Reconsidering Colonial Heritage in West African Cities: Urban Space in Cape Verde, Senegal and The Gambia (Routledge Studies in the Modern History of Africa)

The material heritage of the colonial era is built into Africa’s cities, from their urban layouts, to their architecture, monuments and street names.This book discusses the varying responses to colonial heritage in West African cities, with a particular focus on the case studies of Praia in Cape Verde, Dakar in Senegal and Banjul in The Gambia. Europeans tended to focus on cities as centres of administration, and they were often both the starting points for settlement and the locations in which power was formally handed over to new African governments.Colonialism in Praia, Dakar and Banjul was abolished at different times, under different colonial powers (Portuguese, French and British) and amongst vastly different conditions of unrest.Based on extensive original research, this book demonstrates that the contemporary approach to the contentious issue of urban colonial heritage is often determined by metropolis-colony relationship before decolonisation, postcolonial diplomatic relations