Using only the three excerpts attached from 19th century travelers’ accounts of particular regions of Northeast and West Africa, construct an argument supporting, opposing, or revising John Iliffe’s view that Africa’s ancient rocks, poor soils, fickle rainfall, abundant insects, and unique prevalence of disease produced an environment hostile to agriculture and populations that were short lived and sparse.

The aim of this assignment is to enable you to construct in your own words a very succinct account of the complex ways in which women, men and children produced and traded in a wide range of agricultural and manufactured products in 19th century Africa, and to be able to do so on the basis of a close reading of texts written by three people close in age at the time of their travels to what you are now, i.e. their late teens and 20s.

Only use the short excerpts from the texts linked to this assignment. Make sure you use material (citations, quotes) from ALL three.

Please footnote quotes and other direct citations from the excerpts, and include a separate bibliography listing your three sources with full publication details (you will find these on the title page of each except) according to Chicago Style (a description of that system, widely used by scholars in the humanities and social sciences) is attached.