Frontiers of Violence in North-East Africa: Genealogies of Conflict Since C.1800
Frontiers of Violence in North-East Africa: Genealogies of Conflict Since C.1800
escarpment and lowland peripheries, stretching between the modern Eritrean Red Sea coast and the southern and eastern borderlands of present day Ethiopia. Sudanese and Somali frontiers are also examined insofar as they can be related to ethnic, political, and religious conflict, and the violent
state- and empire-building processes which have defined the region since c.1800. Reid argues that this modern warfare is not solely the product of modern political 'failure', but rather has its roots in a network of frontier zones which are both violent and creative. Such borderlands have given rise to markedly militarised political cultures which are rooted in the violence of
the nineteenth century, and which in recent decades are manifest in authoritarian systems of government. Reid thus traces the history of Amhara and Tigrayan imperialisms to the nationalist and ethnic revolutions which represented the march of volatile borderlands on the hegemonic centre. He suggests
a new interpretation of Ethiopian and Eritrean history, arguing that the key to understanding the region's turbulent present lies in an appreciation of the role of the armed, and politically fertile, frontier in its deeper past.
Author: Richard J. Reid
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Published: 05/12/2011
Pages: 296
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.40lbs
Size: 9.20h x 6.10w x 1.10d
ISBN: 9780199211883
Review Citation(s):
Choice 01/01/2012
About the Author
Dr Richard Reid currently works on the history of warfare and militarism in Africa. He previously taught at the University of Asmara in Eritrea, and at Durham University in the UK. He is the author of several books, including studies of the Kingdom of Buganda and of warfare in pre-colonial eastern Africa, and a history of Africa in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Dr Reid has also published numerous articles on various aspects of war and militarism in east and northeast Africa, particularly Eritrea and Ethiopia.
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