Title & Author:

Repair across Africa : mending, making and material care / edited by Charline Kopf, Paul Wenzel Geissler, Aïssatou Mbodj-Pouye, Lotte Meinert.

Publication:

Bristol ; Chicago : Intellect Books, 2026.

Description:

xxi, 300 pages : illustrations (color) ; 25 cm

Notes:
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Introduction: acts of repair in contemporary Africa / Charline Kopf, Paul Wenzel Geissler, Aïssatou Mbodj-Pouye and Lotte Meinert -- 'Kobeta Toles': re-pairing mobility on Congo's inland waterways / Peter Lambertz -- Cobbling together a life of repair: deciding how to deal with loss at a Burkina Faso market / Sarah-Jane Phelan -- A car on the street named desire: the significance of material breakdown and repair for brokering change in South Africa / Evelien Storme -- Pulled lines and people's connections: infrastructural extension and layered repair in Cape Town / Angela D. Storey -- Below the infrastructural breakdown: electric repair work as skilled improvisation and its moral entanglements in Northern Uganda / Kirsten Milo Nielsen -- Repairs under tension: negotiating risks and connectivity in mobile phone repair in Bamako / Issa Fofana and Issa Togola -- Turn of the screw: unhinging power relations through 'Unauthorised Repair' in Lomé's mobile phone 'Black Market' Dékon / Janine Patricia Santos -- Hacking to repair?: smartphone repair in the Kariakoo Market, Dar es Salaam / Christian Medaas -- Timbila: tracing Mozambican history through a musical artefact, its repair and reinvention / Sara Morais and Gianira Ferrara -- La Casa Verde heritage, colonialism and (un)repairing in Equatorial Guinea / Alba Valenciano-Mañé and Laida Memba-Ikuga -- Under repair: undoing colonial fascist legacies in Addis Ababa through critical architectural preservation / Emilio Distretti and Abel Assefa -- In the absence of repair: architectural métissage and forced labour in colonial Congo / Simon De Nys-Ketels and Robby Fivez -- Maxaquene Khovo students house in Maputo: on social repair and material decay / Silvia Balzan -- Narratives of mending, repair and transformation in West Africa: examining Freedom Park Lagos / Ola Uduku -- Repair and relief: 'Building Back Better' in post-cyclone Idai Malawi / Tanja D. Hendriks -- The time of being in-between: mending, repair and social change in Turkana, Northern Kenya / Samuel F. Derbyshire -- Dogon objects to throw away, to repair or to collect / Éric Jolly -- Adobe walls and leaking pasts: vital ecologies of mending and repair in Niger / Adeline Masquelier -- Afterword: breaking down repair / Brenda Chalfin.

Summary:

"Repair across Africa is the first edited collection to focus specifically on repair in African contexts, bringing together a diverse group of scholars and practitioners from anthropology, geography, musicology, architecture, history, and critical urban studies. Moving beyond a narrow understanding of repair as merely fixing broken things, this volume explores it as a relational practice that bridges past and present, and connects the material with the social, economic, and spiritual. The essays investigate the role of repair by mitigating the wear and tear of time in everyday life, by confronting the impact of violence and destruction and addressing environmental disasters as well as the enduring legacies of colonial and postcolonial histories that continue to shape urban transformation. Highlighting the commitment and artisanal skill, the ingenuity and traditions behind these practices, the contributors illuminate how repair becomes a vital practice of care, adaptation and contestation in a rapidly changing world, while also acknowledging the matrial constraints and economic pressures that often make it necessary and sometimes hazardous. By situating repair within broader critiques of late capitalism and colonialism, and within longstanding anthropological scholarship, this multidisciplinary volume opens new conversations in material culture, heritage, urban life and the politics of infrastructure"--back cover.

ISBN:

9781835952566 paperback
1835952569
ePub ebook
9781835952573
PDF ebook
9781835952580

Subject:

Maintenance.
Repairing Social aspects Africa.
Repairing Economic aspects Africa.
Repairing Africa.
Entretien.
Réparations Aspect social Afrique.
Réparations Aspect économique Afrique.
Réparations Afrique.
maintenance.
Repairing
Africa

Added entries:

Kopf, Charline, editor.
Geissler, Wenzel, editor.
Mbodj-Pouye, Aïssatou, editor.
Meinert, Lotte, editor.

Holdings:

Location: Library study room new acquisitions 327986
Call No.: 327986
Copy: 1
Status: Available