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FROM BUSH TO CITY: A Look at the New Africa by Marc and Evelyn Bernheim Kirkus Star

FROM BUSH TO CITY: A Look at the New Africa

By

Pub Date: Oct. 26th, 1966
Publisher: Harcourt, Brace & World

If awards were given for superior photo-journalism for young people, this would be a strong contender. The text is a brief essay, topically divided, on the theme of continuity between past and present; the photographs, taken by the authors, make the continuity immediately and dramatically evident. Each chapter begins with a brief summarizing paragraph; the succeeding discussion is studded with specific images and incidental insights. The authors illumine the plight of semi-educated teenagers swarming into cities, creating ""problems of slums and juvenile delinquency that were nonexistent in tribal society."" They point out that varying degrees of education and attainment have resulted in a new flexible society with all levels of sophistication in just one family. Equally fluid is the religious life, in which Animism (a more appropriate name for paganism), Christianity and Islam coexist and commingle. Also changing is the status of women, the position of art as a medium of expression, and the economic dependence on agriculture. In concluding, the authors state that Africans are trying to ""change Africa's image""; they have done more, they have provided a vital, visible new image.