A IS FOR AFRICA

A London-based photographer offers images of traditional life and culture in her Nigerian homeland. Sharp, sun-drenched photos filled with smiles and bright colors create an idealized impression of village life, with little evidence of poverty and only occasional, inadvertent, signs of modern influences—a child wearing a T-shirt, or oil lamps made from recycled milk tins. In an introduction and many of the brief captions, the author suggests that the drums, beads, mud huts, family structures, and other details she captures on film represent Africa in microcosm, a risky sort of reductionism. The diversity—and unities—of African culture are evoked more effectively for younger readers by Musgrove's Ashanti to Zulu (1976); the photos in Chiasson's African Journey (1987) provide a more multifaceted view of village life. Visually appealing, but simplistic. (Picture book. 5-8)