Civic Spaces

Celebrating Whispers 15 Years On: How Satire Can Further Civic Discourse

This year, 2018, marks 15 years since the death of Wahome Mutahi (1954 – 2003), who was one of Kenya’s most prolific fiction writers, as well as a playwright, columnist, political satirist, pundit and public opinion leader. He was popularly known as Whispers after the name of the column he wrote for The Daily Nation from 1982 to 2003, offering a satirical view of the trials and tribulations of Kenyan life. According to George Ogola in The Idiom of Age in a Popular Kenyan Newspaper Serial, at a time when the state had all but monopolized public sites of expression in the country, Whispers kept the Kenyan popular media porous, opening up spaces for the discussion of social and political issues that could otherwise only be ‘whispered’. It became the most visible site of social, cultural and political expression for the last two decades at a time when freedom to such expression was highly constrained by the state.

Kenya: Short Film “Watu Wote” Nominated for the Oscars

After “Watu Wote” scooped the Students Oscars in September 2017 and numerous International Festival Awards, today’s Oscars Jury pronouncement further warrants this Film project the publicity it deserves not only in the East and Horn of Africa region but the world over. 

The film, based on a true story, narrates the experience of a group of bus travelers who on 21st December 2015 in Mandera (Kenyan-Somali border region) were attacked by Al-Shabaab terrorists. Like in so many incidences before, the militia had planned to massacre all the over 30 Christians on board the bus.
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Projects

Who I Am Who We Are - Art Project on Kenyan Identity

Inspired by the notion that today’s world reacts a reality both multiple and unique, Who I Am, Who We Are aims at creating adequate spaces and conversations for personal reflection on relevant themes about Kenya at 50 - present and future. 

The Two Sudans - Online Film Project

A web documentary, which embarks on a visually and emotionally gripping journey into Sudan and South Sudan shedding some light onto the personal stories of those at ground level.

Our Publications on Civic Spaces

The Evolution of Kenyan Art and the Kenya Arts Diary

Supported by the Heinrich Boell Foundation and coordinated by Nani Croze of Kitengela Glass, the Kenya Arts Diary has become a popular annual art exhibition in Nairobi, Kenya and identified with the Heinrich Boell Foundation. The diary has built a new physical but portable space whose multi-functionality allows local artists to display their craft, advertise their skills, join a regional network, and find belonging.

First published in 2011, the Kenya Arts Diary is a catalogue - complete with descriptors - of photography, installations, oils, acrylics, patch-work quilts, wood, cement and scrap metal sculptures, some from “stitched found objects”. The Diary also carries artists’ bios and a directory that provides artists’ contacts and announces the range of collectives and studios where contemporary artists pursue their passions.

 

 

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Energy Futures in Eastern Africa

Publication
Whereas the momentum of economic development in the 20th century depended on abundant fossil fuels and centralized electric power, countries are now revisiting their energy strategies to reduce the risks of unpredictable climate change. Our countries are not exempt from this dilemma. Should they continue to power their transition from agricultural to industrial societies by exploiting fossil fuels and centralized power? Or is a different energy system possible? Which investments will get priority? Who will benefit from whatever energy system is put into place, and who will be the biggest losers? 
 
Produced by the Society for International Development (SID) with the support of  Heinrich Böll Stiftung, East and Horn of Africa Regional Office, this booklet presents and explores possible scenarios that could unfold in four Eastern African countries. The analysis and three stories presented imagine practical future scenarios for energy and how these would affect energy poverty in Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda and Tanzania.
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Perspectives #03/2018: Through the Looking Glass: Images of African Futures

The Hollywood action movie Black Panther captured the imagination of audiences around the globe. In several African countries, it quickly became the highest grossing film of all time. The tale is set in Wakanda, a technologically advanced African kingdom that avoided the shackles of colonialism and slavery by isolating itself behind a guise of poverty and deprivation. Although what it presents as “African”, in terms of narrative and images, is far from uncontested, the film catapulted Afrofuturism – a discipline or aesthetic that enlists science fiction and technology to imagine black identities and futures unconstrained by past and present circumstances – from the avant-garde circles of artists and intellectuals into the mainstream.

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