Conferences, Festivals, Tours

Caar conference 2011

Writing and the Relation

Writing and the Relation

Wednesday, April 6, 201117.15-18.30

Lecture Hall Ernest Vilgrain (Amphi 1A), Building Halle aux Farines, Université Paris Diderot-Paris 7, Paris Rive Gauche site

With Rozena Maart, University of KwaZulu Natal, Durban, South Africa

Introduction by Sylvie Laurent, Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Paris, France

How do writers consider the representation of human relations, and particularly between characters with various racial, gender-related, sexual, or national (self)identifications? In what way does that influence – or not – both their mind’s eye and their literary praxis? How do they negotiate – and possibly anticipate – what Paul Ricoeur has called the “hermeneutic circle” by which the story-told is supposed to facilitate and forge the reader’s identification? Has their work and art a political value and if so is it intended to be transcended? Has literature an identity and if so, is it related to the author as both artist and subject?

Professor and writer, Rozena Maart will address the main theme, Writing and the Relation by offering a tour-de-Azania of what writing means when inscribing relations of blood, sex, gender and sexuality, inking blood in textual coloniality, under and between  apartheid ‘s reign when its tongue was twisted, locked in a tight vaginal grip with the British Empire and its allies. She will show you how she has written her history  in then out of the absences of her present, past and future, somewhere then everywhere, on walls, on the inside of thighs, under chairs and on top of them, between legs and at the  top of mountains, in psychiatric wards where Fanon  diagnosed revolution and down medical halls and soccer fields where Biko announced Black Consciousness. The relation is you, her, she, he, zhe, mademoiselle, monsieur, meneer and mevrou, auntie and uncle, you who believe you have no relation, no relation to writing or the already inscribed, and your tour-de Azania, the original name of South Africa, will be spiked with the memory of Edouard Glissant’s creole words that spoke the forbidden, Biko’s fisted smile that fought for freedom,  Fanon’s fearless fight in bringing the mind into the centre of colonial discourse, Paulette Nardal’s siore where she hosted discourses of negritude in Paris on dinner plates, Derrida’s determination to reveal White Mythology, Lllian Ngoyi’s march against the apartheid laws—these are her relations.

Rozena Maart

Dr. Rozena Maart, Associate Professor, is Chair of Gender Studies at the University of KwaZulu Natal, Durban, South Africa. Her work examines relationships between and among Political Philosophy, Derrida and Deconstruction, Black Consciousness, Psychoanalysis, Feminist Theory and Critical Theories of race and racism. She is an award winning writer who has published short stories, a novel and poetry; one of her screen scripts, based on The Writing Circle, is currently under review with a film company. She is a member the International Assembly of Women Philosophers.

Rozena Maart was born in District Six, Cape Town, South Africa and in 1973 along with her family members and close to a quarter of million people were forcibly removed from District Six, the slave quarter in Cape Town. In 1986 she, along with four women, started the first Black feminist organisation in South Africa, Women Against Repression.  The following year Dr.  Maart was nominated to the “Woman of the Year,” award for starting the first Black feminist organization in South Africa and for her work in the area of violence against women. At the time Dr. Maart was working in Gynecology and Emergency Unit at Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, South Africa. In 1988 she obtained her Masters’ degree at the University of York, UK and in 1997, after working for several years as professor and consultant, Dr. Maart completed her PhD at the Centre for Cultural Studies at the University of Birmingham, UK., which was titled, “The Politics of Consciousness: The Consciousness of Politics: When Black Consciousness Meets White Consciousness.”

In 1992, Dr. Maart won “The Journey Prize: Best Short Fiction in Canada,” for her short story, “No Rosa, No District Six”. After completing her doctoral work, teaching for a few years, she then decided to write four more stories, which then went into a collection titled, Rosa’s District Six. Rosa’s District Six was published in December 2004 and made the weekly bestseller list in Canada in 2006; it also made the HOMEBRU list in South Africa in April 2006. She published The Writing Circle in November of 2007 both in Canada and South Africa. In 2010 The Writing Circle was noted as one of the ten top books in South African literature in her homeland, South Africa.

FOR MORE DETAILS ON BLACK STATES OF DESIRE CONFERENCE:
http://caar2011.caar-web.org/

COLLEGIUM FOR BLACK WOMEN IN PHILOSOPHY
CBWP CONFERENCE IV

APRIL 14-16, 2011

The fourth conference of the Collegium of Black Women Philosophers will be held APRIL 14-16, 2010 at Penn State University.  Participants are encouraged to arrive in the afternoon/evening on Thursday, April 14th for an opening conference activity.  Conference papers and the keynote address are open to the public and will be presented on Friday, April 15th.  Workshops for conference participants only (not open to the public) will be held on Saturday, April 16th.

The Collegium of Black Women Philosophers (CBWP) is a philosophical organization whose purpose is to encourage and foster a networking and mentoring relationship between the underrepresented Black women in philosophy including undergraduate students and graduate students as well as assistant, associate, and full professors in the Academy.  The objective of the CBWP is to mentor and retain the Black women who are currently professors or graduate students in philosophy while simultaneously recruiting more Black women into the discipline.


Philosophical Dialogue Between Africa and the Americas / April 18-20, 2011

Course Image “AFRICA AND ITS DIASPORA”
Simulcast and Live Streaming

Conference languages: English, French, Portuguese, Spanish

The conference will bring together philosophers from throughout Africa, its diasporas, and the Americas (Latin America, Canada, Mexico, Caribbean, United States) to address contemporary challenges, especially the meaning of community, liberation, health, and ideals of the beautiful. The conference will use simulcasting and Web-based conferencing techniques, as well as creating a database of interviews of philosophers and conference debates for future webcasting. The dialogue from the conference will be made available after the conference for educational uses and as a resource for continued debate.

Northern Cape Writer’s Festival

KIMBERLEY 2009

ncw

David wa Maahlamela managed to capture speakers, performers and attendees at the Northern Cape Writer’s festival.

Northern Cape Writer’s Festival

Stellar Literary Festival in Oshawa, Ontario 2008


ivlaunch.jpg image by rozenamaart

Ribane Nikedi, Fred Khumalo, Rozena Maart–HOMEBRU selected writers at FM Radio and Exclusive Books sponsored joint reading with a lively audience at Cape Town’s Waterfront.  We were honoured to have a saxophonist at the event and very  privileged to have David Kau, one of South Africa’s top comedians, open the evening with a string of politically incorrect skits.