The West African Dinners

Enjoy the 11th installment of our Ethnic Dinner Series running since 1999. Interspersing our other events and activities, the Dinner Series is our culinary homage to the long and distinguished tradition of area studies at the School.

Special guests: Alumnae and alumni of some of the leading African universities

We will be traveling to Senegal and Nigeria. Senegal has a deep history. The presence of humans in the region of modern Senegal around 1.7 million years ago is attested by the discovery of stone tools characteristic of the Early Stone Age. Finds of fine pottery and early statuettes indicate that these human settlements transitioned to fishing and farming during the Neolithic period. The small settlements consolidated to larger state entities before the arrival of the Portuguese in 1444. During the 17th century, overseas trade, including that of slaves out of the infamous island of Goree, increased greatly and was dominated by the rivalry between the two dominant colonial powers at the time, France and Great Britain. Senegal became fully independent from France in 1960, with the noted poet Leopold Senghor being elected its first president.

Nigeria is a giant: the most populous country in Africa with 186 million inhabitants and a multinational state with over 500 ethnic groups, the three largest being the Hausa, Igbo and the Yoruba. Nigeria has the world's 20th largest economy, overtaking South Africa in 2014. Islam was introduced through the Hausa States during the 11th century and Christianity by Portuguese monks during the 15th century. Colonial rule ended in the 1960 but in 1963 Nigeria succumbed to military rule after a bloody coup d'etat. It temporarily returned to multi-party democracy in 1977. Simultaneously with the spike in oil prices following the Yom Kippur and the Iran-Iraq Wars, Nigeria was catapulted to the sixth largest oil producer in the world by 1979. After an interlude of consecutive military governments, Nigeria re-transitioned back to democracy in 1999. The reform presidency of Olusegun Obasanjo was followed by those of Umaru Musa Yar'Adua, Goodluck Jonathan and Muhammadu Buhari.

This event is open not only to all LSE alumnae and alumni but also to alumnae and alumni of African universities.

Series History: 1999 Italy, 1999 Lebanon, 2000 Mexico, 2000 Japan, 2001 Morocco, 2002 Brazil, 2004 Iran, 2007 Ethiopia, 2015 Vietnam and 2017 Mongolia