Africa: a modern history Guy Arnold (Atlantic Books, £35 hb) ISBN 1843541750 The state of Africa Martin Meredith (The Free Press, £12.99 pb) ISBN 0743232216 Africa since independence Paul Nugent (Palgrave, ?27.70) ISBN 0333682734 Histories of the hanged David Anderson (Phoenix, £10.99 pb) ISBN 039332754X Britain’s gulag Caroline Elkins (Pimlico, £8.99 pb) ISBN 1844135489 Africa, … Read more
KEARNEY, Mother Kevin (1875–1957), missionary sister, was born on 28 April 1875 in Knockenrahan, Arklow, Co. Wicklow, the third and youngest daughter of Michael Kearney, farmer, and Teresa Kearney (née Grennell); she was baptised Mary Teresa. Her father died before her birth, and after her mother’s death in 1885 she was reared by her maternal … Read more
The Oxford English Dictionary defines the term ‘miasma’ as ‘infectious or noxious exhalations from putrescent organic matter; poisonous particles or germs floating in and polluting the atmosphere’. Before the later nineteenth-century scientific discoveries of Pasteur, Lister and Koch established the germ origin of infection, many medical practitioners believed that the environment was responsible for the … Read more
Dr R. E. G. Armattoe was a man of many talents—a medical doctor, anthropologist, writer of prose and poetry, and, towards the end of his life, a budding politician. Although born and raised in Africa and receiving most of his tertiary education in Germany and France, Armattoe spent over a decade working in Northern Ireland. … Read more
The British empire balks large in Irish history and the Irish experience but is one of such ambivalence that it rarely gets examined in a thoughtful and systematic fashion. The ‘Studies in Imperialism’ series has provided Keith Jeffrey with an opportunity to start filling in this gaping hole. His introduction, nuanced around whether Ireland’s role … Read more