Research Catalog

Title

Robert W. July collection, 1958-1999.

Author

July, Robert William.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

• Beier, Ulli.
• Irele, Abiola.
• Austin, Dennis.
• Nketia, J. H. Kwabena.
• Crawford, Michael.
• Legum, Colin.
• Dike, K. Onwuka (Kenneth Onwuka)
• Sutherland, Efua Theodora.
• Diagne, Blaise, 1872-1934.
• Boilat, P.-D. (P.-David), 1814-1901.

Description

2 linear ft. (2 boxes)

Summary

The collection provides the perspective of an executive of a major foundation who encountered many of the leading cultural and intellectual figures in Africa, black and white, on the eve of independence in the French-speaking and British Commonwealth territories. The author's published books are represented by correspondence, reviews and research material. Other writings include two unpublished novels, book reviews, conference papers, encyclopedia articles, and an essay article on the political philosophy of Wole Soyinka. Correspondents include the critic and editor of "Black Orpheus," Ulli Beier; the Nigerian author and critic Abiola Irele; the British Africanist Dennis Austin; the Ghanaian folklorist Kwabena Nketia; the British editor of "Nigeria Magazine," Michael Crawford; the West African authors Colin Legum, Kenneth Dike and Efua Sutherland; in addition to publishers and agents. July's extensive research notes for the book "Origins of Modern African Thought" drew from local West African newspapers from the 1860s to the late 1920s, and from archival sources in Sierra Leone, Nigeria and Ghana. Also included are microfilm copies of documents from French colonial archives on the Senegalese Blaise Diagne, and on David Boilat, a mulatto priest and literacy advocate in West Africa in the 1840s.

Subject

• July, Robert William
• Soyinka, Wole > Criticism and interpretation

Note

• Photographs transferred to Photographs and Prints Division.

Source (note)

• Robert W. July estate

Biography (note)

• Born in 1918, Robert W. July was a Rockefeller Foundation Assistant Director for the Humanities and spent the decade between 1955 and 1965 scouting for new talent in West and Southern Africa. After a stint as visiting professor at the University College of Nairobi, Kenya, and the Ibadan Institute of African Studies, Nigeria, he switched to a new career as a historian. His work received critical praise from various African and African-American historians. July died in 2004.

Call Number

Sc MG 748

OCLC

NYPG05-A10134

Author

July, Robert William.

Title

Robert W. July collection, 1958-1999.

Biography

Born in 1918, Robert W. July was a Rockefeller Foundation Assistant Director for the Humanities and spent the decade between 1955 and 1965 scouting for new talent in West and Southern Africa. After a stint as visiting professor at the University College of Nairobi, Kenya, and the Ibadan Institute of African Studies, Nigeria, he switched to a new career as a historian. His work received critical praise from various African and African-American historians. July died in 2004.

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Finding Aid

Added Author

Beier, Ulli.

Irele, Abiola.

Austin, Dennis.

Nketia, J. H. Kwabena.

Crawford, Michael.

Legum, Colin.

Dike, K. Onwuka (Kenneth Onwuka)

Sutherland, Efua Theodora.

Diagne, Blaise, 1872-1934.

Boilat, P.-D. (P.-David), 1814-1901.

Research Call Number

Sc MG 748