Africana Studies 243 - Rural Prosperity African Past

This course seeks to understand what relationships engendered rural prosperity in African communities in the past, and what processes of change have led millions of rural people to abandon their homes and livelihoods to join flows of migrants to cities and other nations. We examine African patterns of production over the long term and the transformation of African agriculture in the last two centuries, considering famine, the social and political organization of access to productive resources, and the relationship of rural and urban communities. We ask how rural prosperity might be recreated in the 21st century.