Just watched this 14-minute clip from a recent TV profile by Norwegian television of a visit by Somali novelist Nuruddin Farah to the country of his birth. I never imagined book TV could look this good and informative.  Tradition, immigration, colonialism, exile, etcetera, gets an airing. We especially love how Farah steers the Norwegian interviewer’s questions about war, corruption and sadness towards the personal or familial.

The clip also includes an interview with Brit-Somali novelist Nadifa Mohamed.

 Here’s a link to a second part on Youtube (there’s some repetition though).

Further Reading

Leapfrogging literacy?

In outsourcing the act of writing to machines trained on Western language and thought, we risk reinforcing the very hierarchies that decolonization sought to undo.

Repoliticizing a generation

Thirty-eight years after Thomas Sankara’s assassination, the struggle for justice and self-determination endures—from stalled archives and unfulfilled verdicts to new calls for pan-African renewal and a 21st-century anti-imperialist front.

Drip is temporary

The apparel brand Drip was meant to prove that South Africa’s townships could inspire global style. Instead, it revealed how easily black success stories are consumed and undone by the contradictions of neoliberal aspiration.

Energy for whom?

Behind the fanfare of the Africa Climate Summit, the East African Crude Oil Pipeline shows how neocolonial extraction still drives Africa’s energy future.