Foreign Policy Blogs

Despite My Reservations . . .

I am deeply skeptical of online education, especially as it’s being sold both to the public (cheap college in your pajamas!) and to those of us in academia (students want cheap college in their pajamas! We must give it to them!) But certainly the internet can be a very useful tool for learning. I will always advocate good old-fashioned face-to-face classroom time where people talk to one another, argue with one another, and where they can see my facial expressions when I am being a wry smartass (as opposed to the short, cold, angry tone that almost all wry smartass remarks convey online). I would thus encourage you to check out these 100 Open Lectures All About Africa, even if after completing them you won’t have earned a degree.

[Hat tip to my editor, Robert, for the link.]

 

Author

Derek Catsam

Derek Catsam is a Professor of history and Kathlyn Cosper Dunagan Professor in the Humanities at the University of Texas of the Permian Basin. He is also Senior Research Associate at Rhodes University. Derek writes about race and politics in the United States and Africa, sports, and terrorism. He is currently working on books on bus boycotts in the United States and South Africa in the 1940s and 1950s and on the 1981 South African Springbok rugby team's tour to the US. He is the author of three books, dozens of scholarly articles and reviews, and has published widely on current affairs in African, American, and European publications. He has lived, worked, and travelled extensively throughout southern Africa. He writes about politics, sports, travel, pop culture, and just about anything else that comes to mind.

Areas of Focus:
Africa; Zimbabwe; South Africa; Apartheid

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