Questions about property and property disputes have been central to African history and African studies more broadly. Studies of a enslaved Africans trying to resist their own commodification or 20th and 21st century battles over land redistribution have long revealed how competing forms of property ownership structured African societies in the past and present. More recently, scholars with diverse backgrounds have revealed the key role that gender, global commodity chains, migration, urbanization and other local and transnational forces played in changing how people across Africa conceived of, demarcated, and managed property. This panel seeks to build on this work to discuss some of the new questions about the meaning of property and property disputes across time and space in Africa. Projects from all disciplines and time periods are welcome.
If interested please contact Gregory Valdespino (Princeton University) by email at gv5961@princtoned.edu by the end of Monday, March 28 2023.
