From its modest beginnings in the mid-19th century, Dar es Salaam has
grown to become one of sub-Saharan Africa's most important urban
centres. A major political, economic and cultural hub, the city stood at
the cutting edge of trends that transformed twentieth-century East
Africa. Dar es Salaam has recently attracted the attention of a diverse,
multi-disciplinary, range of scholars, making it currently one of the
continent's most studied urban centres. This collection from eleven
scholars from Africa, Europe, North America and Japan, draws on some of
the best of this scholarship and offers a comprehensive, and accessible,
survey of the city's development. The perspectives include history,
musicology, ethnomusicology, culture including popular culture, land and
urban economics. The opening chapter offers a comprehensive overview of
the history of the city. Subsequent chapters examine Dar es Salaam's
twentieth century experience through the prism of social change and the
administrative repercussions of rapid urbanization; and through popular
culture and shifting social relations. The book will be of interest not
only to the specialist in urban studies but also to the general reader
with an interest in Dar es Salaam's environmental, social and cultural
history. James Brennan is a Lecturer in History at the School of
Oriental & African Studies (SOAS), University of London. His research
interests include nationalism and urbanization in Tanzania, and he is
currently researching the historical role of radio and other mass media
in East Africa's political culture. Andrew Burton is an Honorary
Research Fellow of the British Institute in Eastern Africa, based in
Addis Ababa. He has published widely on East African urban culture; and
his current interests are the history of youth, urbanization and
delinquency in Eastern Africa. Yusuf Lawi is the former Head of the
Department of History at the University of Dar es Salaam; and is
currently Senior Lecturer in History and Deputy Director of the
University's Centre for Continuing Education. He specializes in
environmental and social history.
