BBC World Histories Magazine Issue 4

Each issue, for our Big Question feature we ask leading global experts to discuss a contentious historical issue – and few issues are as contentious as Africa’s turbulent past. Marred by hundreds of years of external exploitation, warfare and slavery, the continent still bears the scars of this legacy today. But how can we best understand this history in the 21st century? And are the continued misunderstandings by some in the west just as damaging as the events of centuries past? A panel including Hakim Adi, Martin Meredith and Emma Dabiri tackles these and other aspects of the debate from page 36. Another historical episode with long-lasting global repercussions was the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918–20, which infected a third of the global population and left at least 50 million…

Jago Cooper Curator of the Americas at the British Museum in London, Cooper has written and presented several documentary series on ancient civilisations for BBC Four. On page 76 he explores seven ‘lost’ cities that “remind us both how easily the truth about the past can be lost, and of the power of history in forging the future”. Emma Dabiri Social historian, writer and broadcaster Dabiri is among the experts debating the continued legacy of Africa’s often violent history, from page 36. “The continent’s past has been almost entirely obscured by an infrastructure that sought to – that seeks to – legitimise the damage that Europe did to it and its people,” she argues. Caroline Moorehead On page 24 journalist and author Moorehead introduces the inspiring band of resistance agitators…

The history behind today’s news “The current face-off has coincided with a drive by China to project naval power more widely, including its development of aircraft carriers” Why is the South China Sea a focus of tension at the moment? The South China Sea has always been an important area, because of its strategic position between China and south-east Asia. Much of Asia’s trade passes through the South China Sea, and it has significant reserves of natural gas and oil. On one level, the sea is subject to great power rivalries. The United States, China and increasingly, though still very much in the distance, India view the area as a strategic lane of commerce and naval passage in their grand designs regarding global dominance. On another level, particularly with regards…

Clive Myrie is a BBC world affairs correspondent and presenter DISCOVER MORE From Our Own Correspondent is broadcast every Saturday at 11.30am on BBC Radio Imagine waking up one morning to find that the world you knew has vanished. There’s a banging on the door, and you’re ordered, on pain of death, to leave your home and head to the local square. On the way you meet others making the same journey – in fact, the whole village is on the move. Marshalling the throng are armed men, pushing and shoving you. What once passed for law and order – the local militia, police, the nearby army unit – has disappeared. You join hundreds of others gathered in the square. In the middle you see several men and boys, their…

MAR 2017 MAY 2017 1 TRIQUET ISLAND CANADA First Americans unearthed? The remains of possibly the earliest settlement in the Americas has been discovered. The site on the central coast of British Columbia is estimated to date from around 14,000 years ago – a millennium before the first mooted migration of Stone Age people across an ice bridge to Alaska from Siberia. Fish hooks, fire-lighting tools and spears have been unearthed, indicating a community adept at coastal hunting during an ice age that limited land-based food gathering. 2 PRAGUE CZECH REPUBLIC Wartime action replay One of the most dramatic wartime episodes of Czech history is being recreated in a groundbreaking new computer game. The action in Attentat 42, due for release later this year, centres on the assassination of SS…

Viewpoints Expert opinions on the historical issues behind today’s news Last September, the Indian government announced an international competition to design a National War Memorial in New Delhi, to honour all of the Indian soldiers who served in the various wars and counter-insurgency campaigns from 1947 onwards. The terms of the competition also specified that the new structure would be built adjacent to the India Gate – a memorial to the Indian soldiers who died in the First World War. Between the old imperialist memorial and the proposed nationalist one, India’s contribution to the Second World War is airbrushed out of existence. The Indian government’s conception of the war memorial was not merely absent-minded. Rather, it accurately reflected the fact that both academic history and popular memory have yet to…