. This collection, edited by Tim Kelsall, aims to provide scholars and students with an introduction to the main themes in Ellis’ work.

South Africa is battling growing anti-immigrant attitudes driven by vigilante groups. PhD candidate Tinashe Chimbidzikai writes about how anti-immigrant sentiments have become episodic, in the ASCL Africanist Blog.

In this seminar on 31 May, Wayne Modest (Director of Content of the National Museum of World Culture) will explore the demands to decolonise museums and other heritage institutions, and the museums’ responses. He remains close to his own experience, focusing on the Tropenmuseum.

Annachiara Raia has received funding from the Dutch Research Council (NWO) for the research project 'Forging Transoceanic Muslim Histories: Swahili Literary Networks on the 20th-Century Indian Ocean Coast'. From the 1930s in East Africa, a massive print production of Swahili religious pocket literature started.

'Period poverty' is a term used to refer to the insufficient access of millions of girls and women around the globe to the sanitary products and facilities they need when menstruating. It is a situation that hugely affects girls' physical and mental well-being, and one that undermines their confidence to go to school. My First Time, by Janet Mbugua, is a collection of personal stories of more than 50 Kenyan women about the first time they menstruated and how they dealt with their period as a girl. My First Time is the subject of our new Library Highlight!