Quid novi ex Africa? is a frequent, virtually perennial, question, posed especially during the era of geographical discoveries. The interior of the continent was rather unknown at that time, a mystery enticing many to explore it. The publication series Ex Africa semper aliquid novi, initiated by the City Museum of Zory (Poland) in 2014, addresses itself to this longstanding question, showing the rich past of this continent but most of all, the various aspects of contemporary life there. It is a continent full of potential and hope.
The next (fifth) volume in this series concentrates on art, the anthropology of things, and literature. It opens with an extensive text by Katarzyna Mich on the formation of the local culture of ancient Nubia after the fall of Meroe. This look so far back highlights the fact that there are still many mysteries hidden in Africa’s past and indicates a need for study and new interpretation of this past. The next two articles, by Jarosław Różański (Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski University in Warsaw) and Sławomir Szafrański (University of Szczecin) present the past history of Polish research in Africa, concentrating on Ryszard Buchta, pioneer of photography in the Sudan, and Leopold Janikowski, a principal researcher of lands which are part of today’s southern Cameroon. The last text in the “Art and the Archeology of Things” section, by Anna Nadolskia-Styczyńska of the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Torun, bears an outstandingly national accent, presenting research on the interesting collection of Africana at the Missionary and Ethnographic Museum in Pieniężno. The final text in this thematic block, by Aneta Pawłowska of the University of Łódź, also links Europe and Africa, as reflected in an analysis of the paintings of Irma Stern.
The second section of texts is dedicated to literature and theater. It opens with a piece from Ewa Kalinowska of the University of Warsaw on the francophone literature of Africa and its perspective on the tragic genocide of the 1990’s. Izabella Zatorska, an expert on Malagasy theater and literature from the same university, presents two texts associated with 20th century literary occidentalisation – in theater and personal diary on that largest of African islands. The last text in this section, authored by Patrycja Kozieł, presents the activities of literary institutions and societies of Ghana.
The volume closes with texts placed under Varia. The first of these is the fruit of studies by Lucjan Buchalik (City Museum of Zory) conducted among the Tamberma of Togo from 2000–2012. The second one attempts to look at history from the research perspective of the South-Sudanese native elite, presenting the Shilluk-Luo peoples as creators of world civilization (Maciej Zabek, University of Warsaw). In the last text Wojciech Trojan—a researcher not associated with any academic center—speaks of the shameful pages of the history of the German Reich’s colonization: “German skull-hunters in Africa in an anthropological-legal context.”
Open access: https://www.academia.edu/44554525/
Key words: Nubia, Christianity in Nubia, Richard Buchta, South Sudan, Bahr Al-Ghazal, Leopold Janikowski, Stefan Szolc-Rogoziński, Klemens Tomczek, Ethnographic Museum in Pieniężno, South Africa, Irma Stern, Rwanda, Madagascar, Rabearivelo, Ghana, Tamberma, German colonies