BOOK AND FILM REVIEW
This section is a work in progress. We decided to try to create a recommended list of books and films. It is not a complete list and many African author’s books are not included as we would have liked as we lost a lot of our old reviews over a decade ago, and would have to re-read books to give a detailed review. Feel free to make a contribution.
500 Years Later
500 Years Later is an African Holocaust production made by Halaqah Films (UK). Naturally, we recommend it with strong emphasis. Click here to buy it and support our site.
GUNS GERMS AND STEEL
Egypt, Ethiopia, Mali, and a few other places stand out but the majority of Africa did not reach the same development state as the rest of the world and this was prior to slavery and prior to colonialism. Now everyone should have read Jared by now, we have been recommending it for some time. But it is a recommendation with a caveat. Because the book is totally useless depending upon where you are coming from. If you still into Kings and Queens and perfect Black people living in Utopia then do not bother reading this book. Also if you do have an understanding of science the book will be useless. If you are not a critical thinker it will be a good paperweight. The book is special because of its synthesis. It is full of serious errors esp the chapter on “Black people in Africa”. While Jared is not as racist as Fage and some others it was Jared that pushed this Black conquest theory into South Africa to allow white people to justify settling SA and stealing the land. After all the Bantu farmers did it albeit earlier (what a joke). Anyway, the book does have in 70% truth when it comes to explaining why some places–like Europe and the Levant, Asia were able to outperform most of Africa. He also explains why it is kind of unfair to compare since Africa is pretty huge and pretty depopulated (historically) compared to Europe. It is very technical and as stated before if you are unfamiliar with the background science it will only confuse you more.
Jared is a liberal. But his racist liberal POV does not contaminate most of the book. And I could write a book on the complexities of people like Jared. He actually is semi-racist depending on the subject. He is trying very hard NOT to be a Eurocentric, harder than anyone else. And I would say most of the time he is NOT Eurocentric. He seems to do this by putting Asia ahead of Europe and downgrading the boast of White Europe. When he comes to Africa he is often an apologist, mainly because he is trying so hard to avoid being seen as Eurocentric. What spoils it for him is the chapter on how Africa became Black. I have no idea if this man ever spoke to a serious African historian or spent any time looking at Afrocentrism. And he should because the contributions of Afrocentrism to the discussion on Africa are critical from a political pov. Afrocentrism is far more relevant politically than historically. And Jared’s entire attitude to Africa is steeped in a total colonial outlook of Blacks in Africa and because he sees us as blacks in Africa (our home) he treats the dominant African Bantus as foreigners. But we are not blacks, we are Africans in our Motherland. It is ridiculous to build ancient history and lock oneself to modern constructions like “black” people. How are Somali and Wolof part of the same “black” race from a historical perspective when we are discussing anthropology and science? It is so unprofessional it is shocking.
HISTORY OF THE WORLD
Good for summary only
Brilliant depending on what you know if you need a quick overview of a lot of historical events. But as a serious source of history, use this as a guideline to do deeper research. This book finds fringe arguments and pushes them as established facts. It treats Islam as all orientalist projects do, as an exception. It was only Islam that brought the concept of religion plus warfare to the world. It was religious zeal that drove the conquest of the Arabs in the 7th century. And the DVD continues to make these kinds of superficial treatments of complex history for the sake of an interesting film.
