First as tragedy, second as farce
NoViolet Bulawayo’s novel 'Glory' forcefully evokes the Zimbabwean political landscape but struggles to stretch itself beyond the documentarian, vacillating between the journalistic and fictive.
Search Result(s) for: “Angola”
Afrobeat futures
In the first of five articles on Afrobeat in South America, Simon Adetona Akindes discusses Abayomy Afrobeat Orquestra and Bixiga 70 from Brazil.
The gods of liberation
The imperative to tell the untold stories of Zimbabwean freedom fighters during that country’s liberation war, especially their engagement with spirituality.
Amilcar Cabral and the South Africans
Amilcar Cabral’s influence stretched far beyond the Portuguese colonies, profoundly influencing the political struggle in South Africa, past and present.
The people have spoken
In its first few years, the magazine 'Révolution Africaine' opened possibilities for Franco-Algerian cooperation. It was then co-opted by the state.
The media of the useable past
Revisiting the papers of left, anti-colonial revolt from the continent can remind us of messy, rich alternatives.
Imagining counter-futures
The film 'Neptune Frost' reduces the gulf between Africanfuturism and Afrofuturism by connecting their shared vision against violent systems of domination.
Chris Hani’s black Marxism
Chris Hani’s legacy is often reduced to debates about his assassination in April 1993, but his significance goes beyond South Africa’s democratic transition.
How to think about colonialism
Contemporary approaches to the legacy of colonialism tend to narrowly emphasize political agency as the solution to Africa’s problems. But agency is configured through historically particular relations of which we are not sole authors.
Reading List: Pedro Monaville
Pedro Monaville selects key texts that helped shape a new book on Congolese student-driven left nationalism in the aftermath of Patrice Lumumba’s assassination.
Editing pan-Africanism
Many know Frene Ginwala, the iconic anti-apartheid activist, as democratic South Africa’s first speaker of parliament. But few know of her time building pan-African media in Dar Es Salaam.
The “Caribbeanization” of Afrobeat in Colombia
In Colombia, doing straightforward political music carries many risks, including confronting state repression, political armed rebellions, and organized crime.
Reimagining non-alignment
In the context of climate apartheid, a new scramble for resources, and debt crises, the Global South must find another way to be human.
Wathinta abafazi, wathinta imbokodo
How 'Dawn' magazine illustrates the significant role women played in South Africa’s armed struggle against apartheid.
With what are you apologizing?
If slavery is the material and metaphysical womb of the modern world, reparations will require nothing less than the end of this world.
Punching above its weight
South Africa’s ICJ case against Israel is the latest example of its ability to act as a normative superpower, exceeding even the great powers in shaping global moral discourse.
Explaining AFCON upsets
So far, the group stages have delivered a host of surprises at this edition of the Africa Cup of Nations. But, fans of the tournament have long come to expect the unexpected.
Kwame Nkrumah today
New documents looking at British and American involvement in overthrowing Kwame Nkrumah give us pause to reflect on his legacy, and its resonances today.
The people’s coup
Incoming Senegalese president Bassirou Diomaye Faye is as much outgoing President Macky Sall’s creation as he is Ousmane Sonko’s.
House of stone
Roy Guthrie was a refrigerator salesman in South Africa before he moved to Zimbabwe and established its largest sculpture park.