A City’s Memory: Kigali 22 Years after the Rwandan Genocide

WiSER invites you to a lunchtime seminar by

Véronique Tadjo

“A city’s memory: Kigali 22 years after the Rwandan genocide.” 

Twenty-two years after the genocide, Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, is modernising and expanding fast. The country is ranked among the top three easiest places to do business on the African continent. Its “zero tolerance for corruption” mantra certainly accounts for this. Beyond the success story of Rwanda’s post genocide economic development, to what extent has the reconciliation process worked? Has trauma been overcome in the young generation? What sort of memory is the city shaping for itself? After a recent stay in Kigali, last June, I will use the notes and the material I gathered during my visit to answer some of these questions.

Véronique Tadjo was born in France and grew up in Côte d’Ivoire. She did most of her studies in Abidjan and then went on to earn a doctorate degree in African American Literature and Civilization from the Sorbonne, Paris IV. After a Fulbright scholarship to Howard University to continue her research, she returned to lecture at Abidjan University for several years. From 2007 to 2015, she was the head of French and Francophone Studies at the School of Literature, Language and Media. She remains affiliated to Wits University as a visiting professor and now shares her time between London and Abidjan. She is an award winning fiction writer and the author of several novels among which L’ombre d’Imana (The Shadow of Imana, Heinemann AWS, 2000) is on the genocide in Rwanda.

All welcome.