A revelatory survey of problematic coverage of Africa throughout history.
A study of how Western reporters and editors have contributed to a distorted and derogatory representation of African people.
In 1964, Time magazine reported on an attempt by Belgian paratroopers to rescue White citizens threatened by Black rebels in the Congo. “Black African civilization...is largely a pretense,” the reporter wrote. “The rebels were, after all, for the most part, only a rabble of dazed, ignorant savages, used and abused by semi-sophisticated leaders.” Time was not alone in its casual racism at the time. In this disturbing and compelling account of Western media’s inglorious coverage of Africa, John Jay College adjunct professor and Black Star News publisher Allimadi reveals how “Demonization of Africans was the handmaiden of conquest and colonization” and shows how reporters at distinguished publications manufactured “stereotypical racist representations” of Africans that persist to this day. The author also takes well-known figures to task, such as Thomas Jefferson and Joseph Conrad as well as British explorer Samuel Baker, who wrote in 1866, “Human nature viewed in its crudest state as pictured amongst African savages is quite on a level with that of the brute.” The most compelling revelations, however, come from internal correspondence that Allimadi excavated from the New York Times’ archives. In one undated exchange, Allimadi reports, the Times’ foreign news editor Emanuel Freedman complimented Africa correspondent Homer Bigart for being “American journalism’s leading expert on sorcery, witchcraft, cannibalism and all the other exotic phenomena indigenous to darkest Africa.” The message from the Times, Allimadi laments, “was that Africa was not to be taken seriously.” For the most part, the book has something of a dry, academic tone that may not appeal to lay readers. However, there are many startling moments, as in 1967 when a Times reporter in Nigeria complained after an editor inserted a fictitious reference to “small pagan tribes dressed in leaves” into his copy. Allimadi also effectively shows how racism affected coverage of recent upheavals in Rwanda and Libya.
A revelatory survey of problematic coverage of Africa throughout history.Pub Date: June 14, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-79246-647-2
Page Count: 167
Publisher: Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company
Review Posted Online: Sept. 28, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorkerstaff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
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