Myers, Garth (2011), African Cities: Alternative visions of urban theory and practice, London: Zed Books Ltd. ISBN 978 1 84813 509 3 pb African Cities is a generalist book and a very good starting point if you are interested in Urban Africa but do not know where to begin. The Author, Garth Andrew Myers is director of the Kansas African Studies Center and professor in the department of geography and African/ African-American studies at the University of Kansas. He is the author and co-author of many important books, articles and studies, the vast majority on African urban development topics. His research emphasizes eastern and southern African cities, primarily. With the knowledge acquired during his more than 20 years of study and a formal style he makes a critical “review” of some of the principal thinkers, not only theorist but also novelist and artist. He wants to bring awareness to the following main ideas. First Urban Africa is marginalized in most of the intellectual thought and planning practice and it is an error as he states “although few of Africa’s cities are among the world’s largest or most economically powerful, but the interconnections of African cities with those of the rest of the world make it necessary to link the discussions and academic literatures far more than has been the case.” Second there is not just one type of African city but a huge diversity. Studies “typically collectivizes a crisis narrative”, he argues it is “far more complex”, the way each city has experienced and managed their history and city governance with the different degrees of success. It is important to talk about Africa in all its complexity. Third and last principal idea is that the challenges for African urban studies must not only be theoretical but also practical. It has to pay attention to “the marginalized, informal, invisible, […]”, the inequalities must be studied and these might contribute to improve the quality of the poorer inhabitants of the city, which are the vast majority. The book is structured in an introduction, six chapters and a final conclusion, which as he explains follow the Ed Soja’s trilogy of critical urban theory, Postmetropolis, but with a slight different focus. His five themes are Postcolonial cities (chapter 2), (I)n(f)ormal Cities (chapter 3), Governing Africa’s cities (chapter 4), Wounded city (chapter 5) and Cosmopolitan cities (chapter 6). He starts every chapter with a personal experience, which introduces the theme or the idea of each chapter, to catch the reader’s attention, he usually chooses experiences that made him think about the following aspect he develops. In his first Chapter what if Lusaka is the Post-metropolis? Myers chooses Lusaka as an ordinary city that can exemplify the main themes of his book, giving just one of the many cases there is and giving in my opinion a very good image for those of us how are not very familiar with the African context. Chapters 2, 3 and 4 where the more inspiring for me and would be the ones I will develop. Chapter 2, Postcolonial city, introduces an interesting reflection: “have we really entered another period, or do we find the same theater, the same mimetic acting, with different actors and spectators, but with the same convulsions and the same insult? Can we really talk of moving beyond colonialism?’ Myer argues that although colonialism is long over, the same structures and similar agents that impeded a balanced development of the city continue in action. He also brings a very interesting thought “move beyond colonialism will involve revalorizing ‘indigenous management strategies’ and embracing the cultural heterogeneity of African cities as a strength”. This idea is further developed and better argued and exemplified in chapters 3 and 4. The clever word game (I)n(f)ormal cities resumes the whole idea in just one word. Cities have been growing vastly and informally during the last decades. There has been a huge rural migration to the cities, depending on the cases, most of these new inhabitants were not allowed to stay in the center and settled in the outskirt, in an illegal form and reproducing rural structures. Some of them were able to develop strong community forces, which allowed to protect themselves from the elite that wanted to expel them without giving an alternative or giving alternatives which are to expensive and imped their community relationships, since many designs follow western ideology. These huge urban areas are where most people live, it is their homes, although they lack the most fundamental services and infrastructures, this has become since decades the normal for millions of Africans. This is the real African city and it is precisely here where we can find new alternatives in which cities can develop instead of assuming western theory, which systematically ignores Africa; “if we are looking for postcolonial urban thought, in the sense of thinking that truly attempts to move past colonialism, the places to look are probably not necessarily in government planning offices or the posh campuses and gated compounds of expatriate donors. Instead, it may be found in the ‘ingenuity with which African urban residents have developed novel strategies’ for confronting the ‘structural and social crisis confronting them’ (Demissie 2007a: 8”. I could not agree more. Unfortunately I am very new to this topic and have only received a western point of view till now, the little I know is from living a couple of months in one of these informal neighborhoods in Kinshasa. It is true that this areas are very austere and sometimes insecure but they are full of live and community, they surely seem much more alive than any new neighborhood of for example a Spanish city. It seems a coherent idea to look for answers here, although it seems very difficult to succeed in this complicated web, it is a gigantic work and as in any community urbanism, there is the risk of losing ourselves in this complicated net. It is hard to work with individuals that “represent” others or speak for others. But I’m pretty sure it is worth trying, not only for Africa’s urbanism but for all urbanisms, western cities have been in crises for too long, there is too many failures based on neoliberal policies. I would also like to briefly mention chapters 5 and 6, which offer another very interesting idea, alternative ways of looking, analyzing and studying. Literature like Farah’s novels of Somalia and Kulie Mehretu‘s artwork, not only show the internationality or globalization of Africa due to diaspora but also offers us other tools to see and analyze with other eyes the African context. Alternative views comprehend not only reading alternative (or non western) mentalities but also different ways of expression. It is a global movement not only theoretical. Sometimes images are more useful than words or complement each other. Concluding the reading note I would like to point out, the importance of the study of African urbanism in all its complexity and diversity, specially the “informal” part of the city which hosts millions of people and that can be the source of a new thought or probably thoughts. I would also like to remember that these new mentality cannot only be based on books and theoretical work but also in other sources like art and literature. And above all, Africa needs action and this urbanism must be practical, even when it involves such a hard work.