ANU Africa Network

The Sydney South African Film Festival has gone virtual! 10 fabulous premiere films will kick off Saturday, May 16 – all which you can watch from the comfort of your own home.

This report is from Mrs Maureen Hickman, President of the Royal Commonwealth Society (ACT Branch) who took over from Colin Milner (History, RSSS ANU) earlier this year. Maureen is also the Editor of the RCS Newsletter from which this piece is reproduced.

“By 2050, Africa will have 2.4 billion people, a middle class of one billion, and every fourth person on earthwill be in Africa, figures that might ‘excite or frighten—
but cannot be ignored’, according to H.E. Isayia Kabira,
High Commissioner for Kenya. Speaking at the Commonwealth Dinner in March, Mr
Kabira added, ‘if you are thinking about the future, you should be thinking about Africa.’
‘Our challenges today are the opportunities of tomorrow.’

Describing Africa as ‘the continent of the future’
whatever you read or hear about it, Mr Kabira said
That many people have asked him where he gets ‘all
this optimism about the Dark Continent’. But what he
sees is opportunity to find alternate ways to deal with
problems such as providing clean renewable energy
where there is no electricity, and, at a
local level, where there are no credit
cards, teaching people how to use their
mobile phones to transfer money.

Having achieved ‘the political kingdom’
of freedom, with the majority of African
nations under democratic rule ‘with a
smooth handover of power and a zero
tolerance of military coups’ what Africa
is now seeking is ‘the economic kingdom’.
He continued,
‘Africa today is home to 30 per cent of
the world’s natural resources; Australia
has invested over $40 billion in 700 projects
in the extractives sector, and, to
further consolidate our economic gains,
the African Continental Free Trade
Agreement is now in its operational
phase, making it much easier to trade
with ourselves and with the world.’
Mr Kabira acknowledged that in 30 years time, a
population of 2.4 billion people would need to be fed.
But this, he sees as yet another opportunity to satisfy
that need and ‘get more money into the pockets of
farmers’, encouraged by the Kiswahili saying: Mfuata
nyuki hakosi asali—one who follows the bees will
never fail to get honey (never mind the occasional
sting).”

The Journal for the Academic Study of Religion, the publication of the Australian Association for the Study of Religion, is inviting expressions of interest for a planned special issue on the theme of “Religion, Spirituality and the New African Diaspora” to be published in 2021.

In contrast to the African diaspora created through the slave trade, the “new” African diaspora is the product of recent and voluntary human movement (Okpewho & Nzegwu 2009), as individuals, families and communities have sought asylum, education, employment and other opportunities outside Africa. Recognizing that continuities and changes in religious and spiritual practices are a foundational aspect of diasporic experience, and that religion can be the “motor” of migration and migrant identity formation (Adogame 2007), this special issue is open to research articles on all aspects of religion, spirituality and the new African diaspora. We are particularly interested in studies from the Asia-Pacific region, but welcome articles focusing on any part of the world.

Although the Journal for the Academic Study of Religion does not publish purely confessional articles, we welcome cross-disciplinary contributions from across the humanities and social sciences addressing the topic through various theories and methodologies. Representative (but not exhaustive) of the themes scholars may wish to address, we would welcome contributions engaging with: theories of the Black Atlantic, or more recent conceptualizations of the “Black Mediterranean” and “Black Pacific”; religion, spirituality and new expressions of racism and xenophobia; religion, identity, and the securitization of migration; indigenous African religions in the new diaspora; religion and spirituality as resources for individual and collective resilience and resistance; transnational religious networks; Pentecostalism and the new African diaspora; religion and the production of the local; religious music and popular culture in the new African diaspora; postcolonial and decolonial approaches to religion and spirituality in the new African diaspora.

Contributors should initially submit an abstract of up to 300 words and a brief biography by 31 July 2020 to both editors. Full papers will be due by 31 December 2020. Articles should not exceed 8000 words (including references).

Dr Ibrahim Abraham (Australian National University, co-editor JASR) ibrahim.abraham@anu.edu.au

Dr Victor Counted (Western Sydney University, guest editor JASR) v.counted@westernsydney.edu.au

References:

Adogame, A. 2007. “Raising Champions, Taking Territories: African Churches and the Mapping of New Religious Landscapes in Diaspora,” in T. L. Trout (ed.), The African Diaspora and the Study of Religion. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Okpewho, I. & N. Nzegwu (eds). 2009. The New African Diaspora. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.