Novels make worlds. They create an intuitive sense and mental image of a place. And the senses of space produced by fiction shape how readers see the world itself, just like maps do.

Podcast | WiSER’s Hlonipha Mokoena in conversation with @CapeTalk’s Abongile Nzelenzele talking 100-year story of South Africa’s our first history book published in isiZulu.

This year marks the centenary of the publication in 1922 of Abantu Abamnyama Lapa Bavela Ngakona (The Black People and Whence They Came), the first book-length history of black people written in isiZulu. Part of the Nguni language group, there are an estimated 12 million isiZulu speakers in South Africa.

Its author was Magema Fuze, now seen as a major figure in the body of writings produced in African languages in South Africa, but one who remains too little known outside narrow scholarly circles.

Laura Pereira | Reimagining an empowered Africa

https://mg.co.za/opinion/2022-04-04-reimagining-an-empowered-africa/

Gwen Ansell | Improvising the future of decolonised jazz 

WiSER’s Director Sarah Nuttall and Hlonipha Mokoena in New Frame on jazz, music and the university ‘after decolonization’.

https://www.newframe.com/improvising-the-future-of-decolonised-jazz/

https://www.amashinga.com/
 

The British & The Zulu Kingdom

Sihle Zikalala | Remembering Magema Fuze on the centenary anniversary of the publication of Abantu Abamnyama Lapa Bavela Ngakona

"Undoubtedly, this text is a piece of important history, and thanks to leading Fuze scholar, Professor Hlonipha Mokoena, and the UKZN Press among others, the book will be republished sometime this year."

Read more here.

WiSER's Professor Achille Mbembe is one of eight to receive an honorary doctorate from the University of Bergen.

"Professor Achille-Joseph Mbembe will be appointed as an honorary doctor for his sound research on history and politics."

The full article can be found here.

Building an art gallery in the midst of war in Zimbabwe

“Ndabatisa malayitsha mapiritsi amai eBP” (I gave malayitsha the BP tablets for mother). “I will send [the groceries] with malayitsha at the end of the month.” “Is your malayitsha reliable, I want to send my things home?” “How much does [the] malayitsha charge [to carry] one thousand rands?” “Did malayitsha deliver all the things I sent?”