Mahmood Mamdani (b. 1947 in
KampalaKampala is the largest city and capital of Uganda. The city is divided into five boroughs that oversee local planning: Kampala Central, Kawempe Division, Makindye Division, Nakawa Division and Lubaga Division...
,
UgandaThe Republic of Uganda is a landlocked country in East Africa. It is bordered on the east by Kenya, on the north by Sudan, on the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, on the southwest by Rwanda, and on the south by Tanzania...
) is the Herbert Lehman Professor of Government in the Departments of Anthropology and Political Science at
Columbia UniversityColumbia University in the City of New York is a private university in the United States and a member of the Ivy League. Columbia's main campus lies in the Morningside Heights neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan, in New York City...
in the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. He is also the Director of Columbia's Institute of African Studies. He is a former President of the Council for Development of Social Research in Africa (CODESRIA)
DakarDakar is the capital city of Senegal, located on the Cape Verde Peninsula, on the country's Atlantic coast. It is Senegal's largest city. Its position, on the western edge of Africa , is an advantageous departure point for trans-Atlantic and European trade; this fact aided its growth into a major...
,
SenegalSenegal , officially the Republic of Senegal, is a country south of the Sénégal River in western Africa. Senegal is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Mauritania to the north, Mali to the east, and Guinea and Guinea-Bissau to the south, and it also encircles The Gambia on its three sides,...
.
Mamdani's reputation as an expert in African history, politics and international relations has made him an important voice in contemporary debates about Africa.
Mahmood Mamdani (b. 1947 in
KampalaKampala is the largest city and capital of Uganda. The city is divided into five boroughs that oversee local planning: Kampala Central, Kawempe Division, Makindye Division, Nakawa Division and Lubaga Division...
,
UgandaThe Republic of Uganda is a landlocked country in East Africa. It is bordered on the east by Kenya, on the north by Sudan, on the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, on the southwest by Rwanda, and on the south by Tanzania...
) is the Herbert Lehman Professor of Government in the Departments of Anthropology and Political Science at
Columbia UniversityColumbia University in the City of New York is a private university in the United States and a member of the Ivy League. Columbia's main campus lies in the Morningside Heights neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan, in New York City...
in the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. He is also the Director of Columbia's Institute of African Studies. He is a former President of the Council for Development of Social Research in Africa (CODESRIA)
DakarDakar is the capital city of Senegal, located on the Cape Verde Peninsula, on the country's Atlantic coast. It is Senegal's largest city. Its position, on the western edge of Africa , is an advantageous departure point for trans-Atlantic and European trade; this fact aided its growth into a major...
,
SenegalSenegal , officially the Republic of Senegal, is a country south of the Sénégal River in western Africa. Senegal is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Mauritania to the north, Mali to the east, and Guinea and Guinea-Bissau to the south, and it also encircles The Gambia on its three sides,...
.
Mamdani's reputation as an expert in African history, politics and international relations has made him an important voice in contemporary debates about Africa. His book
Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism won the 1998 Herskovits Award of the
African Studies AssociationThe African Studies Association is an association of scholars and professionals in the United States and Canada with an interest in the continent of Africa. Started in 1957, the ASA is the leading organization of African Studies in North America. The associations headquarters are Rutgers...
of the USA.
In 2001, he was one of nine scholars to present at the Nobel Peace Prize Centennial Symposium. He has been named as one of the top 100 public intellectuals in the world by the US magazine
Foreign PolicyForeign Policy is a bimonthly American magazine founded in 1970 by Samuel P. Huntington and Warren Demian Manshel. Under the stewardship of editor-in-chief Moises Naim, Foreign Policy evolved from an academic quarterly in the 1990s to a bimonthly glossy, winning the 2009, 2007, and 2003 National...
in May 2008 and the UK magazine
ProspectProspect is a monthly British general interest magazine, specialising in politics and current affairs. Frequent topics include British, European, and US politics, social issues, art, literature, cinema, science, the media, history, philosophy, and psychology...
in July 2008
http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=10261.
Early life and background
Mamdani was born a third-generation
East AfricanEast African may refer to:*Any person or object of, or pertaining to, East Africa*East African Airlines, an airline based in Kampala, Uganda*East African Safari Air, a now defunct airline based in Kenya*The EastAfrican, a weekly newspaper in East Africa...
of
South AsiaSouth Asia, also known as Southern Asia, is the southern region of the Asian continent, which comprises the sub-Himalayan countries and, for some authorities , also includes the adjoining countries on the west and the east...
n origin. Upon Uganda's independence from Britain in 1962, Mamdani was offered a scholarship by the United States government. He attended the
University of PittsburghThe University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...
, receiving a B.A. in 1967. He went on to get an M.A. and A.A.L.D. at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy,
Tufts UniversityTufts University is a private research university in Medford/Somerville, near Boston, Massachusetts, USA. The university is home to the nation's oldest graduate school of international relations, The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy....
in 1969. Mamdani studied for his Ph.D. at Harvard, where he led graduate students in a strike to protest a tuition hike. He received his doctorate in 1974.
Career
He returned to Uganda, only to be forced to leave the country by dictator
Idi AminIdi Amin Dada , commonly known as Idi Amin, was the military dictator and President of Uganda from 1971 to 1979....
. Amin deported Indians and confiscated their property, (see:
Expulsion of Asians in Uganda in 1972On 4 August 1972, Idi Amin, President of Uganda, gave Uganda's Asians 90 days to leave the country, following an alleged dream in which, he claimed, God told him to expel them....
). Mamdani lived as a refugee in Britain before obtaining a position at the
University of Dar es SalaamThe University of Dar es Salaam is a university in the Tanzanian city of Dar es Salaam. The university was born out of a decision taken in 1970 to split the then University of East Africa into three independent universities; Makerere University , University of Nairobi and University of Dar es...
, in
TanzaniaThe United Republic of Tanzania is a country in central East Africa bordered by Kenya and Uganda to the north, Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west, and Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique to the south. The country's eastern borders lie on the Indian Ocean.The United...
.
He returned to Uganda when Amin was overthrown and
Milton OboteApolo Milton Obote , Prime Minister of Uganda from 1962 to 1966 and President of Uganda from 1966 to 1971 and from 1980 to 1985, was a Ugandan political leader who led Uganda to independence from the British colonial administration in 1962. He ruled by harassing, terrorizing, and torturing...
returned to power. In the following years, Mamdani was involved in adult literacy programs and political activities among railway workers and started working at the
Makerere UniversityMakerere University, Uganda's largest university, was first established as a technical school in 1922, and in 1963 it became the University of East Africa, offering courses leading to general degrees of the University of London...
in Kampala.
Mamdani's political activism continues with his support of
Disinvestment from IsraelDisinvestment from Israel is a campaign conducted by religious and political entities which aims to use disinvestment to pressure the government of Israel to put "an end to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories captured during the 1967 military campaign." The disinvestment campaign is...
.
His wife is the film director
Mira NairMira Nair is an Indian film director and producer based in New York. Her production company is Mirabai Films.She was educated at Delhi University and Harvard University. Her debut feature film, Salaam Bombay! , won the Golden Camera award at the Cannes Film Festival and also earned the nomination...
. They have a son, Zohran.
Besides English, he speaks
FrenchFrench is a Romance language globally spoken by about 65 million people as a first language , by 50 million as a second language, and by about another 200 million people as an acquired foreign language, with significant speakers in 57 countries. Most native speakers of the language live in France,...
,
GullahThe Gullah are African Americans who live in the Low Country region of South Carolina and Georgia, which includes both the coastal plain and the Sea Islands...
,
GujaratiGujarati is an Indo-Aryan language, and part of the greater Indo-European language family...
,
HindiStandard Hindi, also known as High Hindi, Nagari Hindi or Literary Hindi is a standardised register of Hindi. It is one of the 22 languages with official status in India, and is used, along with English, for administration of the central government.Standard Hindi is a sanskritised register derived...
, Luganda,
PunjabiPunjabi or Panjabi is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by inhabitants of the historical Punjab region ....
, Swahili, and
UrduUrdu is a Central Indo-Aryan language of the Indo-Iranian branch, belonging to the Indo-European family of languages. It is one of the two official languages of Pakistan. It is also one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of five Indian states...
. His lecturing experience includes the University of Dar-es-Salaam (1973-79), Makerere University (1980-93), and University of
Cape TownCape Town is the second most populous city in South Africa, and the largest in land area, forming part of the City of Cape Town metropolitan municipality. It is the provincial capital of the Western Cape, as well as the legislative capital of South Africa, where the National Parliament and many...
(1996-99). Mamdani was also the founding director of Centre for Basic Research in
KampalaKampala is the largest city and capital of Uganda. The city is divided into five boroughs that oversee local planning: Kampala Central, Kawempe Division, Makindye Division, Nakawa Division and Lubaga Division...
, Uganda (1987-96).
In recent years he has criticized the
Save Darfur CoalitionThe Save Darfur Coalition is a U.S.-based advocacy group calling for international intervention in the Darfur conflict in the Eastern African state of Sudan...
as ahistorical and dishonest, and argues that the conflict in
DarfurDarfur is a region in Sudan. An independent sultanate for several hundred years, it was incorporated into Sudan by Anglo-Egyptian forces. The region is divided into three federal states: West Darfur, South Darfur, and North Darfur which are coordinated by a Transitional Darfur Regional Authority...
is more about land, power, and the environment than it is directly about race.
. He also wrote and article for the
London Review of BooksThe London Review of Books is a fortnightly British literary and political magazine.The LRB was founded in 1979 during the year-long lock-out at The Times...
on
ZimbabweZimbabwe , is a landlocked country located in the southern part of the continent of Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo rivers...
and
Robert MugabeRobert Gabriel Karigamombe Mugabe is the current President of Zimbabwe.He has held power as the head of government since 1980, as Prime Minister from 1980 to 1987, and as the first executive head of state since 1987...
, that while condemnining his human rights record, criticized the narrow focus on Mugabe as being solely responsible for Zimbabwes economic problems.
Selected published works
- From Citizen to Refugee (Francis Pinter Ltd., 1973)
- Myth of Population Control. (Monthly Review Press, 1973)
- Politics and Class Formation in Uganda. (Monthly Review Press, 1976).
- Imperialism and Fascism in Uganda. (Africa World Press, Inc., 1983).
- And Fire Does not Always Beget Ash: Critical Reflections on the NRM. (1996).
- Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism. (Princeton University Press
The Princeton University Press is an independent publisher with close connections to Princeton University. Its mission is to disseminate scholarship within academia and society at large....
, 1996).
- Crisis and Reconstruction -- African Perspectives: Two Lectures (with Colin Leys). (Nordiska Afrikainsinstutet, 1998).
- Beyond Rights Talk and Culture Talk: Comparative essays on Rights and Culture. ed. (St. Martin's Press, 2000).
- Council for the Development of Social Research in Africa (CODESRIA) in Dakar, Senegal. December 14-18, 1998, page 2
- Report of the CODESRIA Mission to the Democratic Republic of Congo. September, 1997. Text of report submitted to the General Assembly of the United Nations
- When Does a Settler Become a Native? Reflections of the Colonial Roots of Citizenship in Equatorial and South Africa. Text of Inaugural Lecture as A. C. Jordan Professor of African Studies, University of Cape Town, Lecture Theatre 1, Education Building, Middle Campus, Wednesday 13 May 1998, 8.15 p.m.
- When Victims Become Killers: Colonialism, Nativism, and Genocide in Rwanda. (Princeton Univ. Press, 2001).
- Good Muslim Bad Muslim: America, The Cold War, and the Roots of Terror. (New York: Pantheon/Random House, 2004).
- Saviors and Survivors: Darfur, Politics, and the War on Terror. (Pantheon, 2009)
Selected articles
External links
Interviews
- "You (and I) got Darfur Wrong" - radio interview with Watson Institute's Radio Open Source, April 3rd, 2009
- "Politics and humanitarianism" - an interview with the Boston Globe, March 22, 2009
- Video Interview with PBS's Wide Angle
Wide Angle is the debut studio album by British breakbeat trance producers Hybrid, and was re-released in 2000 as a double-CD edition entitled Wider Angle...
, episode "Underground Zimbabwe", February 11th, 2009
Audio
Other