Originally posted on Material Culture of Politics in Africa:
In a previous blog, I talked about why material culture matters in terms of conservation: political ephemera —  especially from opposition groups — is particularly vulnerable to loss.  This matters because we then only tell part of a story, we fail to fully grasp how contestation…

Originally posted on Material Culture of Politics in Africa:
This picture comes from my first visit to Zimbabwe in 1991. I was fascinated by the omnipresent President.  A friend ‘rescued’ this picture from an office where it had been abandoned, folded up and in tatters, replaced by a newer, shinier, framed portrait.  Even though it…