Niger & Nigeria

Curse Of The Black Gold: 50 Years of Oil in the Niger Delta

Curse of the Black Gold: 50 Years of Oil in the Niger Delta takes a graphic look at the profound cost of oil exploitation in West Africa. Featuring images by world-renowned photojournalist Ed Kashi and text by Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka, prominent Nigerian journalists, human rights activists, and University of California at Berkeley professor Michael Watts, this book traces the 50-year history of NigeriaÂ’s oil interests and the resulting environmental degradation and community conflicts that have plagued the region.
Now one of the major suppliers of U.S. oil, Nigeria is the sixth largest producer of oil in the world. Set against a backdrop of what has been called the scramble for African oil, Curse of the Black Gold is the first book to document the consequences of a half-century of oil exploration and production in one of the worldÂ’s foremost centers of biodiversity. This book exposes the reality of oilÂ’s impact and the absence of sustainable development in its wake, providing a compelling pictorial history of one of the worldÂ’s great deltaic areas. Accompanied by powerful writing by some of the most prominent public intellectuals and critics in contemporary Nigeria, KashiÂ’s photographs capture local leaders, armed militants, oil workers, and nameless villagers, all of whose fates are inextricably linked. His exclusive coverage bears witness to the ongoing struggles of local communities, illustrating the paradox of poverty in the midst of plenty.
The publication of Curse of the Black Gold occurs at a moment of worldwide concern over dependency on petroleum, dubbed by New York Times journalist Thomas Friedman as "the resource curse." Much has been written about the drama of the search for oil—Daniel Yergin’s The Prize and Ryszard Kapus´cin´ski’s Shah of Shahs are two of the most widely lauded—but there has been no serious examination of the relations between oil, environment, and community in a particular oil-producing region. Curse of the Black Gold is a landmark work of historic significance.

Nigeria 2nd (Bradt Travel Guide Nigeria)

To Timbuktu: A Journey Down the Niger

Nigeria Map by ITMB

Folded road and travel map in color. Scale 1:1,600,000. Distinguishes roads ranging from freeways to other roads. Legend includes tracks, railways, international/domestic airports, airfields, gas stations, hospitals/medical facilities, hotels, rest houses, huts, camp sites, border crossings, ferries, points of interest, archaeological sites, museums, mosques, missions/churches, beaches, national parks, nature reserves. Includes inset map of Lagos, Lagos Island and Benin City.

Niger: The Bradt Travel Guide

Among the Ibos of Nigeria (Travellers, Explorers & Pioneers)

Journal of an expedition to explore the course and termination of the Niger: With a narrative of a voyage down the river to its termination (Harper's family library)

Nigeria (Countries of the World)

No camera or fanny pack needed for this trip! We're traveling to faraway lands with the turn of a page! Children will discover similarities and differences of each country's culture, landscape, geography, economics, and more!

Cultural Dimensions of Expatriate Life in Nigeria

"Cultural Dimensions - Nigeria" reflects the author's love of West Africa, as well as the combined observations and experiences of many other expatriates whose views have contributed to this book. Here is a brief sample of the kind of "street-smart" information you will encounter throughout the book.

Nearly all rural Nigerians and even many urban dwellers, including many Muslims believe in the existence of nature spirits. These are spirits that animate water, trees, rocks, etc. In some areas there will be a special Chief in charge of a shrine to a particular spirit. Many Nigerians believe in the power of these spirits to help and to harm. Illness, injury and death are often attributed to a strong juju cast by an enemy, and drought and famine are seen as signs of the anger of these spirits, while equally often good fortune and good crops, along with healthy children and productive animals are attributed to the positive spirits.

African culture is rich in spiritual experience throughout everyday life because spiritual experience is not limited to formal practices and ceremonies but occurs many times a day as a person goes about the ordinary tasks of living like working, communicating, eating, talking, or thinking. Westerners tend to pride themselves on not being superstitious, and may sometimes characterize the kinds of beliefs they flatter themselves to think that they observe among Africans as primitive or magical. This kind of culturally biased observation may appear to have little to do with technical or business issues, however, West Africa is not kind to Western managers and technical experts who fail to understand the power of the unseen.

For many Africans, especially those who are not technically or broadly educated, the world is full of unseen forces that act on people and on mechanical systems as well. When a complex system begins behaving erratically or breaks down, the Western analytical mind immediately begins to look for the mechanical or electrical cause, and only jokes about bugs and gremlins. From the traditional African point of view, a highly probable cause of any given system failure would be what Westerners call magic or witchcraft. Many educated Africans reject the notion that they are affected by such thinking, but that rejection may sometimes be due to concern for how their western colleagues would judge them if they admitted even an academic interest in the topic.

Babes In The Jungle: A Year of Village Life in the Niger Delta

Rats in the rafters, lizards in the store room, and soldier ants advancing purposefully through the yard towards the house - millions of them. Babies under threat from a twin taboo, a neighbour engaged in illegal activity, and a "corpse" that climbed a palm tree. These were some of the adventures and misadventures that befell the author and his family during an eventful year in a village in the Niger Delta 40 years ago. And all against the backdrop of two military coups and increasing political tension that eventually led up to the Biafra war.