Surfing the sublime – on leisure and warfare
Robertsport, Liberia 2017 Preamble: My desk is facing the beach and ocean. I am currently on the small Indonesian island of Sumba, and my Californian neighbour is hitting…
Author: Mats Utas
Photography and travel
No, you can’t! My wife has just politely asked if she can take a picture of a mural in a Korean restaurant we pass in Vietnam’s capital, Hanoi.…
Functional multilingualism and the use of standard languages, by Bo Utas
With a description of the complex linguistic situation that characterized my father’s native village in the Ukraine as a starting point, I will try to demonstrate the multifarious…
“From Zero to Hero”: The life of Sierra Leonean football players in Scandinavia, by Zora Šašková
Community league game in Lunsar, Port Loko District “Is Foday back home?” I asked Erik, a former Danish Superliga coach and owner of a second division club in…
The making of a market: politicising gangs in Sierra Leone, by Kars de Bruijne
The back of a clique member By January 2019, politicians were recruiting gang members once again, nearly a year after the Sierra Leone elections. They were asked to…
Are Sierra Leone’s gangs a new phenomenon? by Kars de Bruijne
MOB – Members of Blood together with 103 a constituency number is an indication of the politics and gangs nexus – photo by the author One Friday afternoon,…
Development for somebody else, by Alexander Öbom
Motorcycle-taxi driving: one of few new jobs in Kisoro district. Drivers often rent their vehicle from someone else, who can afford to buy it. Alexander Öbom graduated from…
Africa Today: The Legacies of Colonialism, by Henrietta Ezegbe
I960 often referred to as “The year of Africa” symbolized emancipation and a new dawn for the African continent. The Independence movement spread through the continent like wild…
Philanthrocapitalism a means to Soft Power in Global Health, by Henrietta Ezegbe
In this era of global rise in charity spending, and dependence on donor aid particularly in the spheres of global health by developing nations, It is interesting to…
Freetown – tangible progress, by Mats Utas
Kushe-o (hello) – entering Eastern parts of Freetown in the late afternoon New roads and through fares, broadened streets, less traffic congestion, paved streets, a toll road making…
The ruins of a mining economy, by Danny Hoffman
Still from the film Uppland Around the 23-minute mark in the short film, Uppland, an unidentified voice speaks over a series of historical images of Yekepa, Liberia. Male…
Sierra Leone’s laws to protect women have unintended consequences, by Luisa Schneider
Age-of-consent law is complex. If it is set too high, there’s a risk that it will undercut young people’s agency. If it is set too low, it does…
In between homes – the in-between existence of refugees in transit in Eastleigh, Nairobi, by Lena Johansson (master student at Uppsala University)
Eastleigh shop in 2009 soon after Obama became US president. Photo by Mats Utas Eastleigh, Nairobi is pictured as a good area for Somali refugees in media and…
Congosa politics: Rumours and elections in Sierra Leone, by Diana Szanto
The red party. APC political rally in Freetown Congosa in Krio means gossiping and spreading rumour, but its connotations are much darker than in English. It equals with name…
Elective Affinities: Fragility and Injustice in the Field, by Luisa Enria
2017 They say they can’t tell if I have malaria or not, maybe it’s something else. “Just lie down, try the drip, and see if it helps”. I…
Can you imagine? Reflections on the SL elections and implications for penal policy and practice, by Andrew Jefferson and Luisa Schneider
Sierra Leone has a new president. And despite being challenged prior to the elections, the two party-system dominated once again. After two five-year terms under Ernest Bai Koroma…
Sierra Leone General Elections 2018 – A personal diary, by Diana Szanto
On the 4th of April, I was sitting on the veranda of a restaurant in Lungi and watched mesmerized the police officer next to me who, in his…
Urban kinship: the micro-politics of proximity and relatedness in African cities, by Jesper Bjarnesen and Mats Utas
It is our pleasure and privilege to introduce a special issue of Africa, exploring the micro-politics of proximity and relatedness in six African cities. To understand how social…
Fragile Security or Fatale Liaisons? Reflections on 2 March 2018 Attacks in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, by Sten Hagberg
On Friday 2 March 2018 around 10 o’clock, two coordinated of terrorist attacks took place in Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso. The first attack involved gunmen seeking…
Jostling for power: Sierra Leone’s election runoff, by Luisa Enria and Jamie Hitchen
After six days of patiently waiting, during which 25% increments of Sierra Leone’s 7 March presidential vote were gradually released, on the evening of 13 March, chair of…
Generation Terrorists: The Politics of Youth and the Gangs of Freetown, by Kieran Mitton
Youth at Risk – Youth as Risk On the evening of the 15th February, six leading presidential candidates for the Sierra Leone presidential elections took to the stage.…
The legacy of Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Why ‘great aspiration’ is not quite enough, by Leena Vastapuu and Maria Martin de Almagro
The first elected woman head of state in Africa, President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, has just stepped down from her office in Liberia. Her successor George Weah assumed the position…
The myth of the trickle-down effect: What Guinea’s recent upheavals intimate about the country, by Joschka Philipps
The dry season’s dust has again settled on Conakry’s streets, aside from a few marks of ashes and rubble on the sides of the main avenues, everything seems…
The New Gambia, by Niklas Hultin
President Adama Barrow greeting the people. Photo by Katarina Höije It finally became clear on January 21, 2017, that Yahya Jammeh, the long-serving autocratic president of The Gambia…