Talk:History of Africa

Medieval and modern era

Is it worth expanding this section a bit to summarise the main article Medieval and early modern Africa?

At the moment I do think this section is very bare and I don't think its content is logical or broad enough, I find the paragraph on the Xhosa, whilst excluding all other ethnic groups, very strange Alexanderkowal (talk) 18:22, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

And possibly even separating it into two sections, Medieval era (CE 500-1500) and Early modern era (1500-1800), as there's just so much content that I imagine would be difficult to summarise without either ignoring the difference in pace of state formation/centralisation between and within regions or ignoring some regions. Alexanderkowal (talk) 18:41, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

with only ancient period and ignoring historiography section, 6000 words Alexanderkowal (talk) 12:27, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

Copying from other pages

Just putting it here that most of what I've written is copied from other pages, I know I should credit that in the edit summary but I forget. Alexanderkowal (talk) 19:17, 28 April 2024 (UTC)

Remove too many links warning?

After reading over the article I wanted to ask if the too many links warning should be removed which I think it should since it seems to have a necessary amount of links. Wastelandhero18 (talk) 18:46, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

I support the removal of that warning. Masterhatch (talk) 21:36, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

Tbf when that was put there was one big paragraph of links, it's now better organised but the policy seems ambiguous. I do think the current version is necessary and not a huge eyesore Alexanderkowal (talk) 22:05, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

Ok I'll remove it. Wastelandhero18 (talk) 03:09, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Btw if anyone wants to add anymore to it feel free, I'd like to add another Madagascan one but they're talked about on the pages of ethnic groups rather than having their own page Alexanderkowal (talk) 22:07, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

Image

The map at the top of this article ignores, at least, Madagascar's successive pre-colonial states. ꧁Zanahary꧂ (talk) 20:32, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

I know, the map is very biased, I put Merina in the description but it’s still not great. It needs to be edited to include more kingdoms from central, east, and southern africa Alexanderkowal (talk) 22:25, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Is there a way to request editing/creation on Commons? I'd be willing to put together a list of kingdoms and compile some other relevant maps to guide the creation. ꧁Zanahary꧂ (talk) 22:27, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

There should be but idk, if there isn’t it might be worth messaging people who have made maps of African kingdoms in the past and nicely asking if they would be interested in making a big one for the main African history page? Idm doing this? Alexanderkowal (talk) 08:31, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

I did a request at Commons and pinged you, dk if it worked Alexanderkowal (talk) 12:53, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

Update

Hi, sorry about the slow progress, there’s been very little work done on a modern general history of Africa and I’m still learning African history as I go. I’m on west Africa at the moment, about half way through, and have a skeleton for east Africa. I need to learn more about oral tradition before going much further so I’ve bought Vansina’s book and plan to edit oral tradition as I learn. If anyone has any expertise or knowledge of sources regarding the empty sections please provide them below, people are welcome to help. What I’m doing might be too ambitious idk Alexanderkowal (talk) 22:33, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Don't apologize! Wikipedia is collaborative :) the work you're doing is amazing. I will contribute to Madagascar's sections down the line. ꧁Zanahary꧂ (talk) 22:38, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Nothing wrong with the content you want to add, it's just, for the place where the blank sections were, not there. One blank section, maybe just saying "sub-Saharan Africa" with an empty section template, would suffice — we don't need ten different empty sections which aren't properly formatted to be present when just one is enough of a line between reader usability and invitefulness to edit said section. All the necessary information to add is additionally already on the main article, Medieval and early modern Africa, so we don't necessarily need to write a whole new large block of text in this article (which is already too long at ~11,500 words) when we can simply summarize that article. Flemmish Nietzsche (talk) 22:44, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

What if we had those sections and had for northern Great Lakes for example {main|Empire of Kitara|Kingdom of Rwanda|Busoga|Nkore|Buganda etc. so that the reader can still read about the region in that time period? Alexanderkowal (talk) 08:28, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

I want to delete and rewrite the Historiography section so it’s only a couple medium paragraphs, page length is an issue though, the post classical section for North Africa will be by far the longest because that period of history was utter turmoil Alexanderkowal (talk) 08:47, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

I think the goal for this page is to have a history of africa where readers can trace the threads of african history from ancient times to the various colonies and modern day countries, I think the post colonial section should probably be quite short, and the colonial section just cover the conquests and the various rebellions, with a couple sentences on colonial rule from the african perspective, and then an overview of the independence wars. I like the tone of the current colonial section Alexanderkowal (talk) 11:46, 11 June 2024 (UTC)