The African Studies Association of the UK is happy to announce the shortlist for the Fage and Oliver Prize 2020.The prize is awarded to the author of an outstanding original scholarly work and one that is enlightening for a wider public about African issues published during the preceding two years. All nominations received are made by the publishers.
The nine books on the 2020 shortlist, alphabetically by author, are:

• Silenced Resistance: Women, Dictatorships, and Genderwashing in Western Sahara and Equatorial Guinea by Joanna Allan (USA, University of Wisconsin Press)
• The Revolution’s Echoes. Music, Politics, and Pleasure in Guinea by Nomi Dave (USA, The University of Chicago Press)
• The Man Who Killed Apartheid. The Life of Dimitri Tsafendas by Harris Dousemetzis (South Africa, Jacana Media (Pty))
• Modernist Art in Ethiopia by Elizabeth W. Giorgis (USA, Ohio University Press)
• A Fistful of Shells: West Africa from the rise of the slave trade to the age of revolution by Toby Green (UK, Allen Lane)
• At the crossroads: Nigerian travel writing and literary culture in Yoruba and English by Rebecca Jones (UK, James Currey, Boydell & Brewer)
• Mũkami Kĩmathi: Mau Mau Woman Freedom Fighter by Wairimu Nderitu (Kenya, Mdahalo Bridging Divides)
• An Ethnography of Hunger. Politics, Subsistence, and the Unpredictable Grace of the Sun by Kristin Phillips (USA, Indiana University Press)
• Africa’s Gene Revolution. Genetically Modified Crops and the Future of African Agriculture by Matthew A Schnurr (Canada, McGill-Queen’s University Press)

Chaired by Ray Bush, Professor of African Studies and Development Politics, University of Leeds, the jury has selected a shortlist of nine exceptional books, each chosen for originality, engaginess and readability about crucially important issues for Africa.
Commenting on behalf of the jury, Professor Bush said, ‘We have been delighted and challenged by the tremendous quality of submissions. We have read exceptionally engaged and important work on Africa from a range of disciplines which made shortlisting difficult but enjoyable’.
Professor Ray Bush (Chair) is joined on the 2020 jury by: Dr Reginald Cline-Cole, Department of African Studies and Anthropology, University of Birmingham, Dr Diana Jeater, Department of History, University of Liverpool; Professor Madhu Krishnan, Department of English, University of Bristol and Dr Kate Skinner, Department of African Studies and Anthropology, University of Birmingham.
The 2018 Fage and Oliver prize winner was Professor Francis B Nyamnjoh for #RhodesMustFall: Nibbling at Resilient Colonialism in South Africa (Bamenda: Langaa RPCIG, 2016)
The winner will be announced via online channels on Thursday 10 September.