The Myth and Reality of Empire Building: Italian Land Policy and Practice in Ethiopia, 1935-1941.

Apart from being Italo-centric, the vast majority of scholarly work on the short-lived period of Italian occupation of Ethiopia is mainly preoccupied with political events and particularly with their repercussions on international diplomacy. With the exception of a few pioneering studies, Italian rule and its impact on Ethiopia is given marginal importance. The present thesis confines itself to one specific key area of Italian policy - land. Search for an outlet to settle Italy's excess population and deploy its surplus capital, had sustained Italian imperialist ambitions from the 19th century and justified the conquest of Ethiopia against quasi universal international opposition. With the conquest of Ethiopia, Italy claimed to have become one of the 'satisfied' nations. Unlike the older Italian colonies that were described as a useless "collection of sand", Ethiopia, with its varying climate and fertile soil, was portrayed as an El Dorado where Italy's long-standing imperial aspirations could be effectively fulfilled. Yet impressive land colonization programmes, aiming at settling Italian colonists with a mission to transform, within a short time, the agricultural sector into "the granary of Italy" and the Ethiopian Empire into an extension of a Magna Italia, were an unmitigated failure. The building of the Empire proved extremely difficult, largely because realities on the ground had vastly hampered practical results. Nevertheless, the attendant policies accelerated the process of change already set in motion and had a lasting effect on traditional Ethiopian social structure. Each chapter discusses key aspects of these policies, highlighting the forces contributing to the great contrast between their formulation and their actual achievement and, particularly in the conclusion, their impact on an independent Ethiopia

Working At Night

The night has always and almost universally represented a special ‘out of the ordinary’ temporal zone with its own meanings, possibilities, and dangers. It is only since the modern era that the night has become increasingly ‘normalised’. Although 24/7 industrial production is often seen as a consequence of capitalist expansion, other political and economic regimes adopted the ‘night shift’, normalising it as part of an alternative modernity

Working At Night

The night has always and almost universally represented a special ‘out of the ordinary’ temporal zone with its own meanings, possibilities, and dangers. It is only since the modern era that the night has become increasingly ‘normalised’. Although 24/7 industrial production is often seen as a consequence of capitalist expansion, other political and economic regimes adopted the ‘night shift’, normalising it as part of an alternative modernity

Popular fiction television production in Nigeria: global models, local responses

This thesis explores the ways in which popular fiction television is produced in Nigeria in the 21st century and through it the investigation of social relations in the industry and the analysis of its products. In so doing the thesis also interrogates the assumptions of social theorists regarding the impact that the globalization of culture is supposed to have on local cultures. Drawing on empirical evidence from fieldwork carried out in Nigeria between February and June 2006 involving participant observation in the location production of a television drama series, semi-structured and unstructured interviews with 15 people in Nigeria’s television industry, the thesis argues that despite some production practices in the industry not yet being, according to the practitioners, up to scratch, Nollywood has also evolved social and institutional structures which are recognisable features of the structure of the television industry everywhere. The thesis also argues that despite its having an industry that is ranked third in the world in terms of output, the West, but Hollywood in particular, retains a strong grip on the imagination of Nigeria’s popular fiction television producers. For a more nuanced account of the impact of the globalization of culture on Nigeria’s popular fiction television industry, however, I propose that we need to go beyond how people speak about what they do, to how they do what they do. Analysis of popular conventions of a less powerful audio visual industry, like Nigeria’s Nollywood, alongside those of Hollywood will help unpack further the nature of the impact that dominant cultures are assumed to have on local cultures

1995 BRAC Commission

Regional Hearing Material for CA, IL, MA, GA, TX Regional Hearings, May - June 1995. (Box 94