Colonel Steele, a strict military man, as well as a man of his word, writes his memoirs in much the same way as he lived. His courage and bravery, as well as his honesty, come through just as history has recorded. He did not give praise lightly, nor did he speak ill of anyone without just cause. His word was his bond and not to be broken. A definite insight into the history of that period, as well as into the man himself.

This book provides a detailed history of the influences of western society on sub-saharan African culture. The reader should be aware that this is a "history textbook" long on facts and at times dull. However, if one perseveres many gems of information can be gleamed from the book's pages. This is not a quick read and requires some effort to finish and absorb all the detail. It would be great for the novice scholar or student. If you are looking for a text to give a brief and concise overview of the subject look elsewhere. The book lacks the necessary maps, figures, charts etc... to retain this readers interest for more than brief reading sessions.

Well written book that gives both historical background and cultural information. The book tends to focus on the northern parts of Ghana (i.e. Tamale), and some assumptions are made by the author that do not reflect the southern regions quite as accurately. This is not intended as a tourist guide!

The author collects a great deal of information from scattered sources on the earliest mentions of horses in West Africa, their types, and their use. The coverage of West African cavalry is very good. Unfortunately the author knows little about horses, as he confesses, and so did not dig for the information a reader might wish: nutrition of traditional diet, training, etc. This is a pioneering effort, and leaves a great many questions still to answer. At some places in Ch. One his dismissal of evidence as being of course too late smacks of assumption as he has given no better evidence to the contrary. The use of one rein on a bitless bridle to control horses in the most ancient tradition would seem less odd to him if he had investigated the known history of the Libyan horse, a very amenable beast ridden with no bridle at all, responding to taps with a stick as well as the rider's leg aids. In short, he has spent his time assembling ancient texts and more modern information from his own field studies, but lacks the background to really pull this together.

I found Bame Nsamenangs book titled, Human development in cultural context: A third world perspective, intriguing, yet too "intellectual." In this book, Nsamenang reports his studies on the culture of (West) Africa from a standpoint of the development of a child in a collectivist culture. As (West)Africa is a collectivist culture, where they place more emphasis on the group rather than on the individual, Nsamenang seeks to explain the influences on the individual though the various aspects of life. More specifically, he focuses on the historical, environmental, and social aspects that affect the development of the "self" in the culture. For example, Nsamenang states that, "although individuals, particularly children, are submerged in a network of social scripts and status rules that demand conformity and promote collectivism, they are not overly subdued by a herd mentality." As his book is directed more towards scholars in the field of social science, I feel that this book is written at a level that is above "average intelligence." Nsamenang uses words that are not sensitive to the "general" reader. I found myself looking up words simply because they were not in my mental dictionary or they were words that typically are not used in our culture compared to that of West Africa. However, because I am not an expert in the field of social science I don't fault Nsamenang for the position he took in writing this text. His studies were done in Cameroon, so it is evident that he would know more of what he is talking about than would I.

The 2003 edition has a signature bound in that pertains to Ecuador - our daughter who is travelling in South Africa found
out the hard way, check your book before you leave.

Analyzes events that affected Niumi - now known as The Gambia, Africa - from the perspective of World System Theory. Concludes that increased economic interaction with industrialized, trade-seeking nations led to an irreversible peripheralization of Niumi relative to the "core" economies of Europe and America. This book is interesting and descriptive, but not ground-breaking.

After reading Adventures in Africa, we think that this book was not the best book ever. We thought that it was rather dull throughout almost the whole book. One reason that we might have thought that it was dull is because, the book is written like a journal. We haven't ever read a book written like a journal before, and I don't like that style of writing. That could have had an impact on us not liking the book, or just simply because we didn't like the way it was written. Also, the story line was not too interesting. Each journal that he would write each day would just tell about what he did that day. It is like reading a book about a person that sits at home all day. The main character was a tourist in Africa, and would meet new people and travel to different places. Most of the day's he would do the same thing. We found this book to be very repetitive, and we find that pretty boring about books. He would always tell about how he would go to this river and watch all the people bathe. He would do that everyday for a long period of time, and it just got old. After that he would go to a cliff and climb it everyday. Most days though, he would take a tour bus somewhere. While he was in Africa he made many friends, sometimes it was hard to keep them straight. His friend Jean, was his best friend, they went almost everywhere together. This book isn't the best book, and we wouldn't recommend it unless you like to read other peoples' journals. We just didn't find it interesting at all. It didn't grab my attention or make me actually want to read the book. The only reason why we read it was because we had to for a grade.

This book is a literary analysis of some literature, both fiction and nonfiction, dealing with Morocco. The author begins by stating that all Western literature stems from the Aeneid and then charges into a chapter analyzing how the story line of the Aeneid in some way captures early Western impressions of the Middle East. Unfortunately, the one paragraph or so summary he gives of the plot of the Aeneid in his introduction is not enough for anyone without a background in classical literature to make any sense of his lengthy chapter on the Aeneid. The same goes for most of the rest of the chapters- -if you are thoroughly familiar with the material he is analyzing, then perhaps you might enjoy his comments. Otherwise, his descriptions are not very useful for anyone interested in culture. The book may be of more interest for students of lit crit theory than people interested in learning about culture or travel literature. One annoying habit the author has is that of dropping names of well known writers such as Deborah Tannen without giving the reader the impression that he understood the author's point or really had a relevant reason for including the name. Contrary to the subtitle, there is extremely little, if any, material in the book about Moroccan images of the West (with the possible exception of some brief mention of the West in some folk tales told by illiterate storytellers). The author gives the impression that he was interested in women's voices because it's the in-thing rather than because he is truly interested.

As a MENDE from West Africa, I was pleasantly surprised to find a book about my tribe.....until I realized that the author wrote MANDE instead of MENDE. I have tried in vain to find information on the MANDE tribe (as we are referred to by the author). I can't believe that in the author's quest, the name of the tribe is incorrect. I only hope it is my error!