New African Economic Histories Stream at ASAUK24

Since the turn of the twenty-first century, historians of all subspecialties have renewed their focus on economic history, with particular attention to the study of global capitalism. After many years out of favor, Africanists, too, have returned to questions of materialism, capitalism, commodities, markets, development, and more. Much of this recent work holds little in common with the historiography of the 1970s and 1980s, deeply influenced by Marxist and dependency theories. Instead, recent Africanist economic historians have brought together once divorced research questions, using social history to shed light on the functioning of capitalism in everyday lives, focusing on the central role that marginalized actors, such as women or enslaved Africans, played in economic processes; or taking up new subjects altogether, like the dominance of neoliberalism. New African economic histories have also devised novel methodologies, whether through the use of unique archival materials, oral histories, or the creation of datasets. This stream seeks to highlight and reinvigorate this field, with special attention to Africa’s dynamic economic past and the lessons it brings for contemporary policymakers and stakeholders tasked with confronting the continent’s economic volatility and relative poverty.

We invite panels and papers that approach Africa’s economic history in innovative ways. Too often, the precolonial, colonial, and postcolonial have been artificially divided, and scholars focused on diverse geographies have not engaged with one another enough. Thus, we welcome proposals focused on any period of time, any region of Africa, and any scale or scales. The hope with these streams is that, in bringing together a wide range of research and questions into dialog, scholars might be inspired by new methodologies, approaches, research questions, or literatures.

Please be in touch with the stream conveners: Kara Moskowitz, moskowitzk@umsl.edu (Department of History, University of Missouri-St. Louis) and Muey Saeteurn, msaeteurn3@ucmerced.edu (Department of History, University of California-Merced)