What could the curriculum be – if it was designed by the people who dropped out of school so that they could breathe? The latest issue of Chimurenga provides alternatives to prevailing educational pedagogy. Through fiction, essays, interviews, poetry, photography and art, contributors examine and redefine rigid notions of essential knowledge.
Presented in the form of a textbook, Chimurenga 15 simultaneously mimics the structure while gutting it. All entries are regrouped under subjects such as body parts, language, grace, worship and news (from the other side), numbers, parents, police and many more. Through a classification system that is both linear and thematic, the textbook offers multiple entry points into a curriculum that focuses on the un-teachable and values un-learning as much as it’s opposite.
Inside: Amiri Baraka waxes poetic on the theoretics of Be-Bop; Coco Fusco flips the CIA’s teaching manual for female torturers; Karen Press and Steve Coleman instruct in folk-dancing; Dambudzo Marechera proposes a “guide to the earth”; Dominique Malaquais designs the museum we won’t build; through self-portraits Phillip Tabane and Johnny Dyani offer method to the Skanga (black music family); and Winston Mankunku refuses to teach.
Other contributors include Binyavanga Wainaina, Akin Adesokan, Isoje Chou, Sean O’Toole, Pradid Krishen, E.C. Osundu, Salim Washington, Sefi Atta, Ed Pavlic, Neo Muyanga, Henri-Michel Yere, Medu Arts Ensemble, Aryan Kaganof, Khulile Nxumalo and Walter Mosley amongst others. Cover by Johnny “Mbizo” Dyani.
Chants, Dreams and Other Grammars of Love: a gedenkschrift for Harry Garuba (Kraft Books Limited, 2022)
A collection of reflections, reminiscences, critical reviews and poems, all dedicated to the memory of Harry Oludare Garuba, scholar-poet and professor in the Department of English and at the Centre for African Studies at the University of Cape Town in South Africa.
The name 'Harry Garuba' has become synonymous with excellence and innovative scholarship. Well-loved and deeply respected, he left a legacy in the world of African literary scholarship, the impact of which reverberates across institutions and organizations in Africa, Europe and North America.
Acknowledging his global reach, this enduring text bears testimony to Harry Garuba's iconic intellectual stature, as well as his profound care and mentorship across generations, disciplines and borders. Among those who have contributed to this book of tributes are his teachers, classmates and colleagues, his students, his admirers and his students' students. Each contribution comes to the reader on its own terms, all united by their commitment to honour the man, Harry Oludare Garuba, of blessed memory.
With contributions from Remi Raji, Natasha Himmelman, Josephine Alexander, Oyeniyi Okunoye, Idowu Omoyele, Bongani Kona