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Mahmood Mamdani

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This article is about the Ugandan academic. For the Rajya Sabha member, see Mahmood Madani. For the British entrepreneur, see Mohammed Mamdani.

Mahmood Mamdani
20th Director of Makerere Institute of Social Research
Incumbent
Assumed office
June 2010
Preceded byNakanyike Musisi
Director of the Institute of African Studies, Columbia University
In office
1999–2004
Preceded byGeorge Bond
Succeeded byMamadou Diouf
Director of the Centre for African Studies, University of Cape Town
In office
1996–1999
Personal details
Born (1946-04-23) 23 April 1946 (age 78)
Mumbai, British India
NationalityUgandan
SpouseMira Nair (m. 1991)
Children1
Residence(s)Kampala, Uganda
New York City, New York, U.S.
Alma materUniversity of Pittsburgh (BA)
Fletcher School (MA), (MALD)
Harvard University (PhD)
ProfessorshipsUDSM (1973–79)
Makerere (1980–93)
UCT (1996–99)
Notable work(s)Citizen and Subject
Notable AwardsHerskovits Prize (1997)
Lenfest Award (2011)

Professor Mahmood Mamdani (born 23 April 1946) is a Ugandan academic, author, and political commentator. He is the director of the Makerere Institute of Social Research (MISR),[1] the Herbert Lehman Professor of Government at the School of International and Public Affairs[2] and the Professor of Anthropology, Political Science and African Studies at Columbia University.[3]

Early life and education

Mamdani is a third generation Ugandan of Indian ancestry. He was born in Mumbai and grew up in Kampala. Both his parents were born in the neighbouring Tanganyika Territory (present day Tanzania). He was educated at the Government Primary School in Dar es Salaam, Government Primary School in Masaka, K.S.I. Primary School in Kampala, Shimoni and Nakivubo Government Primary Schools in Kampala and at Old Kampala Senior Secondary School.[4]

He received a scholarship along with 26 other Ugandan students to study in the United States. The scholarships were part of the independence gift that the new nation had received.[5] Mamdani joined the University of Pittsburgh in 1963 and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in political science in 1967.

He was among the many northern students who made the bus journey south to Birmingham, Alabama organised by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) to participate in the civil rights movement. He was jailed during the march and was allowed to make a phone call. Mamdani called the Ugandan Ambassador in Washington, D.C for assistance. The ambassador asked him why he was 'interfering in the internal affairs of a foreign country' to which he responded by saying that this was not an internal affair but a freedom struggle and that they too had gotten their freedom only last year.[6]

He then joined The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and graduated in 1968 with a Master of Arts in political science and Master of Arts in Law and Diplomacy in 1969. He attained his PhD in government from Harvard University in 1974. His thesis was titled Politics and Class Formation in Uganda.

Career

Mamdani returned to Uganda in early 1972 and joined Makerere University as a teaching assistant at the same time conducting his doctoral research; only to be expelled later that year by Idi Amin due to his ethnicity. He left Uganda for a refugee camp in the United Kingdom in early November just as the three-month deadline was approaching for people of Asian heritage to leave the country.

He left England in mid-1973 after being recruited to the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania.[6] In Dar es Salaam, he completed writing his thesis and was active with anti-Amin groups. In 1979, he attended the Moshi Conference as an observer and returned to Uganda after Amin was overthrown following the Uganda–Tanzania War[7] as a Frontier Interne of the World Council of Churches. He was posted with the Church of Uganda offices in Mengo and was assigned to research the former regime's foreign relations. His report was published as a book: Imperialism and Fascism in Uganda.

In 1984, while attending a conference in Dakar, Senegal he became stateless after his citizenship was withdrawn by the government under Milton Obote due to his criticism of its policies.[8] He returned to Dar es Salaam and was a visiting professor at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor for the spring semester in 1986. After Obote was deposed for the second time, Mamdani once again returned to Uganda in June 1986.[5] He was the founding director of the Centre for Basic Research (CBR), Uganda's first research non-governmental organisation from 1987 to 2006.[4]

He was also a visiting professor at the University of Durban-Westville in South Africa (January to June in 1993), at the Nehru Memorial Museum & Library in New Delhi (January to June in 1995) and at Princeton University (1995–96).

In 1996, he was appointed as the inaugural holder of the AC Jordan chair of African studies at the University of Cape Town.[9] He left after having disagreements with the administration on his draft syllabus of a foundation course on Africa called 'Problematizing Africa'.[10] This was dubbed as the Mamdani Affair. From 1998 to 2002 he served as President of Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA). In December 2001, he gave a speech on Making Sense of Violence in Postcolonial Africa at the Nobel Centennial Symposia in Oslo, Norway.[11]

In 2008, in an open online poll, Mamdani was voted as the 9th "top public intellectual" in the world on the list of Top 100 Public Intellectuals by Prospect Magazine (UK) and Foreign Policy (US).[12] His essays have appeared in the London Review of Books, among other journals.

Work

Mamdani specialises in the study of African and international politics, colonialism and post‐colonialism, and the politics of knowledge production. His works explore the intersection between politics and culture, a comparative study of colonialism since 1452, the history of civil war and genocide in Africa, the Cold War and the War on Terror, and the history and theory of human rights.[13]

His current research "takes as its point of departure his 1996 book, Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Colonialism."[14] In Citizen and Subject, Mamdani argues that the colonial state in Africa generally took the form of a bifurcated state, wherein racial domination is mediated through direct rule in urban areas and through tribally organized local authorities elsewhere.[15] Terming this form of rule decentralized despotism, Mamdani analyzes extensive historical case studies in South Africa and Uganda to argue that colonial rule tapped into authoritarian possibilities whose legacies often persist after independence.[16] Challenging conventional perceptions of apartheid in South Africa as exceptional, he argues that apartheid was the generic form of the colonial state in Africa, encompassing both British 'indirect rule' and French 'association' strategies.[17]

Personal life

He is married to Mira Nair, the Indian film director and producer. They met in Kampala, Uganda in 1989 when Nair was researching for her film, the Mississippi Masala.[5] She had read his book The Myth of Population Control whilst an undergraduate at university and From Citizen to Refugee just before their meeting. They married in 1991 and have a son.

Honours and awards

Awards

  • 1997: Herskovits Prize for Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Colonialism
  • 1999: University of Cape Town Book Award for Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Colonialism[18]
  • 2009: GDS Eminent Scholar Award from the International Studies Association
  • 2011: Lenfest Distinguished Faculty Award[19]
  • 2012: Scholar of the Year at the 2nd Annual African Diaspora Awards for his immense contribution to African Scholarship[20]
  • 2012: Ugandan Diaspora Award 2012[4]

Honorary degrees

Bibliography

Books

  • The Myth of Population Control: Family, Class and Caste in an Indian Village (1972)
  • From Citizen to Refugee: Ugandan Asians Come to Britain (1973)
  • Politics and Class Formation in Uganda (1976)
  • Imperialism and Fascism in Uganda (1984)
  • Academic Freedom in Africa (1994)
  • Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism (1996)
  • When Victims Become Killers: Colonialism, Nativism and Genocide in Rwanda (2001)
  • Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: America, the Cold War and the Roots of Terror (2004)
  • Scholars in the Marketplace. The Dilemmas of Neo-Liberal Reform at Makerere University, 1989–2005 (2007)
  • Saviors and Survivors: Darfur, Politics, and the War on Terror (2009)
  • Define and Rule: Native as Political Identity (The W.E.B. DuBois Lectures) (2012)
  • When Victims Become Killers: Colonialism, Nativism, and the Genocide in Rwanda (2014)

Collected essays

  • Beyond Rights Talk and Culture Talk: Comparative Essays on the Politics of Rights and Culture (2000)

Edited volumes

  • Uganda Studies in Labour (Codesria Book Series) (1968)

Other works

  • Studies in Labor Markets (National Bureau of Economic Research Universities-National Bureau Conference Ser)
  • African Studies in Social Movements and Democracy (Actes-Sud Papiers)

References

  1. ^ "Profile: Mahmood Mamdani". Makerere University. Retrieved 18 March 2013.
  2. ^ "SIPA Faculty: Mahmood Mamdani". School of International and Public Affairs. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  3. ^ "Faculty Bio: Mahmood Mamdani". Columbia University. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  4. ^ a b c "Professor Mahmood Mamdani, Uganda's Leading Political Scholar & recipient Ugandan Diaspora Award 2012". ugandandiaspora.com. 29 November 2012. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  5. ^ a b c Sen, Manjula (25 January 2009). "'She interviewed me, we fell in love almost instantly'". The Telegraph (Calcutta). Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  6. ^ a b Mamdani, Mahmood (28 April 2007). "The Asian question again: A reflection". New Vision (Uganda) via pambazuka.org. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  7. ^ McCormack, Pete (17 October 2005). "Interview with Mahmood Mamdani". www.petemccormack.com. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  8. ^ Kagolo, Francis (8 February 2012). "Prof. Mamdani to be honoured among Africa's best". New Vision. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  9. ^ "UCT in war over 'bantu education'". Mail & Guardian. 11 March 2011. Retrieved 22 March 2013.
  10. ^ "Is African Studies at UCT a New Home for Bantu Education?" (PDF). Retrieved 22 March 2013.
  11. ^ "Speech by Dr. Mahmood Mamdani: Making Sense of Violence in Postcolonial Africa". Nobel Prize. 6 December 2001. Retrieved 24 March 2013.
  12. ^ "The 2008 List". Prospect Magazine (UK) / Foreign Policy (US). 2008.
  13. ^ Sneh, Itai Nartzizenfield (2008). The Future Almost Arrived: How Jimmy Carter Failed to Change U.S. Foreign Policy. p. 169 Peter Lang (publishing company).
  14. ^ "Mahmood Mamdani | Department of Political Science". polisci.columbia.edu. Retrieved 21 January 2016.
  15. ^ Mamdani, Mahmood (1 January 1996). Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism. pp. 3–33. ISBN 9780852553992.
  16. ^ Mamdani, Mahmood (1 January 1996). Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism. p. 37. ISBN 9780852553992.
  17. ^ Mamdani, Mahmood (1 January 1996). Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism. pp. 16–18. ISBN 9780852553992.
  18. ^ "UCT Book Award". University of Cape Town. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  19. ^ "Professor Mahmood Mamdani Recognized with Lenfest Award". School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University. 15 April 2011. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  20. ^ "Prof. Mamdani Is To Be Honored As "Scholar of the Year" At The Annual African Diaspora Awards NYC". MISR. 19 November 2012. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  21. ^ "Mahmood Mamdani conferred with an honorary doctorate". University of Johannesburg. May 2010. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  22. ^ "Speech delivered by Professor Prof Mahmood Mamdani at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa" (PDF). CODESRIA. 25 May 2010. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  23. ^ "Remarks on receipt of Honorary Doctorate at Addis Ababa University" (PDF). CODESRIA. 24 July 2010. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  24. ^ "Media Statemet: UKZN To honour leading South Africans and women graduates excel" (MS Word). University of KwaZulu-Natal. 12 April 2012. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
  25. ^ "Address on Receiving an Honorary Doctorate at the University of Kwazulu Natal" (PDF). Columbia University. 24 April 2012. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
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