Chimuranga’s Chronic, pan-African gazette from the South African based organisation is out now for your reading pleasure.
Chimurenga is a publication of arts, culture and politics from and about Africa and its diasporas founded and edited by Ntone Edjabe. Both the magazine’s name (Chimurenga is a Shona word that loosely translates as “liberation struggle”) and the content capture the connection between African cultures and politics on the continent and beyond. The publication, which was launched in 2002, has had many contributors like Lesego Rampolokeng, Santu Mofokeng, Keorapetse Kgositsile, Binyavanga Wainaina, Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor, Boubacar Boris Diop, Tanure Ojaide, Dominique Malaquais, Zwelethu Mthethwa, Mahmood Mamdani, and Greg Tate.
Our friends from Chimurenga have a newer publication they call the Chronic which was first released in 2013. The new offering is a 48-page newspaper and 40-page stand-alone books review magazine featuring writing, art and photography inflected by the workings of innovation, creativity and resistance. The newspaper was set to be a quarterly publication – every three months.
The newest edition of the magazine is out in stores – e-stores of course. It explores the tensions between reform and revolution, and decolonisation and the neoliberal order in the academy, through the lens of history and via the alternate education paradigms based in indigenous knowledge systems, and also arising from South Africa’s radical anti-apartheid struggle. With this focus you find pieces by Pedro Monaville, Frank B. Wilderson III, Bwesigye Bwa Mwesigire, Kwanele Sosibo. This series was inspired by the turmoil that South Africa academia went through in the wake of their #FeesMustFall.
Away from this Joshua Craze offers a sobering analysis of the United Nations in South Sudan while Ronald Suresh Roberts asks: What are the true stakes in the controversy over South Africa’s recent failure to arrest Sudanese strongman Omar al-Bashir? Yemisi Aribisala rails against the new fundamentalism cresting the wave of global feminism sweeping her home country Nigeria.
Chronic Books
Then there is Chronic Books which I love the best in this publication as it speaks exclusively about books this time with a focus on Football. James Young writes, the nexus between the twists of life on and off the pitch is revealed.
Lidudumalingani Mqombothi who was announced as a Caine Prize shortlistee yesterday revisits the football matches of his childhood, when radio, not television, was most people’s ticket to the beautiful game. Moses März documents his fleeting orbit of the African football scene, from the Afcon 2008 tourney in Ghana to Angola in 2009 and the 2010 FIFA World Cup extravaganza further south. Other contributors include Rustum Kozain, Florence Madenga, Ed Pavlic, Jon Soske, Meghna Singh, Masande Ntshanga, Abdourahman Waberi, Nick Mulgrew, Lindokuhle Nkosi, Wendell Marsh, Nick Mwaluko and many more.
If you think that this is your cup of chai, I am reading my copy and couldn’t recommend it more, the order the digital or print Chronic here. You can also read it online at Chronic.co.za
Leave a Reply