Category: Announcements

Announcements

Jul 25, 2020

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CELEBRATING JENNIFER DAVIS – Saturday, July 11, 11am (New York), 5 pm (South Africa)

Dear friends and colleagues of the struggle,

An online celebration of the life of Jennifer Davis was held on Saturday, July 11. Although it is sad that there will not be a gathering in person, there is a silver lining that her memorial service can now be viewed online.

This is a sad moment in history when, in the last few years, we have lost so many who were heroes in the struggle against apartheid especially in South Africa but, here in the States, Jennifer’s co-worker at ACOA/Africa Fund, Dumisani Kumalo, Immanuel Wallerstein, Ann Seidman, Sean Gervasi, and others.

Jennifer Davis Memorial Service Recording – July 11th, 2020

For more information: Jennifer-davis.org

Facebook: Remembering Jennifer Davis

Jan 15, 2018

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Association of Concerned Africa Scholars Statement on President Trump’s racist remarks

On Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2018, ACAS expresses its solidarity with people living in African countries and in the African diaspora who were so brutally disparaged in the racist remarks made by President Trump on Jan 11, 2018. As concerned scholars of Africa, with friends, colleagues, and family members in these regions, we are outraged by his bigoted, offensive, and inaccurate characterizations. Sadly, such comments from the White House have become the norm.  We demand that President Trump retract his statements and apologize for the harm he has caused.

To students and visitors who hail from the African continent and from diaspora countries, we reiterate that you are our valued friends and colleagues. Those of us who were born in the United States have a great deal to learn from you. Please continue to work with us to improve the tenor of American civic discourse and American understanding and appreciation of peoples on the African continent and in the African diaspora.

We also are dismayed at your Administrations’s plans to cut funding of UN Peacekeeping funds for more than a dozen African countries and for announced plans to cut funding for HIV-AIDS remediation in Africa as well as reducing contributions to the World Health Organization (WHO) as it coordinates research and action against Zika, Ebola, and malaria, diseases that threaten Haiti and parts of Africa as well as these United States.

Jan 31, 2017

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ACAS Statement on Presidential Executive Order No. 13769

The Association of Concerned Africa Scholars (ACAS) registers its outrage and its opposition to the Presidential Executive Order, “Protecting The Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into The United States,” issued by Donald Trump on January 27, 2017, which has cut off legal immigration and travel to the United States from three African nations: Sudan, Somalia and Libya as well as from Iran, Iraq, Syria and Yemen. This ban directly affects refugees from Somalia, Libya, Iraq, and Syria where the U.S. military actions contribute to the exodus of thousands of refugees. Ironically, this ban is directed toward refugees in a continent whose nations have opened their borders to refugees and people fleeing violence while the U.S. is closing boundaries and building walls.

This ban is an ill-advised, religiously-based attack on the rights of people from these majority Muslim nations. This unwise action will not make the U.S. safe, is in opposition to American values, and will fuel anti-American sentiment in Africa and around the world. This scatter-shot action is a threat to all refugees, to the global system of protection for refugees and other displaced people, and to the future of human rights and of U.S. democracy. In addition, this EO violates the Geneva Convention on Refugees which obliges all member states to take in those fleeing war.

In stating that he plans to favor Christian refugees, the President makes clear that this is a religion-based discrimination. Such discrimination has been condemned by many leaders of U.S. Protestant, Catholic, and Evangelical churches. It also violates the ban on government establishment of religion in the first amendment of the US Constitution as well as U.S. law that bars discrimination “in the issuance of an immigrant visa because of the person’s race, sex, nationality, place of birth or place of residence.” (8 U.S. Code § 1152).

This EO violates the most basic of humanitarian norms at the core of our democracy and puts severe burdens on families in Africa, the other affected countries, and the United States. It will have a severe impact on students and scholars who have or would have sought to have, ties and links with US institutions of higher education.

With many other organizations in the United States and around the world, we therefore call for the immediate rescinding of this executive order and a new U.S. policy to accept more of those fleeing the conflicts around the world.

ACAS  January 31 2017

Dec 05, 2013

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Salute to Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela

The Association of Concerned Africa Scholars salutes the life of a great fighter for freedom, Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela. We send our condolences to his family and to the people of South Africa. He stood unflinchingly for the achievement of fairness, equality and a social peace predicated on justice. He inspired us all with his courage and steadfast dedication to freedom for all, and we are honored to have been associated with the causes to which he dedicated his life.  Hamba gatle, Madiba.

Apr 24, 2013

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Passing of Scholar-Activist Ben Magubane

We are saddened by the passing of South African scholar Ben Magubane. Many ACAS members knew and worked with Ben as both a scholar and activist, particularly during his many years in the United States. His daughter, Zine Magubane, wrote this obituary. Also, this hour-long interview with Magubane by Cape Town historian Sean Field is available on the African Activist Archive website. Magubane discusses his activism in the United States (at 41:28 and 45:02). Magubane also recalls his impoverished childhood in and around Durban, his initial university studies, scholarship to the United States, and work and life at the University of Zambia, where he was close to Oliver (OR) Tambo and Jack Simons.

Feb 01, 2013

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Opposition to drone strikes in Africa

ACAS member Carl LeVan has posted on his blog, “Momentum Builds Against Drones in Africa,” which provides valuable reporting on the broad debate about the use of drones. LeVan also highlights a January 17 letter to President Obama from 33 organizations, including the Association of Concerned Africa Scholars, that opposes the use of drone strikes in targeting militants in Africa, arguing that “current and future military operations will harm U.S. and African interests and communities.”

Dec 12, 2012

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ACAS organizes petition to President Obama on Democratic Republic of the Congo

Today, 221 academics and scholars of Africa in the United States sent a petition to President Obama to take action to protect civilians in the conflict zone of eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The petition was released by the Association of Concerned Africa Scholars (ACAS), since 1977 a national organization of professors and other specialists on Africa.

The press release quoted Noah Zerbe, political scientist at Humboldt State University and co-chairperson of ACAS: “According to the International Rescue Committee, with more than 5 million killed in this disordered nation in the last 14 years, the conflicts there are the world’s deadliest documented conflict since WW II, yet it has not had the attention it needs.”

The scholars are calling on President Obama to take bilateral actions and actions through the United Nations to protect civilians in the conflict zone of eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Specifically, the petition calls on the President to use U.S. influence at the UN to provide the MONUC forces with the mandate and resources to protect civilians, to sanction Rwanda and Uganda for any support to militias there, to use the SEC to enforce the Dodd-Frank Act on conflict minerals, and to fully implement the “Obama Act” of 2006 on the Congolese Army for their contributions to the disorder.

Scholars who would like to join ACAS in policy-oriented research and action on this issue and other issues concerning the U.S. military role in Africa may contact David Wiley (wiley@msu.edu), chair of the ACAS Demilitarization Task Force.

Nov 19, 2012

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ACAS meetings at African Studies Association (ASA) conference – November 2012

2012 marks the 35th anniversary of the founding of the Association of Concerned Africa Scholars! ACAS is holding a strategic planning session on Wednesday, November 28 at 8:30-10:30 pm in Room 413 of the Marriott Philadelphia Downtown Hotel in Philadelphia, in conjunction with the African Studies Association (ASA) annual meeting. The ACAS annual business meeting is on Thursday, November 29 at 8:30 pm in Salon K.

ACAS and the ASA Current Issues Committee are co-sponsoring a Roundtable on Friday, November 30 at 2:30: The 2012 American Elections and their Implications for U.S.-Africa Policy, chaired by Elizabeth Schmidt

ACAS is sponsoring three panels:
IX-E-6 (Sat 8:30 am) Research Frontiers: Analyzing African Land Grabs, with Carol Thompson as Chair and Jeanne Koopman as Discussant

XI-N-27 (Sat 2:30 pm) Militarizing Africa: Historical Perspectives (Part I), Chaired by David Wiley

XII-N-28 (Sat 4:30 pm) Militarizing Africa: African Studies, AFRICOM, & Current US Security-Focused Foreign Policy (Part II), Chaired by David Wiley

Apr 24, 2012

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New teachers’ resource on Kony 2012 campaign

A resource for teachers, React and Respond: The Phenomenon of Kony 2012, is now available on the ACAS webpage Resources on Uganda, the LRA, and Central Africa. The teachers’ packet is written by Barbara Brown (Boston University Africa Studies Center), John Metzler (Michigan State University Africa Studies Center), Patrick Vinck (Program for Vulnerable Populations at Harvard Humanitarian Initiative), and Christine Root (ACAS). Please share it with social studies teachers in your community. We also have been adding other materials to this ACAS Resources page.