Something we’ve been confused about here in Tanzania is why so many Christian women marry Muslims. We asked our student friends, one of whom has a sister who got married to a Muslim. They said it’s not family pressure. Instead, for most girls, it’s seeing the money the Muslim guys […]
As the new academic year begins in Dodoma, it seems like every weekend features another mkesha, the big all-night gathering for university students. The mkesha phenomenon is little more than a decade old. We’re told it began in Dar es Salaam around 2000. With packed daily timetables, students were busy, but were […]
In the last couple of weeks, as the new semester begins, I’ve heard three visions for life at university. Each had a slightly different message and way of using the Bible. I’ve sketched them out below. Wanachuo refers to university students — it’s a neologism that reflects the emerging reality of Tanzania’s […]
Julius Nyerere was Baba wa Taifa of Tanzania, ‘Father of the Nation’, and his portrait still hangs in many shops, banks and schools. He also bore the title Mwalimu, ‘Teacher’. Education was a massive priority for him and this is what he had to say about university students. Those who […]
The academic year has drawn to a close here in Dodoma, which means I’ve completed my first semester auditing a Swahili literature course. I was thrilled to be going back to uni and it’s been super beneficial so I thought I’d share my reasons for why I want to keep […]
Tutorials for my Swahili literature course have finished now as the semester draws to a close. They’ve been a highlight of the course. There are about 40 people in mine and everyone sits in rows on one half of the classroom, facing into the middle. The presenter stands in front […]
It is a very humbling thing to be the one white person in a lecture about black literature. My cheeks burned as the shameful theology of the Sons of Ham was recounted to explain why westerners have looked down on African people for centuries. I felt my own presence questioned […]
Meet Jesus at uni 