Recently finished an article on the question of AfroFuturist technology from various African perspectives and wanted to list some publications and thinkers who I’ve come across.
Category: Does Africa Dream of Androids?
STIR magazine launch: Of countermemories and recursive futurities
I was invited to speak at the launch of STIR magazine’s new edition on the 14th. It was great getting to chat interesting stuff with folk doing some fantastic stuff in the area of speculative design, history of tech and critical approaches.
Below is the transcript of my talk.
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Where Next for AfroFuturism? Thoughts on the Nine worlds panel et al.
I spent much of my Saturday at the Nine Worlds convention in Hammersmith, the first time I’ve ever been actually able to make it though not the first time I’ve heard of it. It’s been touted as one of the most inclusive geek events in the UK and for myself, I think that’s definitely the case, or at least from what I saw.
So wherefore my attendance? Well, I was on a panel titled ‘Where Next for AfroFuturism’, a panel I’d been invited to by Chella Ramanan from BAME in Games who I knew from January’s Afrotech Fest. A lot of – in fact all of – my recent talks have been on tech and inclusive design so it was nice getting to chat about AfroFuturism to a new audience.
Continue reading “Where Next for AfroFuturism? Thoughts on the Nine worlds panel et al.”
New paper to read…
Which I cannot currently access… Analog Girls in a Digital World: Fatimah Tuggar’s Afrofuturist Intervention in the Politics of “Traditional” African Art
Slaves of History
From Jori Lewis at Aeon magazine:
It started a few years ago, with a conversation I had with my then-boyfriend, a Senegalese agronomist, first about peanuts and then about slavery. He lived in the Sine-Saloum region of Senegal, a four-hour drive from where I lived in the capital, Dakar. I was writing about the history of peanut agriculture, Sine-Saloum’s main crop, so I was often there.
Interesting links on African urbanism
African metallurgical practices
A list of papers, books and other readings on topic of African technological practices from before contact with European imperialists:
Departments and Projects
Pre-colonial African metallurgy
People
Peter Schmidt
100 Things That You Did Not Know About Africa…
A succinct yet useful resource. I’m taking a break from my research at the moment due to work, convention and further study, but there’s a lot more coming up in the near future, I promise you that!
100 Things That You Did Not Know About Africa /black People…
The History of Prosthetics Reveals a Long Tradition of Human Cyborgs
For centuries, humans have invented ingenious devices to replace lost limbs. Here we have a gallery of some of the most cutting-edge prosthetics from years past — comparable to today’s bionic arms. What’s fascinating is that these historic devices weren’t just about limb replacement, but also enhancement.
The History of Prosthetics Reveals a Long Tradition of Human Cyborgs
