This methods handbook investigates the multiple sources and interdisciplinary methodologies employed by scholars working on Africa. It illuminates how scholars of Africa locate, select, interpret, and combine sources to reconstruct Africa’s past. Each contributor presents a specific typology of source or body of sources. Focusing on specific case studies, the chapters offer a broad overview of the methods and sources employed by historians, anthropologists, linguists, and related disciplines in the humanities and social sciences, working on Africa. The topics covered are diverse and include the significance of oral sources and how they relate to written sources; the perspectives provided by female writings on and from Africa; the relevance of Islamic court records for the study of Africa; the use of songs and poetry for the understanding of contemporary political protests; the employment of photographs and other visual sources for the study of the African past; how new sources or new
