In the Realms of Gold: Pioneering in African History

Born in India of British colonial parents, Roland Oliver moved to Africa as a young man and became one of the continent's leading modern historians. In this memoir, he writes of his work in training African scholars to conduct regional surveys and collect oral histories, in assembling the multivolume Cambridge History of Africa, and in struggling to give African history academic legitimacy at a time when most universities did not have scholars qualified to teach even an elementary course in the subject. Along the way Oliver considers the questions that engage Africanists today, such as the significance of European colonialism in the historical development of the continent and whether nationalism did more harm than good in the formation of modern African states.