On a warm day in February 2018, a nimble 63-year-old named Oumarou Alim leads the way through the dramatic stone caves of Mount Djim, a rocky peak in the Central African nation of Cameroon. Holding up an arm with a flourish, he declares that this cave “holds the traces of those who came before us.” Mount Djim is said to be the place where Alim’s ancestors—members of the Nizà’à people, one of more than 200 ethnic groups that live in Cameroon—staged a resistance against two waves of colonization. Every year,…
