The political scientist uses oral testimony to record events which happened sometime not too long ago. He retrieves documents about events, usually from eyewitnesses but sometimes from descendants of eyewitnesses. Whenever a witness testifies to events and his testimony is recorded, the following sequence or chain between the events and the record of them has taken place:

The relation between the events and the events as described in the document has therefore undergone the following “distortions”: events--part of the events are perceived--part of the perception is stored in the memory of a man and colored by his personality--part of what is in the memory of the man is released and the release is colored by the interview. There is quite definitely a loss of information between the event and the record of it. There is also, and this is less obvious, quite an accretion to the record of the event by the reflections and the personality of the witness. The aim of the person who uses the record is to know what are the accretions and the distortions so that he would know what actually happened insofar as it is recorded. Critical analysis is the tool used to discover this. It can be made much easier if certain items of information besides the testimony and about it are available. It is therefore of great value to collect this ancillary documentation together with the oral testimony itself.

During 1963 and 1964 theAfricana Newsletter published regularly surveys of ephemeral material (party pamphlets, rare newspapers, constitutions, reports of congresses, trade-union literature, hard-to-find government documents) on Portuguese African nationalist movements, the Camerouns, Nigeria, and the Congo. This material was then filmed and deposited in the Center for Research Libraries (formerly the Mid-West Inter-Library Center), Chicago, Illinois, for use by members of the Cooperative African Microfilm Project (CAMP). The Editors of theAfrican Studies Bulletin would like to continue this program of locating, listing, and collating rare African ephemeral materials. Please send inventories of your collection to the Editors. The original plea by Immanuel Wallerstein to cooperate in this program is reprinted from theAfricana Newsletter:

All of us when we go to Africa acquire, sometimes systematically, more often haphazardly, mimeographed and printed documents which we store, often unused, hopefully to be used in the future. Scattered issues of journals, when added together, can make nearly complete collections.

I have certainly collected many odd items which are of little immediate use to me but which might be invaluable to someone doing particular pieces of research. I would hope that photostats of all these items could be collected in a central place and thus be available to all scholars.

The International African Institute is organising a seminar on the Emergence of New Social Classes and the Roles of Elites in Contemporary Africa, to be held from Tuesday, July 14, to Thursday, July 23, 1964, at the University of Ibadan by courtesy of the Vice-Chancellor, Professor K. O. Dike.

This will be the second in a new series of international African seminars arranged with the aid of a grant from the Ford Foundation; it follows the completion of a first series of four seminars in the years 1959-1961. The seminars are devoted to research problems of significance for further social, economic and educational development in Africa. An important aim is to provide opportunities for research workers and other scholars holding posts in various parts of Africa to establish closer contact with each other and with their colleagues overseas, and to exchange views on problems and methods of research.

Lightning strike is rare, with a reported incidence of around 1:100,000. There are few reports of survival after cardiac arrest due to lightning strike. We report the case of a 12-year-old male survivor. Though he had a prolonged out of hospital cardiac arrest and initial poor systolic function, widespread ST segment elevation on electrocardiography, and elevated cardiac troponin I, he survived with a good cardiac and neurological outcome.

Situated amidst the breathtaking Himalayas and the Arabian Sea, Pakistan grapples with escalating environmental challenges, compounded by the impending threat of climate change. This article delves into the imperative of reshaping primary education in Pakistan to address the pressing issues of environmental degradation and biodiversity loss. The article endeavours a content analysis of the themes prevailing in the primary textbooks which uphold anthropocentric and capitalist values. Recognising education as a catalyst for change, the article argues for a paradigm shift, particularly within the realms of primary school science and general knowledge education, by integrating eco-justice pedagogies and contemplative approaches. Prevailing educational paradigms, heavily influenced by Western perspectives, often reinforce anthropocentric and capitalist ideologies that prioritise human exploitation of nature. To address these inherent shortcomings, the article advocates for cultivating a love for nature from an early age as a means of fostering a profound connection between children and the natural world.

There has been considerable discussion recently in recognition of the need to develop African studies in this country on a far wider basis than at present, where it is concentrated too narrowly in a few major centers of great academic strength. Such discussion has been exacerbated by the demands of Afro-Americans whose concern for African studies is not less significant for the debatable academic basis upon which it is posited.

The problem with all previous programs to inaugurate new African programs has been that they focused totally upon the training of faculty. There have been a series of summer courses, many of which have in themselves been of high quality and substantially imaginative. Yet they did little to innovate new programs on the campus, owing to the sluggishness of the administrative machinery or the relative indifference to the new faculty interest. The program which the African Studies Center at the University of California at Los Angeles planned for the summers of 1968 and 1969 attempted to remedy this deficiency. The project was financed by the Department of Health, Education and Welfare under National Defense Education Act funds and was organized and administered by Michael F. Lofchie and John F. Povey, themselves joint assistant directors of the UCLA African Studies Center.

This review paper presents in more detail the key points of the Brindley Award lecture given at the 61st Annual Meeting of The Clay Minerals Society and 5th Asian Clay Conference in Honolulu in June 2024. It is focused on the research of the author, even though it credits earlier findings. The paper discusses first the definition of illite, its position in mineral classification, the distinction between illite and true micas, the illite crystal-growth mechanism, and the specific properties of illite, resulting from its small crystal size. Second, this review presents evidence and explanation for the exceptional abundance of this mineral on Earth’s surface. Third, the behavior of illite in the rock cycle is characterized: in weathering, in sedimentation, and in diagenetic, metamorphic, and hydrothermal environments. Finally, the exceptional role of illite in geochemical cycling of water and elements K, N, B, Rb, and Cs is presented.

The popularity of keeping domesticated cats (Felis catus) indoor-only or outdoor-indoor varies according to geographical location, and both have risks and benefits. Walking cats (e.g. on leashes) may enable mitigation of roaming risks while providing outdoor access, but the practice of walking cats appears relatively uncommon and is yet to be examined in the literature. Semi-structured online interviews (21 participants across seven countries) were conducted to explore cat walking perceptions and experiences in owners who currently practise it. Interview recordings were transcribed and analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. Five main themes were generated: (1) Benefits of walking; (2) Challenges around walking; (3) Safety for walking; (4) Cat individuality and walking; and (5) Attitudes about walking across geographic contexts. Themes highlighted that participants perceived benefits of walking for both cat and owner but faced challenges largely due to dogs and their owners in addition to judgment from others in the community. The main priorities of walking were seen to be ensuring safety and attending to the individual needs of each cat. Reactions to cat walking appeared to vary according to local norms and attitudes about cats and owner-cat relationships. The subjective nature of both the concept and practice of cat walking was also emphasised. These findings provide an initial base for what the experience of walking cats can be like and highlight that further research to directly investigate the welfare impacts of walking on cats and their owners is now needed.

Giant left atrium is extremely rare in the paediatric population, especially in asymptomatic cases. We report a 5-year-old child with a giant left atrium due to “non-rheumatic” mitral valve regurgitation that presented as a stroke secondary to atrial tachycardia. This case is noteworthy for the unusual “silent” manifestation of a giant left atrium.