What the documents say
Every statement has a numbered citation, and every source is labelled by its kind and by how far it has been checked.
Place guides
Africa on the Ground
Place guides that keep the documented record and the local voice apart.
The place cards
Every card keeps two kinds of knowledge apart: what the record says and what people who know the place say.
The Gambia · River GambiaKunta Kinteh IslandNear Juffureh and Albreda. UNESCO World Heritage since 2003.
Senegal · DakarIsland of GoréeA cultural property on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1978.
MaliOld Towns of DjennéA cultural property on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1988.
ZimbabweGreat Zimbabwe National MonumentA cultural property on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1986.
EthiopiaRock-Hewn Churches, LalibelaA cultural property on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1978.
MoroccoMedina of FezA cultural property on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1981.
Two kinds of knowledge. Never mixed.
What they tell us
One person's experience, shown as theirs, with the name and connection they chose to give. Collected in person or by direct message, with consent.
54 places on the map
- Historic site
- Market
- Dish
- Nature and wildlife
- Culture and institutions
Stories
History told with its sources, myths checked against the record, and the food behind the places.
- Myths · 1 min readAfrica is a continent, not a countryFifty-four countries, and the biggest has about 1,900 times more people than the smallest.
- Myths · 2 min readAfrica is much bigger than the map saysOn the world map most of us grew up with, Africa looks about the size of Greenland. It is fourteen times larger.DR Congo
- History · 2 min readAksum: the great power you were never taughtSeventeen centuries ago a kingdom in the Horn of Africa minted its own coins, wrote in its own script and sat on the trade route between Rome and India.Eritrea · Ethiopia
- Food · 1 min readCassava: the American crop that feeds AfricaMost people who eat garri or fufu today are eating a plant that came from Brazil in the 16th century.Nigeria
- Myths · 1 min readDid one conference in Berlin carve up Africa?A meeting of fourteen states, with no African representative, set rules for the scramble. It did not draw the map.DR Congo
- Myths · 1 min readDo Africans speak "African"?There is no language called African. Glottolog lists more than 2,000 of them, in 43 families.Nigeria