does africa exist?

I am bustling about, cleaning my house in preparation for a visit from my cousin. And as I clean I am listening as usual to the BBC World Service streaming online. All the news today is of the anti-immigrant violence raging in South Africa -- how thousands are currently displaced within the country, and that the government is sending in the army to control the unrest. Angry xenophobic mayhem stomps across Johannesburg. I wonder that my morning perusal of the New York Times hadn't turned up anything of the sort. Curious, I quickly click through to the New York Times and see that South Africa's troubles still don't rate a front page mention. Hmmm. I glance through the World page, frantically searching for signs that the American media cares, and I note in teeny tiny print a subsection at the bottom labeled Africa. "Whew." There is it. "South Africa: Anti-Immigrant Mob Kills 2 at Hostel." It doesn't really communicate the scope, does it?