Module summary

This module was aimed at going further into the question of the history of Africa since the origins until contemporary period.

Africa, considered by many authors a continent without history because it greatly lacks written sources, is unquestionably the cradle of humanity: it is on that continent that humanisation has gone through the longest and the most constant evolution ever known in the world.

In spite of these prejudices about the history of Africa, Mediterranean Africa, in particular Egypt developed a brilliant civilisation before the advent of Islam. It is the same for Western and Sudanese Africa with the empires of Ghana, Mali, Songhaï, etc.

Central, Eastern and Southern Africa, mainly inhabited by Bantu-speaking people set up socio-political organisations worthy of interest: the kingdoms of Kongo, Zimbabwe, Monomotapa, sacred monarchies of the Great Lakes Region which, since the 18^th  century fostered relations with the Arabs living along the coasts of the Indian Ocean.

Between the 16^th and the 19^th centuries, Black Africa and the West had several relationships: Europeans came on the African coasts to buy, almost for free, slaves that they sold in America and in the Caribbean.

Madagascar, an island in the Indian Ocean which separated from Africa during the Tertiary, was inhabited by people both from Africa and Asia. From the 16^th century, various ethnic groups which lived on this island were subjected to the Merina hegemony which is the core of a civilisation based on a political and linguistic unity, on flooded field rice growing and ancestor worship.

The second part of this module evoked the colonial period. After the exploratory expeditions and the dividing up of Africa which the principles were discussed at the conference of Berlin, the Africans tried to resist the European penetration, but in vain. From 1630s, the colonial domination begtan and Africa knew profound transformations in the political, economic, social and cultural domains.

The participation of the Africans in both world wars had consequence that the colonisation was challenged little by little, not only by African nationalists, but also by the great powers and the UNO so that the African independences were granted to the various States around 1960.

Very quickly the young States were confronted with diverse political problems and did not manage to begain an economic growth, because they are always dependent on the outside world.