African Studies.

[James Leopold]

I have a few questions maybe a few of you can donate research and logic to. See, I lost my books for class and I'm broke so I can't buy them again. So basically I am answering questions from online resources. Questions are:

1. what are some major environmental challenges Africans face?
2. which areas of africa are most densely populated?
3. why is the term "tribe" inaccurate to describe different African cultures? what do african scholars say about the concept of "race"?
4. What are the major language families of African languages and where they are located?
5. why is the custom of polygyny declining in Africa?
6. what is the difference between segmental system of government and hierarchal form of government? What about pyramidal systems?

Thanks!

1. I would say that the most serious environmental challenge facing Africa is global warming. Africa already has problems with drought because of its intense heat, but as the polar ice caps melt, it is predicted that the saltwater from these ice caps will knock the North Atlantic drift off course. The North Atlantic drift is what keeps Britain and Northern Europe warmer than Canada and Russia (If you look at a map, Britain is the same latitude as Siberia!). The drift would be knocked south by this and start to heat up Africa. Leaving Europe even colder and Africa even warmer than they were before. This will be catastrophic for the continent as there will be more droughts and ore deaths.

2. The most densely populated areas of Africa would be the Urban areas, mainly the outskirts of major cities. In rural areas, things have been going into decline, less people are interested in buying food from farmers and more interested in trade. This forces families to abandon their farms and move to the cities in search of money.Because of their poor wealth, they would not have enough to afford a house. This forces them to build their own on the outskrts of ciies along with every other poor african, these are called shanty towns. These are so packed, that there would be over 10 people to each house.

3. I'm not really certain of this, but I suppose the term "tribe" could be thought of as demeaning. Making it out that these people are more primitive and less intelligent than ourselves. This is of course wrong, so I suppose people use the word "race" to make these people be thought more as equals than as primitives. Again, I'm not sure of this.

4. I don't know what you mean by language familes, but I do know that many Northern African countries are fluent in French. This is because North Africa used to be controled by France many years ago, until these countries claimed their independence. Spain, Portugal, Italy, Germany and Britain also had territories in Africa, so those areas may also speak those languages.

5. I suppose this might be because of Western influence, or that Africans are changing their views on how many wives they should have. I'm not an anthropologist, so I can't really help you there.

6. No idea mate

Hopefully that was of some help.