Whatever the significance of the postmodern state of mind, recent views concerning philosophical eclecticism are largely the product of researches into the history of philosophy. There is an obvious inclination of today's intellectual historians to investigate background figures of European modernity. The increasing willingness of historians to enlarge the notion of philosophy in both its disciplinary and historical definition seems to be in agreement with a similar disposition of contemporary philosophers. As we can learn from Michael Albrecht's and Patrice Vermeren's books, a critical appreciation of eclecticism throws light both on the conditions of contemporary philosophizing and on the politics of philosophy in the modern age.

Rezension zu Julia Dombrowski: Die Suche nach der Liebe im Netz. Eine Ethnographie des Online-Datings. Bielefeld: Transcript 2011

Yuning Shen’s study deals with transitivity and verb valency in Kiswahili using a corpus-based approach. The author relates the methods used and results with previous studies dealing with the same topic, namely Whiteley (1968), Abdulaziz (1996) and Olejarnik (2005). He uses the meta-function-rank-matrix (MF/R) from Chinese to point out the fallacy of adopting such a matrix from one language and imposing it on another. Using the parts of speech annotation TreeTagger (Schmid 1994, 1995) to examine previous verb classifications, the author discusses the divergent use of concepts such as verb radicals, verb stems and verb bases as used in different theoretical approaches. / Kitabu hiki cha Yuning Shen kinahusu uelekezi na mpangilio wa vitenzi katika lugha ya Kiswahili kwa kutumia mkabala wenye msingi wa kopasi ya kiisimu. Mwandishi anazihusisha mbinu zilizotumika na matokeo yake na kazi za utafiti zilizotangulia zilizoshughulikia mada hiyo yaani Whiteley (1968), Abdulaziz (1996), na Olejarnik (2005). Shen anatumia mkabala wa mpangilio wa viwango tofauti vya matumizi ya lugha (meta-function-rank-matrix, MF/R) iliyotumika kwa utafiti wa lugha ya Kichina kwa ajili ya kuonesha udhaifu wa mkabala huo kwani unaiga mfumo unaofanya kazi katika lugha moja na kuutumia kwa lugha nyingine bila kuzingatia kuwa lugha ni tofauti. Kwa kutumia njia ya matawi ya kutenganisha vipashio vya maneno (TreeTagger) iliyobuniwa na Schmid (1994, 1995) kwa lengo la kuchunguza njia za awali za kuainisha vitenzi, mwandishi anayajadili matumizi yanayotofautiana ya dhana mbalimbali kama vile viini vya vitenzi, mashina ya vitenzi, na mizizi ya vitenzi jinsi ambavyo zimetumika katika mikabala mbalimbali ya kinadharia.

Book review: In 2004 the long awaited second edition of the Standard Swahili - Swahili Dictionary, edited by the Insitute of Kiswahili Research (TUKI) at the University of Dar es Salaam, appeared. With this publication TUKI has once again confirmed its leading role in the field of Swahili lexicography in East Africa. it is up to date, containing new words and phrases which are in use in East Africa in order to cope with the development in science and technology, society, economics and globalization.

`The Rosetta Stone Language Library` is a language learning software developed by the American company Fairfield Language Technologies which allows users to learn a foreign language with their computer without the aid of an instructor. The program promises its users they can learn a language faster and with more ease than ever before, without having to learn vocabulary or grammatical rules. Once having completed Levels I and II, learners should be able to make themselves understood in the new language using a basic vocabulary of roughly 3000 words. Both these levels are to be completed within a time frame of one to two years, and the results should be the equivalent of five years of conventional school instruction. Since 1993, a Swahili language course has been featured in The Rosetta Stone for which only Level I is currently available. With regard to the Swahili course, it must be asked if this design can work with a class language just as it does with an Indo-European gender language. The second question addresses the cultural adequacy of the contexts, or more specifically, of cultural knowledge, which must not be excluded from modern language instruction.

A book review of `Zanzibar: Kinyang`anyiro na utumwa´by Issa Nasser Issa AI-Ismaily (1999).

A book review of `Ebrahim Hussein. Theatre Swahili et nationalisme Tanzanien´(1998) by Alain Ricard.

A book review of `Bukusu tales. Collected arround 1936 by research assistant of Dr. Gunter Wagner (1908-1952).´(1995) by Jan J. de Wolf.

Book review of `Kenya Coast Handbook. Culture, resources and development in the East African littoral`by Jan Hoorweg, Dick Foeken & R. A. Obudho.

Die Einleitung der Veröffentlichung behandelt das Schaffen von Nikolai Rerich, einem der markantesten und urwüchsigsten Maler der russischen Schule.