Periodic Reporting for period 1 - AFREXTRACT (Environmental Histories of Resource Extraction in Africa: Understanding Cultural and Political Responses to Environmental Transformation)
Reporting period: 2022-09-01 to 2025-02-28
Resource extraction industries have caused environmental transformation across Africa, especially between 1950 and 2020. The undeniably dramatic effects of mining and oil drilling on landscapes and lifeworlds have prompted radically divergent cultural and political responses, from apparent acquiescence to violent protest and accusations of ecocide. Yet the nature of the relationship between environmental change and human response in African localities remains extremely poorly conceptualised. AFREXTRACT addresses this gap by analysing how various actors in three emblematic sites – the Witwatersrand, the Copperbelt and the Niger Delta – have experienced and responded to environmental change. The first study to investigate this comprehensively and comparatively, AFREXTRACT demonstrates that insights from environmental history, political ecology and environmental humanities are crucial to topical debates about coloniality/decoloniality and the Anthropocene.
Our main objectives are: 1) to identify the causal factors informing human response to environmental transformation through three in-depth case studies (gold mining in South Africa; copper mining in Zambia; oil drilling in Nigeria); 2) to analyse how cultural expression (specifically literature and music) has made sense of environmental change; 3) to conceptualise varieties of environmentalism beyond a binary of resistance and resignation. AFREXTRACT will combine archival research with oral history, literary analysis and musicology to document changing values regarding the environment. A new analytical framework will facilitate engagement with global discussions about extractivism, colonialism/postcolonialism, environmental inequality and climate change. As resource extraction and its toxic legacies are set to continue, a historical understanding of these issues is imperative.
Our main objectives are: 1) to identify the causal factors informing human response to environmental transformation through three in-depth case studies (gold mining in South Africa; copper mining in Zambia; oil drilling in Nigeria); 2) to analyse how cultural expression (specifically literature and music) has made sense of environmental change; 3) to conceptualise varieties of environmentalism beyond a binary of resistance and resignation. AFREXTRACT will combine archival research with oral history, literary analysis and musicology to document changing values regarding the environment. A new analytical framework will facilitate engagement with global discussions about extractivism, colonialism/postcolonialism, environmental inequality and climate change. As resource extraction and its toxic legacies are set to continue, a historical understanding of these issues is imperative.
In 2022 and 2023, AFREXTRACT organised a webinar series at which internationally prominent scholars of extraction presented their work. Team members interviewed the scholars, to explore the intersections between our research projects.
In 2023, AFREXTRACT team members undertook preliminary research visits to Johannesburg and the Niger Delta. We mapped archival and documentary repositories (in South Africa we visited 7 archives and rare document collections, whereas in Nigeria we consulted 4 collections, including newspaper holdings and archival documents), and we conducted oral history interviews. In Johannesburg, we targeted the mine dumps in Diepkloof, Springs, and Khutsong and we interviewed several NGOs, environmental activists, and filmmakers. In the Niger Delta, the research is concentrated in Eleme and Otuabagi. The NGO and university communities of Port Harcourt are rich sources of information.
Research on the Zambian Copperbelt, which was started in 2017, was continued in 2024. The archival holdings of the National Archives of Zambia in Lusaka, the Zambia Consolidated Copper Mines in Ndola, and the Zambia Environmental Management Agency in Ndola have already been mapped in 2017-2018. In 2024, team members conducted more than 40 oral history interviews in Mufulira (as well as Chingola). Oral history interviews focused on communities living around mining sites. We also conducted research on photographic praxis alongside Danny Chiyesu, whereas collections of literary works are being mapped in both English and iciBemba.
In 2024, Tholithemba Ndaba conducted seven months of research in Johannesburg, focusing on oral history and archival research. Moreover, sources relating to literature, music, and photography have been mapped. Research into photographic praxis occurred alongside Madoda Mkhobeni and William Matlala.
In June-July 2024, AFERXTRACT team members conducted research in the Niger Delta. We conducted oral history interviews in Otuabagi community in Bayelsa state and in Eleme community in Rivers state. Research into photographic praxis occurred alongside Lucas Deinma and Fyneface Dumnamene.
A milestone was the organisation of the project conference in Pretoria in May 2023. This conference brought together twenty scholars working on environmental histories of resource extraction in South Africa and beyond. In July 2024, the AFREXTRACT team organised its second conference at the University of Port Harcourt. More than 40 presenters shared their work. There was also an early career writing workshop, to prepare papers for publication. Two special issues are being prepared from this conference (2025).
Project team members have started publishing their findings, the PhD students have written book reviews, whereas the PI has published three articles and a teaching resource. One co-authored article on methods is in press.
In 2023, AFREXTRACT team members undertook preliminary research visits to Johannesburg and the Niger Delta. We mapped archival and documentary repositories (in South Africa we visited 7 archives and rare document collections, whereas in Nigeria we consulted 4 collections, including newspaper holdings and archival documents), and we conducted oral history interviews. In Johannesburg, we targeted the mine dumps in Diepkloof, Springs, and Khutsong and we interviewed several NGOs, environmental activists, and filmmakers. In the Niger Delta, the research is concentrated in Eleme and Otuabagi. The NGO and university communities of Port Harcourt are rich sources of information.
Research on the Zambian Copperbelt, which was started in 2017, was continued in 2024. The archival holdings of the National Archives of Zambia in Lusaka, the Zambia Consolidated Copper Mines in Ndola, and the Zambia Environmental Management Agency in Ndola have already been mapped in 2017-2018. In 2024, team members conducted more than 40 oral history interviews in Mufulira (as well as Chingola). Oral history interviews focused on communities living around mining sites. We also conducted research on photographic praxis alongside Danny Chiyesu, whereas collections of literary works are being mapped in both English and iciBemba.
In 2024, Tholithemba Ndaba conducted seven months of research in Johannesburg, focusing on oral history and archival research. Moreover, sources relating to literature, music, and photography have been mapped. Research into photographic praxis occurred alongside Madoda Mkhobeni and William Matlala.
In June-July 2024, AFERXTRACT team members conducted research in the Niger Delta. We conducted oral history interviews in Otuabagi community in Bayelsa state and in Eleme community in Rivers state. Research into photographic praxis occurred alongside Lucas Deinma and Fyneface Dumnamene.
A milestone was the organisation of the project conference in Pretoria in May 2023. This conference brought together twenty scholars working on environmental histories of resource extraction in South Africa and beyond. In July 2024, the AFREXTRACT team organised its second conference at the University of Port Harcourt. More than 40 presenters shared their work. There was also an early career writing workshop, to prepare papers for publication. Two special issues are being prepared from this conference (2025).
Project team members have started publishing their findings, the PhD students have written book reviews, whereas the PI has published three articles and a teaching resource. One co-authored article on methods is in press.
In 2023, the AFREXTRACT project published two articles and a teaching resource on lived experiences of resource extraction. These are: 1) Iva Pesa, 'Anthropocene Narratives of Living with Resource Extraction in Africa', Radical History Review; 2) Iva Pesa, 'De klimaatcrisis als koloniale crisis: Inzichten uit de Afrikaanse milieugeschiedenis', Tijdschrift voor geschiedenis. Our lesson plan 'Decolonial Alternatives to the Anthropocene' can be found on https://www.radicalhistoryreview.org/abusablepast/lesson-plan-decolonial-alternatives-to-the-anthropocene/(opens in new window)
Iva Peša’s article ‘Toxic Coloniality and the Legacies of Resource Extraction in Africa’ advanced scholarship beyond the state-of-the-art. Whereas geographers have started mapping ‘climate coloniality’ (Sultana, 2022), such works have rarely been historicised. Our article traces the colonial origins and legacies of toxicity in localities of resource extraction across Africa. This inspired the international conference ‘Mapping Toxic Coloniality: Perspectives from Africa, Asia, and Latin America’, in November 2024, where 24 international scholars presented their work. The organisers envisage a special issue which might lead to a scientific breakthrough.
The oral history interviews conducted in South Africa, Nigeria, and Zambia considerably advance the state of the art, as they document previously unrecorded narratives of people living with resource extraction and environmental transformation. Some of these narratives question received wisdom, e.g. in Diepkloof multiple interviewees mentioned having filed petitions against dust nuisance to area councillors in the 1960s, something that has not been recorded so far. Historical newspaper holdings have also been a major source of findings. Nigerian newspapers recorded oil spills in the 1970s and documented the negotiations between multinational oil companies and local communities about clean-up. In South Africa, newspapers describe mine dumps as a source of criminality, dust nuisance, but also more positively, as a site for photoshoots or exercise. Such findings shed light on the variety of everyday engagements with resource extraction, highlighting multiple lived experiences.
We have collaborated closely with local photographers to take photographs that reflect on environmental change in localities of resource extraction. There is considerable potential for scientific breakthroughs by combining visual analysis and environmental humanities approaches. Workshops to bring these photographs into dialogue with historical memory have been organised in Johannesburg in May 2024 and are planned in Mufulira for May 2025.
Iva Peša’s article ‘Toxic Coloniality and the Legacies of Resource Extraction in Africa’ advanced scholarship beyond the state-of-the-art. Whereas geographers have started mapping ‘climate coloniality’ (Sultana, 2022), such works have rarely been historicised. Our article traces the colonial origins and legacies of toxicity in localities of resource extraction across Africa. This inspired the international conference ‘Mapping Toxic Coloniality: Perspectives from Africa, Asia, and Latin America’, in November 2024, where 24 international scholars presented their work. The organisers envisage a special issue which might lead to a scientific breakthrough.
The oral history interviews conducted in South Africa, Nigeria, and Zambia considerably advance the state of the art, as they document previously unrecorded narratives of people living with resource extraction and environmental transformation. Some of these narratives question received wisdom, e.g. in Diepkloof multiple interviewees mentioned having filed petitions against dust nuisance to area councillors in the 1960s, something that has not been recorded so far. Historical newspaper holdings have also been a major source of findings. Nigerian newspapers recorded oil spills in the 1970s and documented the negotiations between multinational oil companies and local communities about clean-up. In South Africa, newspapers describe mine dumps as a source of criminality, dust nuisance, but also more positively, as a site for photoshoots or exercise. Such findings shed light on the variety of everyday engagements with resource extraction, highlighting multiple lived experiences.
We have collaborated closely with local photographers to take photographs that reflect on environmental change in localities of resource extraction. There is considerable potential for scientific breakthroughs by combining visual analysis and environmental humanities approaches. Workshops to bring these photographs into dialogue with historical memory have been organised in Johannesburg in May 2024 and are planned in Mufulira for May 2025.