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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

I'm happy to pass on the news from Micah's family that he is safely out of Djibouti and expected home in Johannesburg this evening.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

More here on the disappearance of Micah Reddy. Good to read here that the South African government is on the case. www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2026...

dailymaverick.co.za

Top SA investigative journalist goes missing in Djibouti

South African investigative journalist Micah Reddy has not been heard from since midday on Saturday.…

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Worried about my friend the investigative journalist Micah Reddy, who seems to have gone missing in Djibouti. He and his family are in my thoughts.

Photo of Micah with the text:
Urgent alert 🚨: Roshan Micah Reddy, a #southafrican journalist and the #ICJI’s Africa coordinator, has gone missing in Djibouti.
He was staying at the Escale International Hotel and had been in $Djibouti since Thursday. The ICJI and the editorial team at his newspaper have had no news of him since 6.00 am (Eastern Time) this morning. He was accompanied by a local contact named Kooki Mahmoud, of whom there is also no news.
A missing person report has been filed with the #British and South African governments.
According to our information, the hotel is believed to be owned by members of the family of djiboutian President Ismaël Omar Guelleh and is known to be a stronghold of the djiboutian secret services.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Please sign this petition in support of my colleague Sishuwa Sishuwa and other Zambian citizens whose passports have been revoked. c.org/Msb9SWnLGv

c.org

Sign the Petition

Overturn the cancellation of the passports of Dr. Sishuwa Sishuwa and other Zambians

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Reposted by Justin Pearce

Journal of Southern African Studies @jsas-journal.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

JSAS statement in support of Dr Sishuwa Sishuwa jsas.blog/statement-in...

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

I'm sure that if I were a voter in Tennessee I would be supporting Justin J. Pearson and agree his opponent looks vile, but I need to make clear that I am not in Tennessee, I am not in the USA, and I am not Justin J. Pearson.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

There has to be a word in some language for the special kind of unwitting violence done by the Northern Hemisphere based scholar expressing the hope that 'you had a good summer' as we stagger bleary-eyed into the second half of the second semester.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Sad to hear this, but privileged to have known the generous and unassuming John Iliffe. I'll never forget the first time (2013) I tried to contact him and was told he doesn't use email. I dropped off a letter at his college and very soon he replied. RIP.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 07/08/2026

Really enjoyed editing this article. It answered a question that I've been thinking about ever since I was doing my own (unrelated) research and wondering why there were so many eucalyptus plantations in the Angolan highlands.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

Interesting retake on the famous Anna Karenina aphorism. 'Unhappy families tend to spin conflicting narratives, and there would probably be no literature without them.' www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

newyorker.com

How Emily Wilson Made Homer Modern

Her vitally urgent translations of the Iliad and the Odyssey strip away the “tarnish of centuries.”

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

The fact that there is nothing about RW Johnson on Bluesky and lots on Twitter tells you quite a lot about the difference between 'liberal' as understood in SA and in USA. (Even funnier, 'RW Johnson' in bsky search brings up skeets with RW meaning 'right wing' + various Johnsons including Boris.)

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Journal of Southern African Studies @jsas-journal.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

📢 New Article! Do extractive mega-projects create development or deepen inequality? Mattioli compares mining in Tete & LNG development in Cabo Delgado, showing how communities experienced dispossession, organised resistance & challenged extractivist development www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

Best conference ever? #Zimbabwe & Zimbabweans have such a central place in Southern African historiography that having #SAHS in Harare was a necessary acknowledgement of that. Wonderful finally to meet so many people, mostly Zimbabwean, whom I've worked with virtually but never met in person. 1/5

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 25/06/2026

Only in Zimbabwe do you see trees this colour. In Harare with the rest of the delegation from Stellenbosch to #SAHS2026

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

Having just returned to the Democratic Republic of Xenophobia after a wonderful few days in which I was warmly welcomed as a South African in Zimbabwe, it was particularly galling to see this.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 25/06/2026

Only in Zimbabwe do you see trees this colour. In Harare with the rest of the delegation from Stellenbosch to #SAHS2026

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

Hope Czechs appreciate being the new lodestar of Pan Africanism but I doubt it. A country that has foresworn its past of socialist anticolonial solidarity and snuggles in the embrace of Fortress Europe. But hey, are we any better?

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

Sorrowful to see Africans supporting Czechia against South Africa today but can totally understand why.

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Reposted by Justin Pearce

👻 Jack Djinn Wail 🧞 @jacktindale.bsky.social · 15/06/2026

Is your child up at 9pm arguing about tram networks with the entire staff of the FT and some tedious Americans who are not familiar with the concept of a joke? This report make shock you.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

Our Special Issue of @jsas-journal.bsky.social 'Liberation Armies' Imagined Futures in Southern Africa' is now out. We focus on military institutions formed by liberation struggles & remade in independent states as sites of political, social & cultural production. www.tandfonline.com/toc/cjss20/5...

tandfonline.com

Journal of Southern African Studies

Liberation Armies' Imagined Futures in South Africa. Volume 51, Issue 6 of Journal of Southern African Studies

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

My vanishingly few South African followers will share my amusement here. Naughty Helen.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

Idea for a 1980s cover band: Proxy Music.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 27/05/2026

Connections Puzzle #1081 🟩🟨🟪🟦 🟪🟪🟪🟪 🟦🟦🟦🟦 🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟨🟨🟨🟨 First guess had four different colours. Thereafter a reverse rainbow.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

Even cynical I was starting to be moved by the love-fest around Jason Vanporppal. Then I learnt that his two Ugandan companions were denied entry to South Africa. Apparently we suspend our xenophobia for those who bear first-world passports and are not too dark of complexion.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 13/05/2026

To the small Venn diagram of people who follow both South African & UK politics - is anyone else seeing an uncanny resemblance between Wes Streeting & Geordin Hill-Lewis?

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

Slightly increase a band: Level 43.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 10/05/2026

Allowing myself a moment of nostalgia for the 2010s internet. Doge Weather (and everything Doge). Feminist Ryan Gosling. Strindberg and Helium. What do you miss?

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Reposted by Justin Pearce

The Journal of African History @thejah.bsky.social · 04/05/2026

Read the new #OA article by João Vicente Melo on the early colonial elites of #Luanda. #CentralAfrica #AtlanticWorld #Angola #Portugal #Eurafricans #microhistory cup.org/4naBY4L

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

Exactly a decade after my last contribution to @currenthistory1.bsky.social, I have a new article on how both the habits of ruling parties & the possibilities for opposition in #Angola & #Mozambique are constrained by history 50 years after independence. (Paywalled: I can share a copy on request.)

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Reposted by Justin Pearce

Journal of Southern African Studies @jsas-journal.bsky.social · 03/04/2026

📢 New Article! What happens when liberation movements fight in someone else’s war? @justinpearce.bsky.social examines MK’s time in Angola, showing how tensions with FAPLA & competing political visions shaped their alliance and contributed to the 1983–84 mutiny. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Chris Hani, chief of staff of Umkhonto we Sizwe (also known as MK), walks among the MK troops at a rally marking the 30th anniversary of the group's formation, Langa Stadium, Cape Town, South Africa, December 16, 1991.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 08/04/2026

In much of the UK press the analysis of central & eastern European politics goes no further than 'pro-Soviet' = bad guys / 'pro-Western' = good guys. Listen out for the sound of heads exploding. www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...

theguardian.com

JD Vance claims US is not interfering in Hungary election

US vice-president says on visit to Budapest ‘we had to show’ support for Viktor Orbán, as opposition leads polls

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

New article connects Angolan & South African Cold War historiographies, examining the incompatible views of malcontent MPLA & ANC troops who fought on the same side during ANC exile in Angola, particularly on the question of whether UNITA were compatriots or foes. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

tandfonline.com

‘In my territory you have to do something’: MK, FAPLA and the War against UNITA

Camps in Angola were crucial training grounds for the South African liberation army Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) from the late 1970s and through the 1980s, a period when the Angolan state army, FAPLA (Po...

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

I may just have coined a new derogatory political epithet, 'thinktanky'. Cf 'thinktanks on their lawn'.

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 22/03/2026

Bluesky this weekend has been full of supposedly left-wing Americans celebrating someone for having willingly fought in an imperialist war.

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African Politics Conference Group @africanpoliticscg.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

The call for 2026 APCG Award Nominations is live! The deadline for nominations is May 1st. Nominate scholars for Best Dissertation, Best Graduate Student Paper, Distinguished Africanist, Best Article and Best Book! www.afpol.org/blog/2026-ap...

afpol.org

2026 APCG Award Nominations

The 2026 APCG Award nominations are now open and due May 1st! Nominate scholars for Best Dissertation, Best Graduate Student Paper, Distinguished Africanist, Best Article and Best Book.

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Reposted by Justin Pearce

The Journal of African History @thejah.bsky.social · 26/02/2026

Read the new #OpenAccess article by Arturo Zoffmann Rodriguez on the #Ovambo #Genocide in #Angola. #colonialism #Portugal #violence #famine bit.ly/4rhHhQl

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Justin Pearce @justinpearce.bsky.social · 05/02/2026

'They took the credit for your second symphony Rewritten by machine on new technology.' Buggles prefigured AI in 1979. www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8r-...

youtube.com

The Buggles - Video Killed The Radio Star (Official Music Video)

YouTube video by TheBugglesVEVO

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