The History of Africa

In this episode Zeinab Badawi visits rarely seen historic sites and ruins in Mali and Mauritania. Under armed guard, Zeinab visits the fabled city of Timbuktu, which was overrun by extremists in 2012.

Zeinab Badawi travels to Nigeria where she is granted arare interview with the King of the Benin kingdom in Nigeria. She meets the Queen Mother of Lagos, at her ancestral palace on Lagos Island where she relates the history of the Yoruba people.

In this episode Zeinab Badawi visits the coastal settlements of Kenya, Tanzania, and Mozambique on the Indian Ocean coast. Zeinab then recounts the history of how the arrival of the Arabs marked the start of trade of enslaved Africans.

In this episode, Zeinab Badawi travels to South Africa, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, and Zambia to find out about the powerful kingdoms of southern Africa and their rulers from the 10th to 19th century.

In this episode, join Zeinab as she travels to Ghana and Cote D'Ivoire to find out about the history of the Asante people and the great queen who led the resistance against the British and concealed the Asante's most valued possession: the Golden Stool.

In this episode, Zeinab Badawi provides an overview of how Africans lived before the arrival of Europeans. The title describes people who were 'no longer at ease' in the run up to one of the ugliest chapters in history: the transAtlantic slave trade.

Much is known about enslaved Africans once they arrived in the Americas and Europe, but in this episode Zeinab looks at the impact on Africa itself. She travels to several countries to see how, where, and why this trade began in Cabo Verde in 1510.

In this episode, Zeinab Badawi visits Ghana and sees how momentum in the transAtlantic slave trade led to competition for enslaved Africans between European nations who built numerous slave forts along West Africa's Atlantic coast.

Zeinab Badawi travels to Southern Africa to see how the people came to grasp the destruction that would be inflicted upon them by white settlers. We hear about story of Shaka Zulu and how he helped reshape the map of southern Africa.

In this episode Zeinab travels to Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Congo to bring the history of the great Kongo Empire to light . A 99 year old woman relates her memory of Belgian rule during what became known as the 'Scramble for Africa'.

Host Zeinab Badawi examines the struggle for freedom. She talks about that time of independence with the families of three of Africa's best known independence leaders: Kwame Nkrumah,Patrice Lumuba and Leopold Senghor, as well as the son of Fela Kuti.