Fully illustrated with photos, maps, and illustrations, here is an essential guide to over 30 of Africa's most populous and well-known ethnic groups.

Fully illustrated with photos, maps, and illustrations, here is an essential guide to over 30 of Africa's most populous and well-known ethnic groups.

For over hundred and fifty years, a new King was hidden away, a boy never seen by even his people and raised by two different groups of protectors chosen by the ancestors. This King would be the first of his line to protect his people. This was the first King to ever wear and use iShaka or Zudium in Western terms and born of man and a god. This half man, half god King was to be tested and prepared for the first contact with monsters from across the seas or simply Europeans, preparing his successor's path even better. Born of Shaka and a daughter of a farmer whose name remains a secret, Zett for Zulu or traditionally known as Shaka Zulu, uMkhuseli ka Zulu, son of Shaka ka Nguni, the protector of the Heaven People, both in heaven and on Earth, achieved immortality through the teachings of his protectors, something his father, Shaka ka Nguni did not have enough time to learn. During this time, the Heaven People were going through a very difficult time of their lives as they had killed their protector for power. This was because of lack of unity from within the African people. The enemy divided them and conquered. Many other African people were already slaves as Europeans or monsters like their prophecies foretold, had made contact with them hundreds of years before they met any of the Nguni people or the last of his kind, Zulus. At the time monsters landed on the shores of Africa, African people had customs and ways of life that were very precious. They could not even share their knowledge with other African people, especially ones speaking a different language or from a different tribe. They were very secretive about their knowledge that they did not share it in ways that could lead it into the wrong hands. Some cultures such as the Xhosas and Zulus, still try as hard as they can to keep what they do to young men in the mountains, a secret. This knowledge is verbally passed down only to or between those who make it to the mountain.

The peoples of Africa are neither ethnically, culturally, nor religiously homogeneous. European colonial powers took little note of this reality in carving up the continent, a fact reflected in the periodic outbreak of civil war since decolonialization. Likewise, Western European models of development, whether in their liberal or Marxist manifestations, have so far failed to meet African development needs. The path to stability in Africa is through its people's character and goals. Almanac of African Peoples and Nations provides an essential guide to the major ethnic groups of the African continent, highlighting the major contributions and basic features of each.The Almanac reviews Africa's language families and their respective national and geographic concentrations, explaining ethnic classification based on linguistic difference and including language groups that are not indigenous to Africa. The major African peoples are then listed by country with a statistical breakdown on their respective shares in the total population of each country and maps indicating their concentration. The major section of the volume includes a comprehensive listing and descriptive profile of each ethnic, national, and tribal group detailing their history, customs, economic systems, and political and social organizations. The Almanac points out as well which groups support revisionist political aspirations and shows the internal and external pressures they are subject to. Yakan notes that African societies are not highly integrated and must support multitudes of influential sub-cultures with conflicting agendas and loyalties. Arguing that tribalism reflects Africa's historical experience and cultural heritage, he sees the resolution of the continent's problems in consociational democracy, proportional representation, federalism, or some form of autonomous rule.

This is the first full-length study of South African English youth literature to cover the entire period of its publication, from the late nineteenth century to the early twenty-first century. Jenkins' book focuses on what made the subsequent literature essentially South African and what aspects of the country and its society authors concentrated on. What gives this book particular strength is its coverage of literature up to the 1960s, which has until now received almost no scholarly attention. Not only is this earlier literature a rewarding subject for study in itself, but it also throws light on subsequent literary developments. Another exceptional feature is that the book follows the author’s previous work in placing children’s literature in the context of adult South African literature and South African cultural history (e.g. cinema). He also makes enlightening comparisons with American, Canadian and Australian children’s literature.