Download or read book The Primitive City of Timbuctoo written by Horace Mitchell Miner and published by . This book was released on 1953 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Bad Ass Librarians of Timbuktu written by Joshua Hammer and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2016-04-19 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: **New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice** To save ancient Arabic texts from Al Qaeda, a band of librarians pulls off a brazen heist worthy of Ocean’s Eleven in this “fast-paced narrative that is…part intellectual history, part geopolitical tract, and part out-and-out thriller” (The Washington Post) from the author of The Falcon Thief. In the 1980s, a young adventurer and collector for a government library, Abdel Kader Haidara, journeyed across the Sahara Desert and along the Niger River, tracking down and salvaging tens of thousands of ancient Islamic and secular manuscripts that were crumbling in the trunks of desert shepherds. His goal: preserve this crucial part of the world’s patrimony in a gorgeous library. But then Al Qaeda showed up at the door. “Part history, part scholarly adventure story, and part journalist survey…Joshua Hammer writes with verve and expertise” (The New York Times Book Review) about how Haidara, a mild-mannered archivist from the legendary city of Timbuktu, became one of the world’s greatest smugglers by saving the texts from sure destruction. With bravery and patience, Haidara organized a dangerous operation to sneak all 350,000 volumes out of the city to the safety of southern Mali. His heroic heist “has all the elements of a classic adventure novel” (The Seattle Times), and is a reminder that ordinary citizens often do the most to protect the beauty of their culture. His the story is one of a man who, through extreme circumstances, discovered his higher calling and was changed forever by it.
Download or read book TIMBUCTOO written by Tahir Shah and published by eBook Partnership. This book was released on 2012-06-22 with total page 511 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For centuries, Europe's great explorers were sent out to find Timbuctoo - a city supposedly built from pure gold. Most of them never returned alive. At the height of the Timbuctoo Mania, 200 years ago, an illiterate American sailor was found on the streets of snowbound London, claiming to have been taken there as a white slave.
Download or read book Timbuctoo the Mysterious written by Félix Dubois and published by . This book was released on 1897 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Special Envoy of Figaro, Felix Dubois, left Dakar in 1896 and traveled into Mali by train to the end of the line (just after Kayes), and then on foot and horseback to Bamako and in pinnace from Koulikoro to Timbuktu. He describes Bamako, Segou but extremely long Djenne and Timbuktu, focusing on economic and cultural activities, collecting manuscripts and bringing a unique iconography (including photos of Fort Segou, a plan and reconstruction of the old mosque Jenne already been lost and not rebuilt); fundamental evidence on Mali in the early hours of colonization. Dubois resumed (from North) this journey of 15 years later and thus engaged in an assessment of changes. The merit of Felix Jones is to have transcribed the path to that goal, in a masterly text drawn from the sources of the bush, heat and space. His style made great reporter of the late nineteenth century, teeming with anecdotes. With the text researched and documented, it earned him then to be crowned by the French Academy.
Download or read book The Book Smugglers of Timbuktu written by Charlie English and published by William Collins. This book was released on 2018-05-17 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Two tales of a city: The historical race to reach one of the world's most mythologized places, and the story of how a contemporary band of archivists and librarians, fighting to save its ancient manuscripts from destruction at the hands of al Qaeda, added another layer to the legend. To Westerners, the name "Timbuktu" long conjured a tantalising paradise, an African El Dorado where even the slaves wore gold. Beginning in the late eighteenth century, a series of explorers gripped by the fever for "discovery" tried repeatedly to reach the fabled city. But one expedition after another went disastrously awry, succumbing to attack, the climate, and disease. Timbuktu was rich in another way too. A medieval centre of learning, it was home to tens of thousands of ancient manuscripts, on subjects ranging from religion to poetry, law to history, pharmacology, and astronomy. When al-Qaeda-linked jihadists surged across Mali in 2012, threatening the existence of these precious documents, a remarkable thing happened: a team of librarians and archivists joined forces to spirit the manuscripts into hiding. Relying on extensive research and firsthand reporting, Charlie English expertly twines these two suspenseful strands into a fascinating account of one of the planet's extraordinary places, and the myths from which it has become inseparable
Download or read book Travels Through Central Africa to Timbuctoo written by René Caillié and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2013-03-28 with total page 491 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Published in 1830, this two-volume work documents the pioneering expedition of the French explorer Réné Caillié (1799-1838) to Timbuktu.
Download or read book Urbanization and Social Change in West Africa written by Josef Gugler and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1978-07-28 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Originally published in 1978 as part of the Urbanization in Developing Countries series, this is an interdisciplinary study of rapid urban growth in West Africa. Gugler and Flanagan first explore the history of the cities of the early West African empires and they draw on the work of social anthropologists and sociologists, as well as demographers, economists, geographers, historians, political scientists and social psychologists. They then describe the urban explosion that the region experienced after World War II. They explore the implications of widespread urban unemployment and underemployment, the housing crisis and the emergence of metropolitan areas such as Lagos. The literature on urbanization and social change in Black Africa in general, and West Africa in particular, expanded at a fast pace in the years preceding publication. This critical review of the disparate findings filled a gap in African Studies and threw light on the understanding of Third World urbanization.
Download or read book Timbuktu and the Songhay Empire written by John O. Hunwick and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2003-01-01 with total page 490 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The principal text translated in this volume is the "Ta'rikh Al-sudan" of the 17th-century Timbuktu scholar, 'Abd al-Rahman al-Sadi. The other documents include an English translation of Leo Africanus's description of West Africa and some letters relating to Sa'dian diplomacy.
Download or read book Social History of Timbuktu written by Elias N. Saad and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1983-07-14 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Originally published in 1983, this book deals with the precolonial history of the Islamic West African city of Timbuktu. The book traces the fortunes of this fabled city from its origins in the twelfth century, and more especially from around 1400 onwards, to the French conquest in the late nineteenth century. The study rests upon a comprehensive utilisation of the Timbuktu sources, including the well-known chronicles or tarikhs of Timbuktu. The author focuses on the role of scholars and, in so doing, he provides a fresh study of a learned community in sub-Saharan Africa. Additionally, the study shows that the scholars occupied a position of leadership and authority in the social structure of the city. Hence, in providing fuller understanding of the role of scholars and their status as 'notables', the work makes it possible to understand the enigma which has surrounded this extraordinary city throughout its history. It contributes an important perspective for historians of Africa, the Middle East and Islam.
Download or read book Cities of the Mind written by Lloyd Rodwin and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-06-29 with total page 359 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Curious about the images of the city that have been evolving in the different social sciences, we did what academics often do in such a situa 1 tion: we set up a seminar on "Images of the City in the Social Sciences." From the start, we counted on the help of specialists in other fields to pursue their interests. Of the persons who agreed to participate, all but two came from the United States, and their analyses, in the main, reflect the experience of Western countries and the United States. In our formal instructions to our collaborators, we took fi>r granted that a variety of images of the city could be found or inferred in their fields of expertise. We asked them to identify these images and their functions, to explain how and why they have changed over time, and to relate these images to the distinct intellectual traditions and techniques-analytical or otherwise-in their respective fields. The definition of image was left to the judgment of the participants.
Download or read book The Preindustrial City Past and Present written by Sjoberg and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 1960 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From Simon & Schuster, The Preindustrial City by Gideon Sjoberg examines city life both in the past and present. In his work, Sjoberg takes readers on a journey through the history of cities—from their beginnings and the cities that were independently invented to the different economic, political, and religious structures common in cities.
Download or read book Historic Cities of the Islamic World written by Clifford Edmund Bosworth and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2007-01-01 with total page 631 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book contains articles on historic cities of the Islamic world, ranging from West Africa to Malaysia, which over the centuries have been centres of culture and learning and of economic and commercial life, and which have contributed much to the consolidation of Islam as a faith and as a social and political institution. The articles have been taken from the second edition of the Encyclopaedia of Islam, completed in 2004, but in many cases expanded and rewritten. All have been updated to include fresh historical information, with note of contemporary social developments and population statistics. The book thus delineates the urban background of Islam has it has evolved up to the present day, highlighting the role of such great cities as Cairo, Istanbul, Baghdad and Delhi in Islamic history, and also brings them together in a rich panorama illustrating one of mankind's greatest achievements, the living organism of the city.
Download or read book Transnationalism in Ancient and Medieval Societies written by Michael C. Howard and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2014-01-10 with total page 314 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While scholars have long documented the migration of people in ancient and medieval times, they have paid less attention to those who traveled across borders with some regularity. This study of early transnational relations explores the routine interaction of people across the boundaries of empires, tribal confederacies, kingdoms, and city-states, paying particular attention to the role of long-distance trade along the Silk Road and maritime trade routes. It examines the obstacles voyagers faced, including limited travel and communication capabilities, relatively poor geographical knowledge, and the dangers of a fragmented and shifting political landscape, and offers profiles of better-known transnational elites such as the Hellenic scholar Herodotus and the Venetian merchant Marco Polo, as well lesser known servants, merchants, and sailors. By revealing the important political, economic, and cultural role cross-border trade and travel played in ancient society, this work demonstrates that transnationalism is not unique to modern times. Instructors considering this book for use in a course may request an examination copy here.
Download or read book The City in Time and Space written by Aidan Southall and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1998 with total page 488 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This ambitious book treats urbanisation and urbanism all over the world, and from the earliest times to the present. Aidan Southall, a pioneer in the study of African cities, discusses the urban centres of ancient Sumeria, Greece and Rome, as well as medieval European cities, Chinese, Japanese, Islamic and Indic cities, colonial cities, and the great metropolises of the twentieth century. Drawing on this historical and comparative perspective, he offers a fresh analysis of world urbanisation in the contemporary period of globalisation. The study emphasises the enduring paradox of the city, which juxtaposes splendid cultural productions with the poverty and deprivation of the majority.
Download or read book Timbuktu Unbound written by Rachel Ama Asaa Engmann and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book An Ethnography of the Goodman Building written by Niccolo Caldararo and published by Springer. This book was released on 2019-04-25 with total page 371 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “An Ethnography of the Goodman Building vividly incorporates a wide variety of methods to tell the story of class struggle in a building, neighborhood, and city that is replicated globally. I read it as a number of boxes inside each other opened in the course of reading. Caldararo recounts the building’s personal “biography” to convey not only the “facts about,” but the “feelings about” the flesh and blood of the building and its surrounding neighborhood.” —Jerome Krase, Brooklyn College of The City University of New York, USA “This unique contribution to the field of urban and regional studies counteracts current trends in the ethnographies of urban movements by offering, with great hindsight, an analysis from a physical space, and from first-hand experience. The focal point is one building, and the author is a former tenant. This perspective is appealing, especially in an era of global connections where macro social movements are on the front line of urban life and research.” —Nathalie Boucher, Director and Researcher, Respire, and Affiliated Professor Assistant, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Concordia University, Canada. Through in-depth analysis and narrative investigation of an actual building occupation, Niccolo Caldararo seeks to not only offer an historical account of the Goodman Building in San Francisco, but also focus on the active resistance tactics of its residents from the 1960s to the 1980s. Taking as its focal point the building itself, the volume weaves in and out of every life involved and the struggles that surround it—San Francisco’s urban renewal, ethnic clearing, gentrification, and municipal governance at a time of booming urban growth. Caldararo, a tenant at the center of its strikes and activities, provides a unique perspective that counteracts current trends in ethnographies of urban movements by grounding its analysis in physical and tangible space.
Download or read book The Sociology and Politics of Development written by Baidya Nath Varma and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-11-26 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Originally published in 1980, this work answers the crucial question of how social change should be guided in the developing countries. Professor Varma begins by posing the problems of the general scope of modernization and the general criteria used in the modernization process. He examines carefully some of the models that have been used for this purpose in the past, providing extensive summaries of the views on modernization of theorists in various social science disciplines, including sociology, politics, economics, and anthropology, and stresses the importance of these views in guiding policy decisions. The book concludes with a comparison of the development processes of the United States, the Soviet Union, China, Japan and India.
