GENV Unit 6

Question 1

6 models of African Cities

Answer 1

i. The Indigenous City
ii. The Islamic City
iii. The Colonial (administrative) City
iv. The European City
v. The Dual City
The Hybrid City

Question 2

The Indigenous City

Answer 2

• Prior to European colonization
  
  • Administrative and trade centers
  • Examples:
    ○ Benin City in Nigeria,
    ○ City of Loagno, City of Kumasi,
    City of Timbuktu in Mali

Question 3

The Islamic City

Answer 3

• Found across much of the Sahara
  
  • Predominantly northern Nigeria and southern Tanzania
  • Served as religious centers and market places during trans-Saharan trade
  • Design of city based on principle and features of Islamic cities in Middle East
  • Three Planning Principles
    ○ Natural principles
    ○ Religious principles; example the mosque
    ○ Social Principles
    Key features
    ▪ Education
    ▪ Hygiene
    ▪ Housing
  • Examples:
    ○ Sokoto, Kano
    ○ Merca in Solamlia

Question 4

The Colonial City

Answer 4

• Built by Europeans
  
  • Examples
    ○ Dakar in Senegal
    ○ Freetown in Sierra Leon
    ○ Accra in Ghana
  • Served as main points of contact between the colonizers and the native people
  • Colonial housing regimes
    ○ British went on to establish colonial housing policies

Question 5

The European City

Answer 5

• Design based on European town planning ideas
• Originally built as “colonial” city later became a place of permanent new settlement
• Slums are integral part of city systems
• Pretoria - apartheid city model
  ○ 1936 about same number of whites and blacks with fairly high segregation
  ○ 1950’s tens of thousands of non-European residents were forcibly removed un Illegal Squatting and Group Areas Acts
  1961 shortage of several thousand houses, to solve issue established Ga-Rankuwa behind the ‘black reserve’

Question 6

The Dual City

Answer 6

• Combination of two or more of the other types of cities
• Dual cities exhibit a clear distinction between parts
• Example
  Kano in Nigeria

Question 7

The Hybrid City

Answer 7

Characterized by the integration of indigenous and foreign elements in all parts of the city, increased in number since decolonization
- Example
○ Knox and McCarthy
- Accra exhibits an irregular pattern of ethnic and religious enclaves superimposed upon residential sectors of different levels
- Characterized by rapid expansion of an unplanned peripheral sprawl of high-income development