Swahili Literary Festival 2020: Identity Politics on the Swahili Coast

Written by Hekaya Initiative on February 27, 2020. Posted in Interviews, Nonfiction

The Swahili Literary Festival, an annual event entering its second year, is a celebration of the rich intellectual, cultural and literary history on the Swahili coast. The festival is largely driven by the need to bring the Swahili community together in acknowledging and celebrating its heroes and intellectual history.

The 2020 edition of the festival  which will be hosted at SwahiliPot Hub, Mombasa County, is heavily informed by the 2019 edition whose theme was “Celebrating Achievement”. The post-festival conversations we had with different scholars on the issue of “Swahiliness” indicated the need to talk about identity politics on the Swahili coast.

• Continue Reading
• No Comments

Amarula, a play: Thematic plurality.

Written by Hekaya Initiative on July 31, 2018. Posted in Nonfiction, Prose

There is nothing like a live performance. You can look at things on television, and you can look at things on YouTube, but when you get in a room full of people and you say one joke, and everyone’s laughing at the same thing, it’s a really great experience. -Loni Love

To watch Amarula- a tragic, love comedy performance which brings to the front themes ranging from explicit family values, ‘cross-generational’ love affairs, intimacy in return for good university grades and fear- is to be titillated, to be shocked and to be tickled to laughter, all at the same instance.

• Continue Reading
• No Comments