Overview
- There are no other books that deal solely with African Cultural Astronomy
- Brings together the latest research on Africal Cultural Astronomy
Part of the book series: Astrophysics and Space Science Proceedings (ASSSP)
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Table of contents (18 papers)
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Front Matter
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Back Matter
Keywords
About this book
This is the first scholarly collection of articles focused on the cultural astronomy of Africans. It weaves together astronomy, anthropology, and Africa and it includes African myths and legends about the sky, alignments to celestial bodies found at archaeological sites and at places of worship, rock art with celestial imagery, and scientific thinking revealed in local astronomy traditions including ethnomathematics and the creation of calendars. Authors include astronomers Kim Malville, Johnson Urama, and Thebe Medupe; archaeologist Felix Chami, and geographer Michael Bonine, and many new authors. As an emerging subfield of cultural astronomy, African cultural astronomy researchers are focused on training students specifically for doing research in Africa. The first part of the volume contains lessons and exercises to help the beginning student of African cultural astronomy. Included are exercises in archaeoastronomy, cultural anthropology, and naked-eye astronomy penned by authors who use these regularly use these methods for their research. This collection of lessons and research papers provides a foundation for the cultural astronomy researcher interested in doing work in Africa.
Reviews
From the reviews:
"The 17 readable, stimulating papers deal with multiple topics: simple principles of looking at the heavens and what a person can get out of it as an anthropologist and a general observer … and finally how cultural astronomy is expressed today in African cultures. … Clearly a book for universities, this volume will also find interested readers in eclectic libraries, and amateur astronomers will be especially attracted by the contents. Summing Up: Recommended. All levels/libraries." (R. B. Clay, Choice, Vol. 46 (07), March, 2009)
Editors and Affiliations
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: African Cultural Astronomy
Book Subtitle: Current Archaeoastronomy and Ethnoastronomy research in Africa
Editors: Jarita C. Holbrook, Johnson O. Urama, R. Thebe Medupe
Series Title: Astrophysics and Space Science Proceedings
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-6639-9
Publisher: Springer Dordrecht
eBook Packages: Physics and Astronomy, Physics and Astronomy (R0)
Copyright Information: Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2008
Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-4020-6638-2Published: 21 December 2007
Softcover ISBN: 978-90-481-7687-8Published: 25 November 2010
eBook ISBN: 978-1-4020-6639-9Published: 01 January 2008
Series ISSN: 1570-6591
Series E-ISSN: 1570-6605
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: VIII, 260
Topics: Astronomy, Astrophysics and Cosmology, Astronomy, Observations and Techniques, History, general, Regional and Cultural Studies