We are pleased to return from a brief summer break with a new episode of Resistant Communiqués Podcast with Dr. Elizabeth Schmidt, “Race, Foreign Policy, and Africa: A Conversation with Dr. Elizabeth Schmidt.”

Dr. Elizabeth Schmidt is professor emeritus of history at Loyola University Maryland and president of the African Studies Association. She received her PhD from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. A scholar-activist, she has written six books about Africa, covering US involvement in apartheid South Africa, women under colonialism in Zimbabwe, the nationalist movement in Guinea, and foreign intervention in Africa from the Cold War to the war on terror. Her current book project focuses on US and UK support for the white minority regime in Southern Rhodesia in the context of decolonization and the Cold War. Based on recently declassified documents in the US National Archives, it makes a plea for public historians to introduce the population at large to the lessons of history.

For most Americans, Africa is a misunderstood and largely ignored part of the world. The continent is flattened into one homogenous entity: its historical experiences are erased, and the common perception is that the whole continent is dysfunctional. Dated racist tropes and beliefs are still commonplace. The U.S. government has followed suit: apart from intervention as part of the Global War on Terror, Africa is given little attention. Under the Trump Administration, foreign aid commitments have been slashed. Dr. Elizabeth Schmidt is a historian of Africa and U.S. diplomacy who first became an academic at the height of the movement to oppose apartheid in South Africa. Her activism began with research opposing U.S. business involvement in the South African economy. Still, she went on to write multiple books on Southern Africa, decolonization, and foreign intervention on the continent. She spoke with us to discuss her work, the Trump Administration’s views on race and its impact on foreign policy, current U.S. foreign policy towards the continent, and both the challenges and opportunities available to university educators today.

Here is our interview with Dr. Schmidt.

Listen, share, and study with us using the multimedia syllabus below.

Luta,Resistant Communiqués CollectiveLearn more about Resistant Communiqués on the About page (here).Accessibility: The transcript for this episode is available.

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Multimedia Syllabus

Race

Elizabeth Schmidt. “The Dangers of White Totalitarianism.” Africa is a Country. https://africasacountry.com/2024/09/the-dangers-of-white-totalitarianism

William Minter and Sylvia Hill. “Anti-apartheid solidarity in United States–South Africa relations: From the margins to the mainstream.” In The Road to Democracy in South Africa, Volume 3, International Solidarity, Part II. http://www.noeasyvictories.org/research/sadet_usa.pdf William Minter and Zeb Larson. “Make Apartheid Great Again?” Foreign Policy in Focus. https://fpif.org/make-apartheid-great-again/

“The National Party Victory and the Implementation of Apartheid, 1948-1960.” https://antiapartheidlegacy.org.uk/national-party-victory-implementation-apartheid/

Foreign Policy

Inkstick Media. “America’s Forever Wars Have Yielded a 75,000% Increase in Terror Attacks in Africa.”

https://inkstickmedia.com/americas-forever-wars-have-yielded-a-75000-increase-in-terror-attacks-in-africa/

Elizabeth Schmidt. Foreign Intervention in Africa after the Cold War: Sovereignty, Responsibility, and the War on Terror. Ohio University Press. Open Access: https://ohioopen.library.ohio.edu/oupress/13/.

NPR. “Study: 14 million lives could be lost due to Trump aid cuts.”

https://www.npr.org/sections/goats-and-soda/2025/07/01/nx-s1-5452513/trump-usaid-foreign-aid-deaths

Post-Independence Africa

BBC. “Sudan war: A Simple Guide to what is happening.” https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjel2nn22z9o

Global Public Life. “Review: Walter Rodney’s How Europe Underdeveloped Africa.” https://www.theoryculturesociety.org/blog/review-walter-rodney-how-europe-underdeveloped-africa

Talking Politics. “Fanon on Colonialism.”

Elizabeth Schmidt. “The Global Exploitation of Congo Must End.” https://jacobin.com/2023/02/democratic-republic-of-the-congo-war-colonialism-exploitation-resources-intervention-history

Education

The Texas Tribune. “Texas Tech’s limits on gender identity discussion deepen fears of politics breaching academic freedom.” https://www.texastribune.org/2025/09/26/texas-tech-university-system-transgender-identity-restrictions/

Elizabeth Schmidt. “Learning the Scholar’s Craft.” https://issforum.org/essays/formation-essay/204-schmidt

Philosophize This! “Episode #210: Pedagogy of the Oppressed.”

Listen to the Music

Stand By Me (Playing for Change) Stand By Me | Playing For Change | Song Around The World

Resistant Communiqués Podcast Credits

The Resistant Communiqués Collective co-hosts and collaborates on the development of the Resistant Communiqués Podcast.

This episode of the Resistant Communiqués Podcast:

* Podcast Episode Writers: Zeb Larson

* Podcast Episode Question and Script Development: Jamila Hammami & Zeb Larson

* Podcast Episode Script Development: Jamila Hammami & Zeb Larson

* Podcast Episode Researcher: Justin Fowler, Jamila Hammami, & Zeb Larson

* Podcast Episode Fact-Checking: Justin Fowler & Jamila Hammami

* Podcast Episode Production: Jamila Hammami

* Podcast Episode Editing: Jamila Hammami

* Podcast Multimedia Syllabus Development: Jamila Hammami and Zeb Larson

Featuring:

* Resistant Communiqués Podcast Introduction: Jamila Hammami

* Resistant Communiqués Podcast episode Co-Hosts: Jamila Hammami and Zeb Larson

* Resistant Communiqués Podcast episode guest: Dr. Elizabeth Schmidt

* Resistant Communiqués Podcast episode outro: Zeb Larson

Royalty-Free Music:

* Music Editing: Zeb Larson

* Music Mixing: Jamila Hammami

Royalty-Free Music:

* Podcast Intro Music: Cheel – Soft Feeling

* Episode Intro Music: Wayne Jones – Connection

* Episode Music: Karl Casey – New Dawn

* Episode Outro Music: Cheel – Soft Feeling

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