"Africa is people" may seem too simple and too obvious to some of us. But I have found in the course of my travels through the world that the most simple things can still givwe us a lot of trouble, even the brightest among us: this is particularly so in matters concerning Africa.

Let me tell you how I see Africa through my eyes. I see a continent rich in culture, diversity, and creativity, where communities are resilient, innovative, and deeply connected to their roots. I see young people driving change, entrepreneurs building solutions to local challenges, and a wealth of natural beauty that is second to none.

For Africa to me... is more than a glamorous fact. It is a historical truth. No man can know where he is going unless he knows exactly where he has been and exactly how he arrived at his present place.

Africa is interesting. We are unique. For the fact that we’re Africans, our stories are unique. It’s our time, I believe.

Now all the world is wonderful, but surely among its countries there is none more so than Africa; no, not even China the unchanging, or India the ancient. For this reason, I think: those great lands have always been more or less known to their own inhabitants, whereas Africa, as a whole, from the beginning was and still remains unknown.

Africa is not the dark continent, Africa is a great continent, Africa is not a dying continent, Africa is a beautiful continent.

Africa has challenges because of its diversity, and that could also be its strength.

Africa's a continent that's known for its resources, you know. It's very rich in terms of any kind of resource that you can get out of the ground that has value. You're going to find it in abundance somewhere on that continent, whether it's oil, whether it's rubber, whether it's gems or precious metals. It led to colonization and exploitation. It led to borders being drawn, not by the people who are from there, you know. And it led to the mental horrors of colonization, which comes with being told that you're less than, and not worthy of, and losing your language — losing your heritage, and the cousin of colonization, which is a very scary relative of it, is the theft of bodies, is what happened to my ancestors.

A Conrad student informed me in Scotland that Africa is merely a setting for the disintegration of the mind of Mr. Kurtz. Which is partly the point. Africa as setting and backdrop which eliminates the African as human factor. Africa as a metaphysical battlefield devoid of all recognizable humanity, into which the wandering European enters at his peril.

Africa is the world’s youngest continent, and its talents and resources are huge.

..Africa: it's a magic word that lends itselfs to suppositions and sets amateur explorers to dreaming. I want to try to be 'at home' on this bit of foreign [Arab] soil.

Africa is a geographical landscape, and Africans are the human resources deposited into it. Meanwhile, the digital community and preferences are technology, and technology is a tool. This suggests that African essentialism is not only powered by the existence of technology.

There has been a way of seeing Africa in terms of poverty and conflict which has become a kind of shorthand for the continent that still persists today.

Africa is big: fifty-four countries, 900 million people who are too busy starving and dying and warring and emigrating to read your book. The continent is full of deserts, jungles, highlands, savannahs and many other things, but your reader doesn’t care about all that, so keep your descriptions romantic and evocative and unparticular.