Of Worlds and Artworks : A Relational View on Artistic Practices from Africa and the Diaspora

The present volume brings together contributions which explore artworks – including literature, visual arts, film and performances – as dynamic sites of worlding. It puts emphasis on the processes of creating or doing worlds, implying movement as opposed to the boundary drawing of area studies. From such a processual perspective, Africa is not a delineated area, but emerges in a variety of relations which can reach across the continent, but also the Indian Ocean, the Atlantic or Europe.

Contributors are: Thierry Boudjekeu, Elena Brugioni, Ute Fendler, Sophie Lembcke, Gilbert Ndi Shang, Samuel Ndogo, Duncan Tarrant, Kumari Issur, CJ Odhiambo, Michaela Ott, Peter Simatei, Clarissa Vierke, Chinelo J. Enemuo.

Ute Fendler, Ph.D (1992), University of Bayreuth, is professor of Romance and Comparative literary and cultural studies, at the University of Bayreuth. Her publications are on Francophone and Lusophone Literatures and Films.

Marie-Anne Kohl holds a tenure-track position in Historical Musicology (with a special focus on mobility, (forced) migration and cultural transfer) at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna.

Gilbert Shang Ndi, Ph.D (2014), University of Bayreuth, is fellow of the Cluster of Excellence - Africa Multiple, University of Bayreuth, working on the Project: Black Atlantic Revisited: African and South American UNESCO-World Heritage Sites and “Shadowed Spaces” of Performative Memory.

CJ Odhiambo, Ph.D (2005), Stellenbosch University, is professor of Literature and Applied Drama at Moi University, Eldoret, Kenya. He has published widely in the fields of Literature, Applied Drama/Theatre, Popular Culture and Film.

Clarissa Vierke, Ph.D. (2010), University of Bayreuth, is professor of African Language Literatures at the University of Bayreuth. She has published on Swahili poetry, manuscript cultures and the Indian Ocean.