“People may not think of American blacks as culturally mixed, but cultural mixture is what forced African immigrants and their descendants to think of themselves as 'black' rather than Yoruba or Mandinka or half-German or one-quarter Cherokee.”

—from Kelefa Sanneh's “After the Beginning Again”

 

TRANSITION 87: Table of Contents

 

DISPATCHE____________________

Generation Exile
It's hard to hate the Dalai Lama. The maximum leader of Tibetan Buddhism is a spiritual icon, a Hollywood hero, and the world's most famous pacifist. So why are his people dreaming of guerrilla war? Meenakshi Ganguly goes underground with Tibet's youth of today.

POSITIONS____________________

A Brief History of Genocide
The annals of colonialism are replete with accounts of slaughtering natives. But what happens when the natives decide to take their revenge? And what if the “settlers” are black? Mahmood Mamdani examines race and the riddle of Rwanda.

Bombing the Savages
In 1918, the British Royal Air Force had thirty-three hundred airplanes, tons of explosives, and absolutely nothing to bomb. So they set off for darkest Africa, and an obstreperous Somali chieftain. Sven Lindqvist tells a tale of adventure, intrigue, and death from above.

UNDER REVIEW____________________

After the Beginning Again
In the parallel universe of Afrocentricity, Molefi Kete Asante is king, a tireless interpreter of black culture from Egyptology to Ebonics. For Asante and his followers, Africa is the solution—but Africans might be part of the problem. Kelefa Sanneh considers the continental divide.

FICTION____________________

Dakar Noir
A disappearing act.
By Boubacar Boris Diop

The Man with the One-String Guitar
The song remains the same.
By Emily Raboteau

PORTFOLIO____________________

An Indescribable Adventure
“The 1990s have produced a new 'new Cuban art' for our post-utopian times. These artists have been denounced for cynicism, formalism, and complacency . . . ”
By Gerardo Mosquera

CONVERSATION____________________

Dances with Wolofs
Last year, a coterie of radical intellectuals brought down Senegal's socialist government, ushering in a new era of anti-American rhetoric and hip-hop democracy. Boubacar Boris Diop is both radical and intellectual, but he's a skeptic all the same. Charles J. Sugnet talks with Senegal's leading novelist about dope, guns, and writing in the streets.

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