tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/timbuktu-17315/articlesTimbuktu – The Conversation2022-03-29T16:12:23Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1797722022-03-29T16:12:23Z2022-03-29T16:12:23ZTimbuktu manuscripts placed online are only a sliver of West Africa’s ancient archive<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/453620/original/file-20220322-15-1bnaz2q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">MICHELE CATTANI/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The ancient <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-60689699">Timbuktu</a> manuscripts of Mali were back in the headlines following internet giant Google’s initiative to host <a href="https://artsandculture.google.com/experiment/the-timbuktu-manuscripts/BQE6pL2U3Qsu2A">a collection</a> of them at an online gallery. The images of the documents, text in Arabic, can be found at a page called <a href="https://artsandculture.google.com/project/mali-heritage">Mali Magic</a>. </p>
<p>No place in West Africa has attracted more attention and resources than the city that has always captivated the imagination of the outside world, Timbuktu. There have been documentaries and books, academic studies and a renewed public interest since some of Timbuktu’s <a href="https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/119/">world heritage status</a> buildings were damaged in <a href="https://www.icc-cpi.int/mali/al-mahdi">attacks</a> in 2012. The manuscripts, themselves, some reputed to date as early as the 1400s, were threatened and the international community responded.</p>
<p>While Mali Magic displays 45 very photogenic manuscripts from one private library, the site doesn’t begin to tell the full story of the wealth of West Africa’s manuscripts that are found from the Atlantic to Lake Chad. </p>
<p>But thanks to decades of scholarship and, recently, digitisation, that information is now accessible at a bilingual, open-access, online union catalogue of nearly 80,000 manuscripts at the <a href="https://waamd.lib.berkeley.edu/">West African Arabic Manuscript Database</a>. This is a resource I began 30 years ago at the University of Illinois that now provides students access to most of the titles and authors that make up West Africa’s manuscript culture. </p>
<p>It’s at this website that one can access the archive of an association of 35 private Timbuktu manuscript libraries – called <a href="https://www.savamadci.net/61+message-from-the-president.html">SAVAMA-DCI</a>. The association has been working with universities on three continents to secure and record, now digitally, their Arabic and Arabic-script manuscripts.</p>
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<p>The West African Arabic Manuscript Database provides an even bigger picture. It is a comprehensive inventory of over 100 public and private West African manuscript libraries. In it, we find one-third of all extant manuscripts with known authors (314 titles), written by 204 scholars, one-quarter of them from West Africa. Most of these manuscripts come from the 1800s, but have very deep historical roots. </p>
<p>The full story of West Africa’s manuscript culture and Islamic learning centres will finally be known when the attention that is lavished on Timbuktu’s manuscripts is also given to libraries in neighbouring Mauritania, Niger and Nigeria. But we already know a good deal.</p>
<h2>Centres of learning</h2>
<p>Earliest contact between North Africa and Timbuktu focused on West Africa’s gold trade. This commerce also brought Islamic teachings across the Sahara Desert. The first reference to manuscripts in Timbuktu was in the 1400s, contributing to the mystique that has always enveloped the city as a centre of Islamic education. </p>
<p>In fact, Timbuktu was only one of several southern Saharan towns that attracted scholars and offered Islamic learning. In the 1500s, what is called Timbuktu’s ‘<a href="https://medium.com/@elhadjdjitteye/the-golden-age-of-timbuktu-b4daecce33f0">Golden Age</a>’, its famous scholars were known across North Africa. </p>
<p>That period waned, but Arabic learning revived again in the 1800s across West Africa in the wake of several Islamic reform movements that stretched from today’s Guinea and the Senegal River Valley to Northern Nigeria. Today’s older manuscripts in West Africa mainly date from this period.</p>
<p>With the decline of scholarship in Timbuktu in the 1600s, Islamic learning emerged in nomadic centres to the west (in today’s Mauritania). There’s also a national collection of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/jul/27/mauritania-heritage-books-libraries">manuscripts</a> in Mauritania that is based on the contents of 80-odd private libraries. They give us a good idea of what was traditionally found in manuscript libraries.</p>
<h2>What’s in West Africa’s manuscripts?</h2>
<p>The exact subject matter in each of the categories would vary somewhat from one library to the next. But the dominant subject – legal writing – tended to account for one-quarter to one-third of all the manuscripts. </p>
<p>West Africa’s manuscript culture evolved, for the most part, outside any state system. In the absence of a central authority, juridical matters were dispensed by local legal scholars who could cite precedent, case law, to resolve thorny problems. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454189/original/file-20220324-19-pi9vx5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A black and white aerial photo of a square structure, some under roof but mostly an open courtyard with a pyramid-like shrine in the centre." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454189/original/file-20220324-19-pi9vx5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454189/original/file-20220324-19-pi9vx5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454189/original/file-20220324-19-pi9vx5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454189/original/file-20220324-19-pi9vx5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454189/original/file-20220324-19-pi9vx5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=761&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454189/original/file-20220324-19-pi9vx5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=761&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454189/original/file-20220324-19-pi9vx5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=761&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Traditional mosque in the Timbuktu area.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo by Michel HUET/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images</span></span>
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<p>The next most important subject in the manuscripts deals with the Prophet Muhammad, mainly biographical and devotional writing. The ratios of manuscripts dealing with mysticism (Sufism); the Qur’an (including copies of the Holy Book) especially recitation styles; Arabic language (lexicology, syntax, prosody, pre-Islamic poetry); and theology vary, each subject accounting for 7% to 13% of the manuscripts in most libraries.</p>
<p>Locally-written poetry and literature is generally the smallest slice of manuscripts, albeit – with correspondence – some of the most interesting. Oddly, the subject of history, like geography, is almost entirely ignored in many collections. </p>
<p>This reminds us, that Arabic and by extension, Arabic script was at base a religious language used for religious purposes, and its use for secular subjects was not common.</p>
<h2>The power of the Arabic alphabet</h2>
<p>More significant than these Islamic sciences, or disciplines, are the uses to which the Arabic alphabet was applied across West Africa. Arabic uses a phonetic alphabet; each letter always produces the same sound. What this means is that the Arabic script can be used to write any language. </p>
<p>To explain the Arabic of the Qur’an, teachers frequently translated key words into the students’ African language (written in Arabic script). Many West African manuscripts that were used in teaching show these interlineal insertions. From this practice it was an easy step to write classic legends, or memory aids, or poetry in African languages – all in Arabic script.</p>
<p>The name this writing is given in Arabic is “`ajamī” (writing in a foreign language). These manuscripts make up about 15% of most collections in West Africa today.</p>
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<p>In some areas, whole Arabic books are available in `ajamī form. The African languages that have been adapted to Arabic script are many, including: Fulfulde, Soninké, Wolof, Hausa, Bambara, Yoruba, and the colloquial Arabic spoken in Mauritania, Hasaniyya. </p>
<p>In recent times, `ajami writing has been increasingly used, but in historic manuscripts its use tended to focus on traditional healing methods, the properties of plants, the occult sciences and poetry.</p>
<h2>More to come</h2>
<p>Google’s new online library is drawn from the collection of SAVAMA-DCI’s director, Abdel Kader Haidara. In 2013, he entered a partnership with the Hill Museum and Manuscript Library, based in Minnesota, US, to digitise his and 23 other family libraries in Timbuktu. </p>
<p>This is a bigger project that will eventually make available 242,000 manuscripts freely, online, complete with the scholarly apparatus and search capacity necessary for their scientific use. </p>
<p>Additional plans call for that project to include libraries at the town’s three main mosques, and Mali’s other centre of Islamic culture, Djenné. Already, over <a href="https://hmml.org/collections/repositories/islamic-repositories/">15,000 manuscripts</a> are accessible for scholars. Opening these manuscripts to scholars around the world to learn about the intellectual life in Africa before colonial rule promises to help re-balance the continent’s place in world history.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/179772/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Charles C. Stewart does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Opening these libraries up promises to re-balance the continent’s place in world history when it comes to its intellectual life.Charles C. Stewart, Professor emeritus, University of Illinois at Urbana-ChampaignLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1703752021-10-25T13:20:50Z2021-10-25T13:20:50ZFrance has started withdrawing its troops from Mali: what is it leaving behind?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/427737/original/file-20211021-17-1lscrtr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Soldiers from the French Army in Mali. The withdrawal of troops has begun.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo by Michele Cattani/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>France has <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/africa/20211014-french-forces-begin-northern-mali-drawdown-the-idea-is-not-to-create-a-vacuum">begun withdrawing its troops</a> from northern Mali as part of plans to reorganise its anti-insurgent forces deployed in the Sahel region under Operation Barkhane. French army bases in Kidal, Tessalit and Timbuktu will be closed by the end of the year and handed over to the Malian army. Air support will be maintained. But the current contingent of 5,100 French troops will be reduced to roughly 3,000. Adejuwon Soyinka asked Mady Ibrahim Kanté to explain the significance of the changes.</em></p>
<h2>What has changed since France first intervened in 2013?</h2>
<p>France intervened in Mali in 2013, <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/20130111-france-hollande-prepared-intervene-mali-islamists-un-military-au">“following the request”</a> from the transitional government of President Dioncounda Traore to help combat terrorism. At the time, the then French President François Hollande declared that the objective of intervention was to <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/french-troops-help-drive-back-mali-rebels-20130112">“fight against terrorism”</a>.</p>
<p>The declared intention was to deploy French troops in Mali alongside the Malian army to stop Islamist forces going to the south. But it could be argued that the strategic objective of the intervention was the protection of French security and economic interests in the Sahel and West African region. </p>
<p>The initial focus was on the interior of Mali. But the reality is that terrorism is a cross-border phenomenon. In effect France’s intervention was aimed at imposing a reverse domino effect that would allow it to face the terrorist groups in the region – and to impose itself again in the Sahel.</p>
<p>But there are <a href="https://effectivepeaceops.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/EPON-MINUSMA-II-Report.pdf">few visible or effective results</a> on the ground after eight years of war in Mali. And opinion <a href="https://issafrica.org/iss-today/insecurity-in-the-sahel-wont-be-solved-at-high-level-summits">has started to turn</a> as Malians, as well as the country’s transitional authority, see <a href="https://minusma.unmissions.org/sites/default/files/s-2021-844_-_sg_report_on_minusma_-_english.pdf">the security situation</a> in the country <a href="https://www.un.org/press/en/2021/sc14549.doc.htm">getting worse</a> day by day. </p>
<p>While the France intervention was meant to help Mali combat terrorism, the crisis in the region has metamorphosed into an internal <a href="https://globalriskinsights.com/2021/01/conflict-moves-west-in-mali-towards-the-senegalese-border/">ethnic conflict</a>. In the Mopti region there is conflict between the Fulani and Dogons, as well as between the Bambara and Fulani. In Timbuktu and Gao there is conflict between the Touaregs and Arabs on the one hand, and between the Touaregs and the Songhais on the other. </p>
<p>The French forces face many challenges, in terms of protecting civilians, this is according to <a href="https://www.un.org/sg/en/global-leadership/un-multidimensional-integrated-stabilization-mission-in-mali/all">a recent report</a> by the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission (MINUSMA) in Mali. </p>
<p>In addition, France <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2013/05/31/des-maliens-accusent-la-france-de-ne-pas-vouloir-liberer-kidal-occupee-par-les-touareg_3421583_3212.html">is accused</a> of protecting and supporting armed separatist groups in Kidal, one of the desert regions of northern Mali, by many Malians.</p>
<p>It’s therefore clear that France has lost its support of Mali’s government, which has <a href="https://www.voltairenet.org/article214422.html#:%7E:text=On%208%20October%202021%20during%20an%20interview%20with,fighting%20%5B%201%5D.%20%E2%80%9CWe%20have%20proof%20of%20this">accused Paris of training terrorists</a> responsible for instigating and exacerbating ethnicism in the country. </p>
<p>Combined with the population expressing their dissatisfaction about the presence of the French forces in Mali, France had no choice but to reduce its military deployment.</p>
<h2>Is France leaving Mali better off?</h2>
<p>First, we have to know that Mali has strong historical links with France since it is a former French colony. In the broader Sahel region, France remains the leading Western power. </p>
<p>But a majority of Malians have begun <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/01/21/mali/france-investigate-french-airstrike-killing-19">to doubt the sincerity of France</a>, with <a href="https://minusma.unmissions.org/sites/default/files/rapport_final_bounty_bounty9.pdf">mistrust</a> becoming increasingly prevalent. </p>
<p>The other development has been <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/09/24/russia-wagner-group-mali-africa-putin-libya/">Russia’s growing interest in the region</a>. If all French troops were to leave tomorrow, Russian forces – under the <a href="https://www.dailysabah.com/world/africa/russias-wagner-group-seeks-to-extend-presence-in-sahel">Wagner group</a> – would be ready to fill the gap. Russia has the capacity to do so. It has <a href="https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/africa/central-african-republic-troops-beat-back-rebels-with-russian-help-1.4468637">demonstrated recently</a> in Central Africa Republic that it capable of dealing with one of the most important threats in that country.</p>
<p>In addition, Malian public opinion favours <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/exclusive-deal-allowing-russian-mercenaries-into-mali-is-close-sources-2021-09-13/">the arrival of the Russians</a>.</p>
<h2>What does the future hold for Mali?</h2>
<p>Abandoned by its former allies, the Malian army is now on the ground without French military drones or American logistical support.</p>
<p>Added to this is the <a href="https://minusma.unmissions.org/sites/default/files/s-2021-844_-_sg_report_on_minusma_-_english.pdf">precarious political situation</a> in the country. There was a change of government in late May after a coup d’état. A month later on 20 July, the new President of the transitional Government, Colonel Assimi Goïta, <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20210720-mali-s-interim-president-goita-targeted-in-knife-attack-at-bamako-mosque">was the target of an assassination attempt</a> at the Great Mosque in Bamako. </p>
<p>There are two possible scenarios:</p>
<p>The first would be that Mali establishes a new cooperation agreement with one of the world powers. For example, <a href="https://www.theafricareport.com/127421/mali-russia-bamako-to-sign-contract-with-wagner-group/">Russia and its Wagner group</a>. <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-58751423">In the eyes of some Malians and the government</a> they are better placed to manage the situation.</p>
<p>As for the second scenario, negotiations with the jihadists will be on the table, a move that’s been rejected outright by France. </p>
<p>However, it’s my view that negotiations with the two Malian terrorists <a href="https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/sanctions/1267/aq_sanctions_list/summaries/individual/iyad-ag-ghali">Iyad Ag Ghali</a> and <a href="https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/content/amadou-koufa">Amadou Koufa</a> will become the option of choice for the Malian government. They could then wage a joint battle against the Islamic State and non-Malian terrorist groups in the country.</p>
<p>But France hasn’t left the region – and by extension Mali. It will retain a presence through the <a href="https://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/french-foreign-policy/security-disarmament-and-non-proliferation/crises-and-conflicts/g5-sahel-joint-force-and-the-sahel-alliance/">Sahel Alliance</a> which was launched in 2017 by France, Germany and the European Union. This works closely with the <a href="https://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/french-foreign-policy/security-disarmament-and-non-proliferation/crises-and-conflicts/g5-sahel-joint-force-and-the-sahel-alliance/">G5 Sahel</a> which was set up by Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger as a joint effort to fight organised crime and terrorism.</p>
<p>Stability may be a long way off, however. A recent report on the <a href="https://peacekeeping.un.org/en/mission/minusma">United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission (MINUSMA)</a> in Mali shows that it faces serious challenges. The report notes:</p>
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<p>In an increasingly challenging security environment, additional air assets are urgently needed to enable the Mission to deliver on its mandate.</p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mady Ibrahim Kanté does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There are few visible results on the ground after eight years of war in Mali.Mady Ibrahim Kanté, Lecturer, Université des sciences juridiques et politiques de BamakoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/826122017-08-17T13:24:05Z2017-08-17T13:24:05ZHow to achieve Paul Auster’s literary genius? Start living uncomfortably<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182313/original/file-20170816-32632-pe1fyd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Any questions?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/novello-italy-may-28-writer-paul-78401968?src=WIuMrJLt4Jw4hCId7xxPDA-1-1">andersphoto</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Paul Auster takes the stage at the King’s Theatre <a href="https://www.eif.co.uk/2017/paulauster">in Edinburgh</a> to a great reception. He reads the opening pages of his latest work, the <a href="http://themanbookerprize.com/news/paul-auster-interview">Man Booker-longlisted</a> 4 3 2 1. It is a rare chance for his UK fans to see and hear the man up close and personal. </p>
<p>The 70-year-old graciously relates stories from his life as a writer in discussion with fellow American writer <a href="http://www.valleypressuk.com/author/35/nora_chassler">Nora Chassler</a>. Early on, he talks about growing up in a bookless household. The nine-year-old Auster got round this by visiting the public library, coming home with works by Robert Louis Stevenson and Edgar Allan Poe. </p>
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<span class="caption">His latest.</span>
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<p>By his teens, he explains, he knew the writer’s life would be a struggle. His concerned father suggested he become a professor and write poetry as a hobby. Auster even attended a PhD interview, but fortunately a perceptive professor told him not to do it as he had talent as a writer. </p>
<p>You sense being a professor of literature would have been a terrible failure for Auster. He seems to associate such jobs with middle-class careerists and compromisers, prioritising comfort and respectability over the risks of genuine art. There is slight disdain as he (warmly) remembers a brilliant school friend who was expected to achieve wonderful things but merely ended up a Harvard professor – and the prototype for one of Auster’s literary characters. </p>
<h2>Writers and readers</h2>
<p>Auster talks about how books touch people, creating empathy by asking us to inhabit others. Novels used to ask us to sympathise with gods and kings, he says, but are now mainly about ordinary people. It’s democracy in action, an egalitarianism that Auster seems to embody both on stage and in his writing. His novels are all about the complexity of human existence and the struggle to understand, to survive, to feel meaning in life. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182314/original/file-20170816-8765-1qby8kf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182314/original/file-20170816-8765-1qby8kf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182314/original/file-20170816-8765-1qby8kf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182314/original/file-20170816-8765-1qby8kf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182314/original/file-20170816-8765-1qby8kf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182314/original/file-20170816-8765-1qby8kf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182314/original/file-20170816-8765-1qby8kf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182314/original/file-20170816-8765-1qby8kf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>One of the most important aspects of great fiction is often referred to as <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_Writer_s_Voice.html?id=6cU_LY8NfDYC">voice</a>. This is about speaking directly to the reader in a particular consistent style. The pleasure readers receive from “hearing” this voice is what makes them return to an author again and again. </p>
<p>Paul Auster’s mastery of voice is the main thing that makes his prose so captivating. He does it in a conversational American-English, much like his spoken voice, and from this musical prose his characters evolve. It feels so effortless – so spoken – but involves the sophisticated use of a number of literary techniques. </p>
<p>The clarity of his prose is striking, for instance. He recalls an influential conversation with the poet Edmond Jabѐs, in which Jabѐs insisted that syntactical innovations were not as subversive as clarity. Auster goes on to cite Kafka, another writer known for his clarity, as being “always with us”. In future, readers will probably say the same about Auster. </p>
<p>Another element often considered central to Auster’s work is chance. To give one of many examples, in <a href="https://homemcr.org/production/paul-austers-city-of-glass/">City of Glass</a> the main character Daniel Quinn is mistaken for Paul Auster, an event that propels Quinn into a world of uncertainty. During the Edinburgh discussion Chassler refers to coincidence instead of chance, but Auster rejects both labels. He is simply describing the unexpected, he says, something that happens to everyone. He suggests that those who don’t get this point don’t understand the “mechanics of reality”. </p>
<p>He wonders if people who read too many novels – presumably including many in the audience – end up imposing their own limited ideas of narrative onto what they read. They have a sense from fiction that chance occurrences are something remarkable, for example, so they misunderstand Auster’s approach to them. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182310/original/file-20170816-32606-d1hjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182310/original/file-20170816-32606-d1hjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182310/original/file-20170816-32606-d1hjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182310/original/file-20170816-32606-d1hjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182310/original/file-20170816-32606-d1hjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182310/original/file-20170816-32606-d1hjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182310/original/file-20170816-32606-d1hjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182310/original/file-20170816-32606-d1hjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Auster and Nora Chassler.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EIF</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Artistic anxiety</h2>
<p>Auster’s latest novel has clear resonances with his own life. The main character, Archie Ferguson, shares the author’s own chronology (born 1947) and his geography (New Jersey, New York, Paris and so on). Like the young Auster, Archie is struck by the power of Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment as a teenager. </p>
<p>Yet Auster stresses that this character does things he himself never did – and indeed, the novel narrates Archie’s four alternate lives. It is a case of using one’s own life as a starting point, something we see repeatedly in Auster novels. </p>
<p>He began writing 4 3 2 1 at 66 years old, he explains, the age at which his father suddenly died. The thought that he too could drop dead made him work fast, finishing the 866-page novel in three and a half years rather than the expected five. This sense of self-reflection and being aware and anxious about artistic creation is another central theme in his work. Hence many of his characters are writers, living in their own bubbles, obsessed by their literary projects. </p>
<p>You certainly can’t deny Auster’s dedication to his art, both in the craftsmanship and the sheer volume: 18 novels plus numerous books of poetry, non-fiction and screenplays. He explains he pushed everything aside to commit to 4 3 2 1, reinforcing the sense of him as a serious working writer rather than a literary star. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182315/original/file-20170816-10444-96yr7v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182315/original/file-20170816-10444-96yr7v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182315/original/file-20170816-10444-96yr7v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182315/original/file-20170816-10444-96yr7v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182315/original/file-20170816-10444-96yr7v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182315/original/file-20170816-10444-96yr7v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182315/original/file-20170816-10444-96yr7v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/182315/original/file-20170816-10444-96yr7v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Auster: sweat not stardom.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EIF</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>At the end of the event, a long, long line of fans queue to get books signed. Auster is particularly warm and courteous to them, but those with their own literary ambitions will be leaving with some new thoughts from the evening as a whole. </p>
<p>In short, commitment is everything; middle-class trappings must be put aside; true art is about vocation, isolation and obsession. Expect lots of reading and thinking; and relentless work of the kind that most people would find absurd because it involves, as Auster puts it, sitting in a room putting words on a piece of paper. </p>
<p>Yet it’s a worthwhile struggle, which for Auster has produced writing of the highest quality and beauty. Books like The New York Trilogy, Mr Vertigo, Timbuktu and 4 3 2 1 have touched people’s imaginations in the way Dostoevsky and Kafka touched the young Auster. </p>
<p>Finally, never rule out the unexpected. We ourselves queue and get to ask Auster a question after climbing the stage: “Since you’re in Scotland, are there any Scottish contemporary writers you enjoy?”</p>
<p>He seems startled. “What,” he says, so we ask again. </p>
<p>“Ah,” he says, putting his hands to his head. “I’m sure there are some great ones, but I can’t think of any”. He smiles. “I’m sorry. I live in my own little world, in my own little bubble.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/82612/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>America’s answer to Kafka and Dostoevsky gets real at the Edinburgh International Festival.Alan McMunnigall, Tutor in Creative Writing, University of GlasgowPamela Ross, Tutor in Creative Writing and Literature, University of GlasgowLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/825402017-08-17T11:30:11Z2017-08-17T11:30:11ZTimbuktu destruction: landmark ruling awards millions to Malians<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/182408/original/file-20170817-13444-1soyalz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/minusma/13627263695/in/photolist-mLchJk-2AWDuf-2AXibJ-2ASTDk-5XUnjY-2AXirh-2ASdD6-2ASeQt-5XQ8dv-2ASfAc-2ASewt-5XQhfn-2ASec8-2AWC1Q-mLe9Rb-2ASTMc-2AWCFW-2ASdxr-2ASfkP-2AWDD3-2AWCr3-2AWDpQ-2ASehP-2AXhU9-2AWDfQ-2ASfvT-2ASfdz-iW5-2ASU3t-iaqKp-iapM6-iamMs-iapQk-6xPSXc-6xU1zW-fW1sT-fW1QD-fW1U1-fW1gJ-5TVShr-duwWVc-iamWz-ejFFcJ-icDyJg-icDP63-icDKqh-icDvja-icEcG2-icEhZB-icDNJm">MINUSMA/Marco Dormino</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The International Criminal Court (ICC) has ordered Malian radical <a href="https://justicehub.org/article/why-mali-situation-icc?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIntnf7IDe1QIVz7XtCh3qAwR6EAAYASAAEgIzefD_BwE">Ahmad al-Faqi al-Mahdi</a> to pay €2.7m in reparations for his role in the destruction of the UNESCO world heritage site in Timbuktu in 2012.</p>
<p>This is the first time the court has demanded reparations for the destruction of cultural property. The ruling sends a strong message that perpetrators who target cultural heritage can be held to account.</p>
<p>Al Mahdi was one of the leading perpetrators in the Islamic militant group <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-what-is-going-on-in-mali-51066">Ansar Dine</a>. The group attacked Timbuktu in 2012, taking control of the area. </p>
<p>Initially, Ansar Dine banned people in the region from visiting the mausoleums of their ancestors and the saints, as this was seen as an idolatrous and superstitious practice. When visits continued, the group decided to destroy the mausoleums. The aim was partially to stop the practice of worshipping there, but also to defy the international designation of Timbuktu as a world heritage site.</p>
<p>A total of 14 mausoleums were destroyed along with residents’ tombs. The <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-18675539">Sidi Yahya</a> mosque door, which some in the area believed would <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/01/opinion/the-end-times-for-timbuktu.html?mcubz=0">remain closed</a> until the end of days, was also destroyed. </p>
<p>In September 2015, Al Mahdi was arrested in Niger and transferred to the ICC in the Netherlands. In <a href="https://www.icc-cpi.int/CourtRecords/CR2016_07244.PDF">August 2016</a>, he plead guilty to the charge of destruction of cultural property as a war crime, in exchange for a nine-year sentence. Al Mahdi has apologised for his role in the destruction of the world heritage site in Timbuktu, but the ICC requires convicted people to make reparations to the victims affected by their crimes – hence the heavy fine.</p>
<h2>Psychological harm</h2>
<p>With the help of significant international funding, Timbuktu has been largely <a href="http://whc.unesco.org/en/news/1557/">rebuilt</a> since the attack – including the Sidi Yahya door. The reparations decision focuses on the human impact the destruction had on the community in Timbuktu. </p>
<p>Many Malians in the area have a close spiritual connection to the mausoleums and the Sidi Yahya mosque. The attack by Ansar Dine not only took away their ability to worship their saints and ancestors, it also caused psychological harm. Some 139 victims applied for reparations at the ICC. They <a href="https://www.icc-cpi.int/CourtRecords/CR2017_04780.PDF">spoke</a> of their shock and bereavement at the destruction.</p>
<p>The loss of the world heritage site at Timbuktu and ongoing conflict in Mali also meant that tourists and pilgrims could no longer travel to the site. That in turn led to a loss of income for the local people who act as guardians of the sites. </p>
<p>While the ICC recognised that the international community (represented by UNESCO and Mali) had suffered harm, it only awarded them a symbolic €1 each. Instead it focused reparations on the community in Timbuktu. The court awarded individual compensation to victims seen as most affected by the destruction. These included the guardians of the site who suffered a loss of income following the destruction, and the descendants of those whose mausoleums were destroyed who suffered mental harm.</p>
<p>The court also ordered collective measures to benefit the community in Timbuktu. These include community education, return and resettlement programmes for those displaced, and micro-credit grants.</p>
<p>There are of course difficulties ahead, too. Mali is still not a safe place, which will make it difficult for these reparations to be made. In the space of just one week, seven people, including peacekeepers, were recently killed in <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/08/soldiers-killed-attacks-camps-mali-170814213142119.html">Timbuktu</a>. The instability makes it difficult for the money to be put to practical use. </p>
<p>What’s more, Al Mahdi doesn’t have any money. That means the reparations will be delivered through the Court’s Trust Fund for Victims, which is supported by donors.</p>
<h2>Lessons for Syria?</h2>
<p>Over the past few years, cultural property has been destroyed across a number of conflicts, particularly in Syria. Islamic State targeted the UNESCO world heritage site in Palmyra, and indiscriminate fighting in cities like <a href="https://theconversation.com/rebuilding-homs-how-to-resurrect-a-city-after-six-years-of-conflict-74629">Homs</a> and Aleppo has destroyed dozens of cultural property sites. The Al Mahdi case offers some hope that those responsible for this destruction can be held to account. However, given that the fighting in Syria is ongoing, such restoration and accountability may be a long way off.</p>
<p>Cultural property is specifically protected in international law to ensure the rich diversity of communities that in turn enriches humanity as a whole. Attacking cultural property is explicitly prohibited during times of war. The Al Mahdi case emphasises that in rebuilding sites like Timbuktu, we also need to remedy the psychological and moral harm caused to communities connected to such culture.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/82540/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Luke Moffett receives funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council. </span></em></p>The International Criminal Court has told Malian radical Ahmad al-Faqi al-Mahdi to pay €2.7m in reparations for an attack on the world heritage site.Luke Moffett, Senior Law Lecturer in international criminal justice, Queen's University BelfastLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/670712016-10-18T14:33:30Z2016-10-18T14:33:30ZThe ICC’s Al-Mahdi ruling protects cultural heritage, but didn’t go far enough<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141959/original/image-20161017-4735-vbd8m3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A burnt ancient manuscript at the Ahmed Baba Centre for Documentation and Research, in Timbuktu. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Benoit Tessier/Reuters</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the first of its kind, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has delivered an important <a href="https://www.icc-cpi.int/pages/item.aspx?name=pr1242">judgment</a> on the destruction of World Heritage.</p>
<p>International law clearly protects cultural heritage from attack, including during <a href="http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-URL_ID=13637&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html">armed conflict</a>. But such crimes are seldom prosecuted and tend to be viewed as secondary to crimes against people. The ICC has partly changed this in the case against Ahmad Al Faqi Al-Mahdi, a local leader in Timbuktu who was appointed as head of the <a href="https://www.icc-cpi.int/mali/al-mahdi">morality police</a> when power changed hands in the city. The case exclusively concerned attacks against <a href="https://www.icc-cpi.int/mali/al-mahdi">cultural heritage</a>. </p>
<p>This is the first ICC case to examine attacks against cultural heritage. It is also the first to consider the actions of terrorist movements linked to Al-Qaeda. Its findings are likely to affect how the international community responds to attacks on cultural heritage – for example, <a href="http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/23">the destruction of Palmyra in Syria</a> by Islamic State.</p>
<p>The judgment sends the message that the international community will not tolerate destruction of cultural heritage sites. That is to be welcomed. But in our view the judgment did not go far enough. This is because it also sends the message that the court values the culture that binds a community together less than the toll on human lives. While understandable, we suggest that the court’s reasoning is shortsighted and that it missed a valuable opportunity.</p>
<p>We would argue that protecting cultural heritage sites is equally important and connected to the protection of civilian populations. After all, as the ICC recognised in its judgment, the heritage site was a large part of the social glue that made the individuals living in Timbuktu a community. </p>
<p>Without culture, people are but an assembly of organisms in the same species. Culture makes us a people, a civilisation.</p>
<h2>Cultural heritage in times of war</h2>
<p>The rise of the so-called Islamic State (Isis) in recent years has seen a spike in attacks on and destruction of globally significant sites of cultural heritage. Some of these have included <a href="http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/23">Palmyra</a> and <a href="http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/21">Aleppo</a> in Syria, the <a href="https://gatesofnineveh.wordpress.com/2014/07/24/and-now-its-gone-shrine-of-jonah-destroyed-by-isis/">Shrine of Jonah</a> in Iraq and <a href="http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/119">Timbuktu</a> in Mali, which date back centuries and were internationally recognised as protected sites. </p>
<p>Increasingly, such sites are targeted precisely because of their religious and cultural significance and their value to the international community.</p>
<p>The ancient city of Timbuktu holds a special place in Islamic and world history. It played an essential role in the spread of Islam in Africa during the religion’s early period. Its mosques also made it a commercial, spiritual and cultural centre in the <a href="http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/gold/hd_gold.htm">trans-Saharan trading route</a>.</p>
<p>Following the collapse of government in Mali in <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/23/world/africa/mali-coup-france-calls-for-elections.html?_r=0">2012</a>, terror groups occupied the power vacuum. These groups include:</p>
<ul>
<li><p><a href="http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/para/mujwa.htm">MUJWA</a>, an offshoot of Maghred Al-Qaeda;</p></li>
<li><p><a href="http://www.trackingterrorism.org/group/national-movement-liberation-azawad-mnla">MNLA</a>, Tuareg nationalists; </p></li>
<li><p><a href="http://www.trackingterrorism.org/group/ansar-dine">Ansar Dine</a>, Muslim fundamentalists who ordered the destruction of Timbuktu escalating the activities of the morality police led by Al-Mahdi; and </p></li>
<li><p>Al-Qaeda in the <a href="https://www.nctc.gov/site/groups/aqim.html">Islamic Maghreb</a>, a franchise of Al-Qaeda that runs separately from the Saudi Al Qaeda. It was responsible for the 9/11 attacks in the US. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>Al-Mahdi was an educated and respected member of the local community in Timbuktu. From April 2012 he was the head of the <a href="https://www.icc-cpi.int/mali/al-mahdi">Hesbah</a>, the morality brigade responsible for enforcing the religious and political edicts of the two terrorist groups, Asnar Dine and Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. The two groups had gained control of Timbuktu. These organisations decided that the mausoleums to the saints and the mosques in Timbuktu were to be destroyed.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141958/original/image-20161017-4752-1xjcphj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141958/original/image-20161017-4752-1xjcphj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141958/original/image-20161017-4752-1xjcphj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141958/original/image-20161017-4752-1xjcphj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141958/original/image-20161017-4752-1xjcphj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141958/original/image-20161017-4752-1xjcphj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/141958/original/image-20161017-4752-1xjcphj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ahmad al-Faqi al-Mahdi on trial at the ICC for destroying historic mausoleums in Timbuktu.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Patrick Post/Reuters</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Al-Mahdi initially advised against their destruction, recognising that the sites were an important part of the community’s religious and cultural life.</p>
<p>But the ICC found that in organising and providing the means for the destruction and participating in the destruction of five sites, Al-Mahdi was criminally responsible for total or partial destruction of 10 of the most significant sites in Timbuktu. These included several parts of the World Heritage Site.</p>
<h2>Heritage versus human lives</h2>
<p>The ICC sentenced Al-Mahdi to nine years imprisonment, which was within the range of nine to 11 years agreed by the prosecution and defence. The sentence recognised the gravity of the crime, the significance of the cultural heritage destroyed and the religious motivation for its destruction. </p>
<p>But the judges also highlighted that the destruction of “property” – no matter how culturally significant – is less grave than crimes committed against individuals. In other words, cultural heritage has been relegated to a subset of property offences. </p>
<p>In doing so, the ICC suggests that destroying a cultural heritage site that has stood for centuries, and is an important part of a group’s social glue, is about as bad as destroying a modern hospital. While both buildings play important roles, one is much harder to replace than the other. The ICC does not seem to have taken that fully into account.</p>
<p>This will have repercussions for the future protection of cultural heritage in armed conflict. </p>
<p>The judgment also ignored the connection between acts against cultural heritage and violence against the civilian population, which are often both justified by the same discriminatory religious ideals. This therefore weakens its potential to send a strong signal that intentional destruction of cultural heritage will not be tolerated.</p>
<p>The international community has always been reluctant to acknowledge this reality and turn it into law. There are other historical examples. </p>
<p>During World War II, and in many conflicts since, this realisation was always in the mind of the major war criminals, as witnessed in the <a href="http://www.rapeofeuropa.com/">Nazi policy</a> of destroying Jewish art; the <a href="http://www.icty.org/en/press/full-contents-dubrovnik-indictment-made-public">bombing of Dubrovnik</a> during the Yugoslav wars; and the destruction of the <a href="http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/208">Buddhas of Bamiyan</a>.</p>
<p>The ICC had the chance to change the world’s approach to these acts. But it fell short.</p>
<h2>Identifying victims of cultural loss</h2>
<p>Al-Mahdi accepted responsibility and demonstrated remorse for his actions. He pleaded guilty at an early stage and cooperated with the prosecution. Other possible defendants may have taken note of the court’s recognition of this in his sentence. </p>
<p>His guilty plea certainly saved valuable time and resources. And the case has been the most efficient and speedy <a href="https://www.icc-cpi.int/mali/al-mahdi">ICC trial to date</a>. This is an important win for an institution that has struggled to deliver timely justice and faces serious challenges to its credibility due to the collapse of key trials.</p>
<p>The conviction also opens the door for the ICC to consider suitable reparations to victims for the destruction of the sites. This will be the first time an international court has had to consider how one compensates for the loss of the irreplaceable.</p>
<p>Eight victims participated in the trial process. But the court will have to explore who the victims of destruction of cultural heritage are: individuals, local communities, the state of Mali or the international community? </p>
<p>The ICC prosecutor, and the court itself, recognised that at some level all are victims. Indeed, while the suffering of the local community in Timbuktu is deepest of all, we are all affected by the loss of the treasures that bind us as humankind. </p>
<p>If only the ICC could fully see that.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/67071/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lucas Lixinski is affiliated with the Association of Critical Heritage Studies.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sarah Williams does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The ICC sentence against Al-Mahdi for destroying ancient artifacts at Timbuktu sends the right message that the international community will not tolerate the destruction of heritage sites.Lucas Lixinski, Senior lecturer, UNSW SydneySarah Williams, Associate professor, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/635282016-08-09T07:13:57Z2016-08-09T07:13:57ZOf political hair, Jewish noses and South Africa’s failure to become a nation<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/133343/original/image-20160808-18043-u9lw9d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Author Christine Qunta says forgiveness trumps justice in South Africa.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Elelwani Netshifhire</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Book Review: <a href="https://seritisasechaba.co.za/">Why we are not a nation</a>, by Christine Qunta.</em> </p>
<hr>
<p>This readable book by Christine Qunta, free of any jargon, divides into three extended essays. The first, mostly historic and political, is titled Why we are not a nation? The second essay, sociological and psychological, is called Is hair political? – and should be a hot sell among African-Americans. The third is a 50-page part-autobiography called Law, national duty, and other hazards.</p>
<p>It is sad that half a century after <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Basil-Davidson/e/B001IXMLRI">Basil Davidson</a> and <a href="https://www.google.co.za/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=Joseph+Needham%E2%80%99s+books">Joseph Needham’s</a> books popularised respectively African history and Chinese mechanical inventions, Qunta still finds it necessary to devote pages to an Afrocentric summary of history.</p>
<p>It is sad that half a century after the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/422977?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">Oxford History of South Africa</a> and a steady stream of archaeological publications, Qunta still finds it necessary to debunk the colonial and apartheid the-whites-settled-in-empty-land dogma.</p>
<p>But just read the letters to the editors, and the websites, blogs, Facebook and Twitter of 2016, where the <a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/its-just-the-facts-penny-sparrow-breaks-her-silence-20160104">racist memes of apartheid</a> persist and reproduce themselves, and we immediately understand why. Qunta writes:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>White supremacy constituted part of the ideological arsenal developed and deployed by colonialism and imperialism, developing an autonomous existence that has survived long after its economic rationale ceased to exist.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The core argument of the book is that South Africa has:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>…. a type of post-traumatic stress disorder of a nation, one that cannot be treated because it has not yet been diagnosed. (We are a country) where forgiveness is overrated and justice is underrated.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/133111/original/image-20160804-466-1y5wurx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/133111/original/image-20160804-466-1y5wurx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=893&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/133111/original/image-20160804-466-1y5wurx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=893&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/133111/original/image-20160804-466-1y5wurx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=893&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/133111/original/image-20160804-466-1y5wurx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1122&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/133111/original/image-20160804-466-1y5wurx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1122&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/133111/original/image-20160804-466-1y5wurx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1122&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Qunta advocates a reparations fund; to accelerate corrective policies; that white businesses should learn to think strategically; that schools should be freed from colonial indoctrination; and that African culture should be mainstreamed, especially African languages.</p>
<p>The author’s heroes include <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/marcus-garvey">Marcus Garvey</a>, <a href="http://www.ibtauris.com/Books/Humanities/Philosophy/Social%20%20political%20philosophy/Frantz%20Fanon%20The%20Militant%20Philosopher%20of%20Third%20World%20Liberation.aspx?menuitem=%7B65A3FB7C-5D2E-4158-BBA9-D7824186AD5B%7D">Franz Fanon</a>, <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/malcolm-x">Malcolm X</a> and <a href="http://azapo.org.za/azapohistory/bantu-stephen-biko/">Steve Biko</a>. She advocates that colonial symbols, including statues, should be removed from public places and sent to museums; the same with colonial names.</p>
<h2>Of black hair and Jewish noses</h2>
<p>The essay Is Hair political? starts by quoting <a href="http://www.ngugiwathiongo.com/bio/bio-home.htm">Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o</a> that a:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… multibillion industry in the world is built around the erasure of blackness – and its biggest clients are the affluent black middle classes in Africa and the world.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Qunta recalls her screaming in pain as a child when her granny tried to comb her hair straight and her mother burnt it straight, leaving her with marks on her forehead. She then summarises the fashion and beauty industries’ war against African hair. In a profoundly feminist statement, she writes:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>If the fashion and beauty industries were states, they would undoubtedly be fascist.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The phenomenal proportion of black women still using hair-straightening and skin-lightening products decades after white racist laws have been revoked can be explained by a sociological comparison.</p>
<p>From at least the 1930s until the 1960s, many wealthy Jewish women went for “nose jobs” – for plastic surgeons to make their noses look “less Jewish” and more Aryan. During the 1950s and 1960s many Japanese women had surgeons reshape their eyes from almond to round. Even today, many Brazilian and Egyptian women feel pressured to get a gynaecologist to reconstruct their hymens before marriage.</p>
<p>Not those women, but respectively anti-Jewish racism, US hegemony and military occupation of Japan, and contemporary misogyny and double standards, should be blamed for pressuring persons until they felt the need for self-mutilation.</p>
<p>The third essay, Law, national duty, and other hazards, needs to be compulsory reading for all black women to motivate them to succeed in business. Her pages on the South African <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/topic/truth-and-reconciliation-commission-trc">Truth and Reconciliation Commission</a>, after the end of apartheid, vividly remind us of the routine torture, perversion of justice, and perjuring of affidavits under the apartheid machine. She sketches how the apartheid security apparatus tried to turn <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/political-activist-and-advocate-dumisa-ntsebeza-born">Advocate Dumisa Ntsebenza</a>, one of the commissioners, into a second <a href="https://global.britannica.com/event/Dreyfus-affair">Dreyfus affair</a>.</p>
<h2>Egyptian civilisation</h2>
<p>This reviewer has quibbles with one or two claims in the text, but none of these affect the main points which the author makes. </p>
<p>Ancient Egyptian civilisation is probably best dated (page 3) as emerging not in 4000BC, but between 3400 and 3100 BC.</p>
<p>The claims about Dogon knowledge of astronomy lack independent substantiation. But this does not affect African contributions to historic astronomy, from the calendar to what is possibly the world’s oldest Stonehenge at <a href="http://www.ancient-wisdom.com/egyptnabta.htm">Nabta Playa</a>, dating before 4000 BC.</p>
<p>Shamil Jeppie and Souleymane Diagne’s magisterial <a href="http://www.hsrcpress.ac.za/product.php?productid=2216">The Meanings of Timbuktu</a> points out that there was no institute such as a University of Sankoré. This was a metaphor that African authors used to interpret for western readers that Timbuktu was a centre of higher education, where students studied under individual leading scholars.</p>
<p>In the Cape, slaves were not randomly given the names of months (page 67); they were named after the month in which the slaver ship unloaded them in Cape Town.</p>
<p>Everyone should buy this book – it can be read over a weekend.</p>
<hr>
<p><em><a href="http://wits.worldcat.org/title/why-we-are-not-a-nation/oclc/951524791">Why we are not a nation</a> is published by <a href="https://seritisasechaba.co.za/">Seriti sa Sechaba</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/63528/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Keith Gottschalk is affiliated with the ANC. He writes this review in his individual capacity.</span></em></p>Qunta advocates a reparations fund to accelerate corrective policies, that schools be freed from colonial indoctrination and that African culture should be mainstreamed, especially African languages.Keith Gottschalk, Political Scientist, University of the Western CapeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/423352015-05-27T04:21:55Z2015-05-27T04:21:55ZAfrica’s rich heritage is under threat<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/82955/original/image-20150526-24745-s4t9jf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A traditional clay minaret stands in the Malian city of Timbuktu. Structures such as these are being destroyed as a result of conflict.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Adama Diarra/Reuters</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Over the past decade many priceless heritage sites and monuments have been destroyed, vandalised or desecrated in countries across the world. On the African continent, sites in <a href="http://icorp.icomos.org/index.php/news/29-unesco-director-general-calls-for-an-immediate-halt-to-destruction-of-sufi-sites-in-libya">Libya</a>, Algeria, <a href="http://www.academia.edu/7039818/The_looting_and_deliberate_destruction_of_cultural_heritage_during_the_21st_century_conflict_the_search_for_solution">Egypt</a> and <a href="http://www.unesco.org/new/en/media-services/single-view/news/damage_to_timbuktus_cultural_heritage_worse_than_first_estimated_reports_unesco_mission/#.VWQwrU-qqko">Mali</a>, among others, have been destroyed during internal and cross-border conflicts.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.environment.gov.au/heritage/about/world/world-heritage-convention">three main threats</a> to heritage sites are development projects, armed conflicts and natural disasters. International agencies like <a href="http://en.unesco.org/about-us/introducing-unesco">UNESCO</a> have called for the protection of heritage resources in the event of conflict. But this has not happened. </p>
<h2>An attack on history</h2>
<p>The destruction of monuments is a violent act. Those responsible are trying to erase - by force - an aspect of history targeted at material culture. One example was the Nazis who, during World War II, attempted to destroy Jewish people’s art and personal property.</p>
<p>The attacks on monuments and <a href="http://www.frontpagemag.com/2012/raymond-ibrahim/muslim-brotherhood-destroy-the-pyramids/">calls for their destruction</a> reflect the systemic and complex violence in many African states, although it’s important to note that the problem is not only an African one.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/82934/original/image-20150526-24766-wafawb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/82934/original/image-20150526-24766-wafawb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/82934/original/image-20150526-24766-wafawb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/82934/original/image-20150526-24766-wafawb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/82934/original/image-20150526-24766-wafawb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/82934/original/image-20150526-24766-wafawb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=468&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/82934/original/image-20150526-24766-wafawb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=468&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/82934/original/image-20150526-24766-wafawb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=468&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Heritage sites.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">UNESCO</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Isis is the latest group <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/01/world/middleeast/isis-militants-severely-damage-temple-of-baal-in-palmyra.html?_r=0">destroying history and heritage</a>. This is prevalent in Iraq. The group labelled their destruction of the sites as ‘removing the signs of polytheism.’ Syria is another country witnessing its heritage being <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/26/syria-heritage-in-ruins-before-and-after-pictures">wiped out</a>.</p>
<p>When examining the <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/09/mali-forgotten-war-20149691511333443.html">ongoing conflict</a> in the north of Mali, it is clear that heritage sites are just part of the collateral damage of human lives and cultural property in the ongoing conflict. </p>
<h2>The South African case</h2>
<p>In South Africa, <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2015/04/09/Rhodes-has-fallen">recent</a> student-led protests at the University of Cape Town started what became a nation-wide debate. It was mixed with acts of destruction aimed at colonial heritage monuments. </p>
<p>There were many opposing views about the statue of British mining magnate and politician Cecil John Rhodes at the university. Some saw the statue as a vestige of colonial oppression. Others said that monuments should be safeguarded and protected as legacies of South Africa’s past even though they were remnants of an oppressive past. </p>
<p>The debate about Rhodes’ statue <a href="http://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2015/04/11/destroying-statues-is-illegal-repulsive-apartheid-colonial-history-must-be-preserved-zuma">set a precedent</a>. Several other statues in various South African cities have been the scene of public protests.</p>
<p>This has led to the emergence of divergent activist groups championing either the protection of monuments such as the <a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Paul-Kruger-statue-in-Pretoria-vandalised-again-20150411">Kruger monument in Pretoria</a> central or the removal of all monuments associated with the apartheid period of South African history. </p>
<p>The debates continue on this topic and what keeps emerging as an underlying theme is the disenchantment, across various platforms of South African society. Disenchantment with the way in which the effects of apartheid have been dealt with in the post-apartheid period. Many argue that the processes such as the Truth and Reconciliation Commission were not sufficiently able to deal with the trauma and pain wrought by apartheid. </p>
<p>Conflict resolution and peace building would be better served by exploring alternative ways of dealing with heritage destruction. Instead of condemning the heritage to destruction, it should be kept safe so it remains visible and spurs us into constant engagement and conversation.</p>
<h2>Collective approach is needed</h2>
<p>It is worth considering national and world heritage conservation <a href="http://www.unesco.org/culture/ich/index.php?pg=00022">policies</a> and <a href="http://www.heritageportal.co.za/article/implications-amendment-world-heritage-convention-act">legislation</a>. All heritage is valuable and should be protected for posterity. Heritage destruction is not in the interest of humanity and can only serve to legitimate other aspects of heritage violation as was the case in the aftermath of destruction of sites and monuments in Libya and Egypt. </p>
<p>The African continent has to address the question of how we collectively deal with difficult and traumatic heritages. A reflection on the UNESCO Conventions between 1954 and 1972 should also provide guidance on future actions and discourses on heritage management at local and national levels. </p>
<p>The 1954 Convention which calls for the protection of cultural heritage during conflict and war was regularly invoked during the Iraq conflict and recent conflict in Mali. The 1970 and 1972 Conventions draw attention to safeguarding and protecting world heritage by state parties.</p>
<p>With these tools, countries should have sufficient guidance to individually and collectively protect heritage resources. Heritage resources are as much a reflection of our humanity as is our very human existence.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/42335/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alinah Kelo Segobye is affiliated with The University of South Africa. She is faculty at The Thabo Mbeki African Leadership Institute and as Senior Research Affiliate at African Futures Institute in Pretoria, South Africa. She is not currently funded by any organisation to carry out her research.</span></em></p>Africa is losing rich heritage and historical structures through conflict.Alinah Kelo Segobye, Associate Professor of Archaeology, University of South AfricaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.