Scholarship on African cities represents a growing yet still scarce subfield in urban studies, especially considering the scale and variety of African urbanisation patterns. The purpose of this Virtual Special Issue is to review the scholarship published on urban Africa in Urban Studies over the past five decades. In this Editorial, we reflect on the contributions of African urban scholarship and present a selection of articles to highlight the ways in which it has shaped key fields of urban studies. We also note the challenges that underpin ongoing lacunae in urban knowledge production and suggest directions for future work. This discussion provides a lens on our understandings of the urban condition in Africa and the general trajectory of urban scholarship.

中文翻译：

---

非洲城市研究：贡献与挑战

关于非洲城市的学术研究是城市研究中一个不断增长但仍然稀缺的子领域，特别是考虑到非洲城市化模式的规模和多样性。本期虚拟特刊的目的是回顾过去五十年在城市研究中发表的有关非洲城市的学术成果。在这篇社论中，我们反思了非洲城市学术的贡献，并精选了一些文章来强调它塑造城市研究关键领域的方式。我们还注意到城市知识生产中持续存在的缺陷所面临的挑战，并为未来的工作提出了方向。这次讨论为我们了解非洲城市状况和城市学术的总体轨迹提供了一个视角。