Main content

Pan-Africanism

Nana Oforiatta Ayim on her African encyclopedia and mobile grassroots history museum in Ghana, Inua Ellam's Three Sisters set in Biafra, the films of Med Hondo and pan-Africanism.

Nana Oforiatta Ayim, who is creating an encyclopedia of online images of Africa to challenge the way it is seen, has curated Ghana's first art pavilion at the Venice Biennale, toured a mobile museum round the country to gather a grass roots history and published her first novel.

The God Child by Nana Oforiatta Ayim is out now. Cultural Encyclopaedia is an online resource that includes an A-to-Z index and vertices of clickable images for entries about Africa https://www.culturalencyclopaedia.org/ She has been named as one of the Apollo magazine "40 under 40" and Africa Report's 50 Trailblazers.

Poet and playwright Inua Ellams has re-interpreted Chekhov's Three Sisters. The play is set in Biafra in the 1960s at the time of the civil war in Nigeria and raises questions of class, race, religion and education in the context of independence and the colonial legacy. Three Sisters is running at the National Theatre until 19 February 2020

The Mauritanian/French film director and actor Med Hondo died earlier in 2019. Considered by many to be the first pan-African rΓ©alisateur his films like Soleil Γ”, Sarraounia an African Queen and West Indies explore the nature of being African, both within the continent and abroad. Kunle Olulode of the organisation Voice4Change talks about Med Hondo and his legacy. Med Hondo: Africa from the Seine is part of the BFI African Odysseys programme and continues until 15 December.

Marika Sherwood has written extensively on Africa including The Origins of Pan-Africanism, and Kwame Nkrumah and the Dawn of the Cold War. Louisa Egbunike is a writer and lecturer on African literature. With the other guests they discuss whether pan-Africanism implies homogeneity to the detriment of the diversity of African culture.

You can find Free Thinking discussions Celebrating Buchi Emecheta /programmes/b09r89gt
Caine Prize 2019 /programmes/m0006mtb
Caine Prize 2018 /programmes/b0b89ssp
Caine Prize 2017 /programmes/b08xcx1f
Louisa Ebunike on Afrofuturism /programmes/b09bx5l1
Afropean identities /programmes/m0005sjw

Presenter: Shahidha Bari
Producer: Harry Parker

Available now

44 minutes

Last on

Tue 10 Dec 2019 22:00

Broadcast

  • Tue 10 Dec 2019 22:00

Featured in...

The Arts & Ideas Podcast

The Arts & Ideas Podcast

You can download all the past episodes of Radio 3's Free Thinking

Discussions and talks from the Free Thinking Festival 2019

Discussions and talks from the Free Thinking Festival 2019

Angry politics, what we can’t say, being diplomatic, weeping, emotion in music, film & TV

Click to listen to discussions, talks and music as the Free Thinking Festival 2019 Gets Emotional

Click to listen to discussions, talks and music as the Free Thinking Festival 2019 Gets Emotional

Angry politics, what we can’t say, being diplomatic, weeping, emotion in music, film & TV

CLICK to LISTEN & SEE programmes from the Free Thinking Festival 2018: The One & the Many

CLICK to LISTEN & SEE programmes from the Free Thinking Festival 2018: The One & the Many

We examine the fast-changing relationship between the individual & the crowd

CLICK to LISTEN & SEE all programmes, images, clips & features from 2017's festival

Free Thinking Festival 2017: The Speed of Life