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S4-B: Der Indische Ozean als Erinnerungsraum

Übersicht: 

Dieses Vorhaben setzt sich zum Ziel, die kulturelle Produktion des Indischen Ozeans als Erinnerungsraum – Indian Ocean Memories – am Beispiel von Südafrika und Südasien zu untersuchen. Damit leistet es einen Beitrag zum Verständnis der historischen Imagination bei der Entstehung transregionaler Raumkonzeptionen (Schwerpunkt 4) und verweist zugleich auf die Bedeutung von lokalen Erinnerungskulturen für die Darstellung und Deutung aktueller afrikanisch-asiatischer Interaktionen (Gesamtverbund).
Die Leitfrage des Vorhabens lautet, wie die lange Geschichte des Austauschs zwischen Südafrika und Südasien heute erinnert wird und welche Funktionen diese Erinnerungen im Lichte aktueller Interaktionen erfüllen. Das Vorhaben geht von der Annahme aus, dass die bereits seit Jahrhunderten bestehenden Beziehungen zwischen den beiden Regionen (Handel, Sklaverei, Schuldknechtschaft, Soldaten) angesichts neuer Formen der Interaktion (Arbeitsmigration, Tourismus, transnationale Medienkulturen) nicht einfach vergessen werden, sondern einen 'Erfahrungsraum' (R. Koselleck) bilden, vor dessen Hintergrund die Gegenwart gedeutet und Zukunftserwartungen artikuliert werden. Bei dieser Erinnerungstätigkeit kann es sich zum einen um Elemente offizieller Gedächtniskultur handeln (z.B. Gandhi in Südafrika); zum anderen setzt sich das Projekt zum Ziel, das zu rekonstruieren, was John C. Hawley  (2008, 4) in Anlehnung an James C. Scott als "hidden transcripts" bezeichnet – nicht-offizielle, private und subaltern Formen des Erinnerns, die sich jedoch in Literatur, Fotografie, Film und anderen Medien manifestieren können.
Das Vorhaben verortet sich im Feld der memory studies. Es ist intermedial angelegt. Untersucht wird ein breites Korpus von Erinnerungsmedien (v.a. Literatur, Film und Fotografie). Gefragt wird nach narrativen und visuellen Strategien der Erzeugung des Indischen Ozeans als Erinnerungsraum; nach den Gemeinsamkeiten und Unterschieden südafrikanischer und südasiatischer Erinnerungsbilder und  narrative; nach dem Zusammenspiel verschiedener (alter und neuer) Medien bei der Herausbildung, Tradierung und Transformation privater und öffentlicher Erinnerungen an den Indischen Ozean; und schließlich nach den Funktionen des Indischen Ozeans als Erinnerungsraum für die Deutung aktueller und zukünftiger asiatisch-afrikanischer Interaktionen in beiden Regionen.

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Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

Helff, Sissy ; 2013 ; Unreliable Truths: Transcultural Homeworlds in Indian Women’s Fiction of the Diaspora. ; Helff, Sissy ; Rodopi. Pb ; Amsterdam/New York
Erll, Astrid ; 2014 ; From District Six to District 9 and Back: The Plurimedial Production of Travelling Schemata ; de Cesari, Chiara & Ann Rigney ; Transnational Memory: Circulation, Articulation, Scales ; de Gruyter ; Berlin/New York ; 29–5
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; 2014 ; Africa’s Asian Options: Indian Ocean Imaginaries in East African Literature ; Beyond the Line: Cultural Constructions of the Southern Oceans ; Michael Mann, Ines Phaf-Rheinberger ; Neofelis ; Berlin ; 159-179

Talks and Lectures

Helff, Sissy ; ‘Deep Memory’ in Indian Ocean Photography ; Tuesday, March 24, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Writing Back to Whom? East African Literature in a Multipolar World, WiSe 2013/14 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Writers in African Politics, WiSe 2014/15 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Travelling Afrasian Objects ; Friday, May 6, 2016 ; University of Augsburg
Helff, Sissy ; Transregional Sightlines: Visualising Dialogues between Asia and Africa in Photography ; Wednesday, March 12, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur
Helff, Sissy ; Transregional Sightlines: Images of Asia in African Photography ; Wednesday, August 7, 2013 ; St. Lucia
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; Spectres of Solidarity: Transregional Interactions in East African Literature ; Wednesday, March 25, 2015 ; Kapstadt
South Africa and China - Politics and Perspective ; Mageza-Barthel, Rirhandu & John Njenga Karugia, SoSe 2015 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Erll, Astrid ; Indian Ocean Memories, WiSe 2014/15 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John ; In (Visible) Imperial Indian Ocean Memories ; Thursday, June 25, 2015 to Wednesday, March 30, 2016 ; University of Amsterdam
Karugia, John Njenga ; Connective Indian Ocean Memories ; Wednesday, March 25, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Karugia, John Njenga, Erll, Astrid & Sissy Helff ; Collective Amnesia, Denial or Disavowal of History? The Indian Ocean Islands of Mauritius and its Colonial Past ; Tuesday, May 19, 2015 ; The Frankfurt Memory Studies Platform, Goethe University Frankfurt
John Njenga Karugia ; Civilizational Dialogues Between Asia and Africa: Asia in East Africa's Parliaments ; Tuesday, March 11, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Karugia, John Njenga ; Afrasian Literature, WiSe 2015/16 ; Goethe University Frankfurt

S4-A: Imaginationen des Indischen Ozeans in der ostafrikanischen Literatur und Oralkultur

Übersicht: 

Das Projekt beschäftigt sich mit der Transformation von Imaginationen des Indischen Ozeans in der ostafrikanischen Schriftliteratur und Oralkultur. Im Mittelpunkt steht dabei die Frage, welche Zusammenhänge zwischen historischen Wechselbeziehungen zwischen Afrika und Asien und hieraus generierten Imaginationen der Großregion Indischer Ozean einerseits sowie aktuellen afrikanisch-asiatischen Interaktionen und deren Repräsentation in der zeitgenössischen ostafrikanischen Literatur bestehen. Das Projekt nimmt mit den Imaginationen des Indischen Ozeans einen Kernbereich der Genese und aktuellen Ausprägung von neuen transregionalen Raumkonzepten ins Visier (AFRASO-Schwerpunkt 4) und leistet durch seine historische Ausrichtung einen wichtigen Beitrag dazu, der Analyse afrikanisch-asiatischer Interaktionen im Rahmen des AFRASO-Gesamtprojekts historische Tiefenschärfe zu verleihen.

Das Projekt geht von der Annahme aus, dass im ostafrikanischen Kontext höchst unterschiedliche Imagi­nationen des Indischen Ozeans existieren und dass sich insbesondere kulturelle Konstruktionen des Indischen Ozeans in Küstenregionen und im küstenfernen Hinterland historisch deutlich voneinander unterscheiden. Um diese Unterschiede für die Analyse der Transformation von Imaginationen des Indischen Ozeans nutzbar zu machen, werden im Rahmen einer exemplarischen Feldforschung Bilder des Indischen Ozeans in der Oralkultur des ländlichen Uganda sowie in Sansibar ermittelt und kontrastiv ana­lysiert. Am Beispiel der literarischen Auseinandersetzung mit der wohl bekanntesten Ikone des Indischen Ozeans - der Dhow - wird des weiteren untersucht, welche Imaginationen des Indischen Ozeans sich aus der spezifischen Erfahrung ableiten, den Indischen Ozean tatsächlich auf einer Dhow bereist zu haben. In englisch- und swahilisprachigen Erlebnisberichten, Reisedarstellungen und Biographien wird daher die gelebte Erfahrung des Indischen Ozeans von Dhow-Reisenden in historischer Perspektive untersucht und mit aktuellen literarischen Auseinandersetzungen mit dem Dhow-Topos in Beziehung gesetzt. In einem weiteren Schritt wird der Korpus der anglophonen Literatur Ostafrikas (Kenia, Tansania, Uganda) von 1960 bis heute im Hinblick auf Konzeptionen und Bilder des Großraums indischer Ozean als transregionaler kultureller Kontaktzone, Repräsentationen von Asiat(inn)en, asiatischer Kultur und asiatischen Ländern sowie unterschiedliche Ausprägungen von Indian Ocean Imaginaries in den Küstenregionen und im ostafrikanischen Hinterland literaturwissenschaftlich analysiert. Im Zusammenspiel der Analyse von Oralkultur, Dhow-Literatur und des Korpus der anglophonen Literatur Ostafrikas soll so ein differenzierter Blick auf die Genese und Transformation von Indian Ocean Imaginaries ermöglicht und insbesondere die Frage beantwortet werden, ob und in welcher Weise aktuelle Imaginationen des Indischen Ozeans als transregionaler Kontaktzone an frühere Indian Ocean Imaginaries anknüpfen, oder ob sich im Hinblick auf die Repräsentation aktueller afrikanisch-asiatischer Interaktionen ein Bruch mit diesen historischen Imaginationen konstatieren lässt.

A dhow on the Indian Ocean waters next to Zanzibar in 2013. © Karugia, John Njenga

 

A Zanzibar Government document associated with the Dhows season in 1947-1948 © Zanzibar National Archives, photo by Karugia, John Njenga.

The novel, Nairobi to Shenzen: A novel of Love in the East by Mark Okoth Obama Ndesandjo © Mark O. Obama Ndesandjo

The Mtepe, a sewn craft mainly built in Lamu on the Indian Ocean coast © Fort Jesus Museum Mombasa, photo by Karugia, John Njenga

Mao Zedong and Jomo Kenyatta as portrayed on Kenyan and Chinese currency in "Selling World Power" (short story) in Kwani? 04, Kwani, 2007 by Billy Kahora

 

 

Kontakt: 

Ort: 

Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

Schulze-Engler, Frank ; 2015 ; Once Were Internationalists? Postcolonialism, Disenchanted Solidarity and the Right to Belong in a World of Globalized Modernity ; Reworking Postcolonial-ism: Globalization, Labour and Rights ; Malreddy, Pavan Kumar; Heidemann, Birte; Laursen, Ole Birk & Janet Wilson ; Palgrave Macmillan ; London & New York ; 19–35
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; 2014 ; Africa’s Asian Options: Indian Ocean Imaginaries in East African Literature ; Beyond the Line: Cultural Constructions of the Southern Oceans ; Michael Mann, Ines Phaf-Rheinberger ; Neofelis ; Berlin ; 159-179

Talks and Lectures

Karugia, John Njenga ; Writing Back to Whom? East African Literature in a Multipolar World, WiSe 2013/14 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Writers in African Politics, WiSe 2014/15 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Travelling Afrasian Objects ; Friday, May 6, 2016 ; University of Augsburg
Schwarz, Julia ; Transregionale Kontaktzone Indischer Ozean: Afrikanisch-asiatische Interaktionen in Uganda und Sansibar ; Saturday, January 31, 2015 ; Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
South Africa and China - Politics and Perspective ; Mageza-Barthel, Rirhandu & John Njenga Karugia, SoSe 2015 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; Looking Sideways: Afrasian Imaginaries and the Remaking of World Literature ; Thursday, January 21, 2016 ; Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
Beek, Jan & Julia Verne ; Introduction: Geteilte Forschung ; Friday, December 4, 2015 ; Goethe University, Frankfurt
Karugia, John ; In (Visible) Imperial Indian Ocean Memories ; Thursday, June 25, 2015 to Wednesday, March 30, 2016 ; University of Amsterdam
Karugia, John Njenga ; Connective Indian Ocean Memories ; Wednesday, March 25, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Karugia, John Njenga, Erll, Astrid & Sissy Helff ; Collective Amnesia, Denial or Disavowal of History? The Indian Ocean Islands of Mauritius and its Colonial Past ; Tuesday, May 19, 2015 ; The Frankfurt Memory Studies Platform, Goethe University Frankfurt
John Njenga Karugia ; Civilizational Dialogues Between Asia and Africa: Asia in East Africa's Parliaments ; Tuesday, March 11, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Karugia, John Njenga ; Afrasian Literature, WiSe 2015/16 ; Goethe University Frankfurt

S4-D: Indischer Ozean, translokale Geschichte(n) und die maritimen Raumkonstruktionen transregionaler Area Studies

Übersicht: 

Die Bedeutung des Indischen Ozeans als Untersuchungseinheit ist im Verlauf der letzten 130 Jahre, seit der Begründung der Kulturgeographie durch Friedrich Ratzel, erheblichen Schwan­kungen ausgesetzt. Für Ratzel selbst spielt der Indische Ozean in seinen Überlegungen zur Herkunft und Verbreitung afrikanischer Bögen zwar eine Rolle, die vor allem in der historischen Ethnolo­gie weitergedacht wird. Doch mit der Hinwendung zur klassischen Länderkunde und der damit einhergehenden zunehmenden Abkehr von einer auf größere Zusammenhänge blickenden historischen Perspektive Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts verliert sich diese Herangehensweise, so dass der Indische Ozean von diesem Zeitpunkt an keine Rolle mehr als regionaler Schwerpunkt spielt. Erst die Rezeption Braudel’s bekannter Studie zum Mittelmeer regt schließlich Mitte der 80er Jahre vor allem Historiker wieder dazu an, sich mit der Übertragbarkeit einer „maritimen“ Perspektive auf den Indischen Ozean auseinanderzusetzen und erneut nach Zusam­menhang und Einheit dieser Region zu fragen. Obwohl die Regionalstudien insgesamt in den letzten Jahren von unterschiedlichen Seiten immer wieder erheblich kritisiert und grundsätzlich in Frage gestellt wurden, hat der Indische Ozean somit als regionaler Forschungsschwerpunkt v.a. in den letzten zehn Jahren zusehends an Bedeutung gewonnen. Die theoreti­schen und methodologischen Überlegungen, der Einfluss wissenschaftstheoretischer Paradigmen sowie die politischen und institutionellen Rahmenbedingungen die diesen Konstruktionen des Indischen Ozeans als Region zu Grunde liegen, stellen den Fokus des beantragten Teilprojekts dar.

Kontakt: 

Ort: 

Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

Verne, Julia ; 2014 ; Translokalität als sedimentierte Praxis: Getrieben von der Geschichte des Indischen Ozeans ; Geographische Rundschau ; 11 ; 24-31
Berndt, Christian, Boeckler, Marc ; 2016 ; Behave, global south! Economics, experiments, evidence. ; Geoforum ; 70 ; 22–26

Talks and Lectures

Marc Boeckler ; What's in a Region? ; Friday, June 7, 2013 ; Bayreuth
Verne, Julia ; The Art of Hubbing: The Role of Small Islands in Indian Ocean Connectivity ; Friday, October 16, 2015 ; MPI für Sozialanthropologie, Halle
Verne, Julia ; Swahili Studies and the Translocalisation of Areas ; Wednesday, June 11, 2014 ; Bayreuth
Beek, Jan & Julia Verne ; Introduction: Geteilte Forschung ; Friday, December 4, 2015 ; Goethe University, Frankfurt
Verne, Julia ; Imagining an Afrasian Island: The Indian Ocean as an anchor to unite Réunion?. ; Wednesday, March 25, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Verne, Julia ; Geography meets Anthropology: Culture and Space, Past and Present ; Wednesday, August 27, 2014 ; London
Verne, Julia ; Der Indische Ozean als Inspiration in Literatur und Wissenschaft ; Thursday, June 12, 2014 ; Bayreuth

S4-D: Post-Terrestrial Area Studies? The Indian Ocean, Translocal Histories and Maritime Constructions of Space

Übersicht: 

In geographic research, the Indian Ocean first started to play a crucial role in the works of Friedrich Ratzel, the founder of the field of Anthropogeography . Trying to reconstruct the diffusion of African bows, the connections between Indonesia, Polynesia and Africa became a focus of his inquiry and inspired him and his followers - esp. those working in historical anthropology - to think about spatial formations across oceans. However, with a growing interest in nation-states, in the beginning of the 20th century, larger entities such as the Indian Ocean soon became neglected. It was only in the 1980es that the Indian Ocean regained the attention of academics, historians in particular, inspired to a large extent by the seminal work of Braudel on the Mediterranean, posing questions about the connectivity and unity of this region. In the last two decades, an increasing engagement with the Indian Ocean can be observed in the humanities and social sciences, expressing itself in a large number of publications and the foundation of numerous interdisciplinary research institutes focusing on the Indian Ocean.

Parallel to this recent flourishing of the field of Indian Ocean Studies, area studies in general, however, have been met with a lot of critique, questioning the appropriateness of separating the world in different world regions, and pointing especially to the arbitrariness of their borders. As a result, recent attempts to rethink and revitalise area studies often focus on alternative, less topographical constructions of space, putting a special emphasis on mobility, relationality and translocal connections, and thus bringing maritime constructions of space to the fore.

By focusing on the history and recent development of Indian Ocean Studies, in this project we therefore wish to bring together these current – and often very abstract – debates on the nature and role of area studies with an empirical example. First of all, our aim is to revisit the work on the Indian Ocean in historical perspective in order to theoretically reflect on the relation between culture and space as conceived in this non-terrestrial context. Moreover, through ethnographic research in different Indian Ocean Studies Institutes we critically examine the most recent engagements with the Indian Ocean, their motivation and institutionalisation, crossreading these empirical experiences with the current discussions on the role and relevance of area studies.

Kontakt: 

Ort: 

Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

Verne, Julia ; 2014 ; Translokalität als sedimentierte Praxis: Getrieben von der Geschichte des Indischen Ozeans ; Geographische Rundschau ; 11 ; 24-31
Berndt, Christian, Boeckler, Marc ; 2016 ; Behave, global south! Economics, experiments, evidence. ; Geoforum ; 70 ; 22–26

Talks and Lectures

Marc Boeckler ; What's in a Region? ; Friday, June 7, 2013 ; Bayreuth
Verne, Julia ; The Art of Hubbing: The Role of Small Islands in Indian Ocean Connectivity ; Friday, October 16, 2015 ; MPI für Sozialanthropologie, Halle
Verne, Julia ; Swahili Studies and the Translocalisation of Areas ; Wednesday, June 11, 2014 ; Bayreuth
Beek, Jan & Julia Verne ; Introduction: Geteilte Forschung ; Friday, December 4, 2015 ; Goethe University, Frankfurt
Verne, Julia ; Imagining an Afrasian Island: The Indian Ocean as an anchor to unite Réunion?. ; Wednesday, March 25, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Verne, Julia ; Geography meets Anthropology: Culture and Space, Past and Present ; Wednesday, August 27, 2014 ; London
Verne, Julia ; Der Indische Ozean als Inspiration in Literatur und Wissenschaft ; Thursday, June 12, 2014 ; Bayreuth
Karugia, John Njenga ; Chinesische Migration nach Tansania ; Wednesday, February 20, 2013 ; Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum – Kulturen der Welt, Köln
Karugia, John Njenga ; Asiatische Akteure in Afrika im globalen Kontext ; Saturday, November 23, 2013 to Sunday, November 24, 2013 ; Herbert-Wehner-Bildungswerk, Dresden

S4-B: The Indian Ocean as Memory Space

Übersicht: 

The project asks how the Indian Ocean works as a space of memory in Asian and African memory cultures – especially in South Africa, East Africa, South Asia and China. Our research has so far demonstrated the limiting nature of the ‘Indian Ocean’ approach since Afrasian (Africa-Asian) interactions go beyond the littoral states of the Indian Ocean to China and beyond. This project therefore studies the cultural production of "Indian Ocean Memories” which we perceive of as „Afrasian memories“ (see Karugia 2016, in preparation). Afrasian memories are „connective memories“. They connect, reconnect and articulate transregional historical imaginaries. The ‘Afrasian Ocean’ world connects multiethnic communities. In some of these Afrasian spaces, we observe a paradigm-shift from competitive towards multidirectional memory (in the sense of M. Rothberg 2009).

The project's key question is how the long history of exchange between Africa and Asia is remembered today and which functions such memories fulfil in the light of current interactions. The project starts from the assumption that the centuries-old relations between both regions (trade, migration, slavery, indentured labour, soldiers etc.) are not simply forgotten in the face of today's Afrasian interactions (such as labour migration, tourism, transnational media cultures), but that they constitute a "space of experience" (R. Koselleck) against which the present situation is understood and expectations for the future are articulated. Museums, literature and other media, memory institutions and memory sites across the world of the „Afrasian Ocean“ address human interactions and power dynamics across time and space. We ask how Afrasian memories contribute to an understanding of present and future African-Asian interactions.

In the framework of AFRASO, the project's goals are to understand, first, the significance of historical imagination for transregional conceptions of space and, second, the importance of local memory cultures for the representation and interpretation of current African-Asian interactions. In light of the foregoing, we are analysing the production of contemporary transnational imaginaries of citizenship, the complex negotiation of transcultural identities amongst old Asian-African and new Asian diasporas, claims of long-standing transregional socio-political and cultural links, new and old memory sites built or claimed by certain Afrasian communities and Afrasian bio-politics within old and emergent Afrasian diasporas.

'Memory', in this project, describes on the one hand elements of explicit, official memory culture (e.g. the remembrance of Gandhi in South Africa); on the other hand, the project wants to reconstruct what John C. Hawley (2008, 4), drawing on James C. Scott, has called "hidden transcripts": implicit, non-official, private and subaltern forms of memory, which, however, can be articulated in literature, photography, film and other media. Such memories have especially come to the fore in interviews we conducted with various groups of people in South Africa, East Africa, China and India as well as in our recent investigation of ‘travelling afrasian objects’ and ‘multidirectional mnemoeconomics’ (see Karugia 2016, in preparation).

Kontakt: 

Ort: 

Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

Karugia, John Njenga ; 2015 ; “Tazara Memory in Africa’s Contemporary Politics of Dignity” ; (当代非洲政治尊严中的坦赞回忆), International Aid Journal ; 5th 2015 (6th in general) [2015年第5期,总第6期] ; Beijing, 18-25
Helff, Sissy ; 2013 ; Unreliable Truths: Transcultural Homeworlds in Indian Women’s Fiction of the Diaspora. ; Helff, Sissy ; Rodopi. Pb ; Amsterdam/New York
Karugia, John Njenga ; 2017 ; Indischer Ozean ; Handbuch Postkolonialismus und Literatur. ; Hg. von Dirk Göttsche, Axel Dunker und Gabriele Dürbeck ; Metzler ; Stuttgart
Karugia, John Njenga ; 2016 ; Indian Ocean Mega Projects in East Africa vs. Human Rights ; Megaprojekte Contra Menschenrechte - Fortschritt um jeden Preis? ; Braun, Naima ; No. 4 ; Tanzania-Network ; Berlin
Erll, Astrid ; 2014 ; From District Six to District 9 and Back: The Plurimedial Production of Travelling Schemata ; de Cesari, Chiara & Ann Rigney ; Transnational Memory: Circulation, Articulation, Scales ; de Gruyter ; Berlin/New York ; 29–5
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; 2014 ; Africa’s Asian Options: Indian Ocean Imaginaries in East African Literature ; Beyond the Line: Cultural Constructions of the Southern Oceans ; Michael Mann, Ines Phaf-Rheinberger ; Neofelis ; Berlin ; 159-179

Talks and Lectures

Helff, Sissy ; ‘Deep Memory’ in Indian Ocean Photography ; Tuesday, March 24, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Writing Back to Whom? East African Literature in a Multipolar World, WiSe 2013/14 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Writers in African Politics, WiSe 2014/15 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Wissensproduktion in der geteilten transregionalen Forschung ; Friday, December 4, 2015 ; Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Wissensproduktion in der geteilten transregionalen Forschung ; Friday, December 4, 2015 ; AFRASO, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt, Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Wealth in China’s ‚Colonies‘ in East Africa ; Monday, April 14, 2014 to Friday, April 18, 2014 ; University of Innsbruck, Innsbruck, Austria
Karugia, John Njenga ; Travelling Afrasian Objects ; Friday, May 6, 2016 ; University of Augsburg
Helff, Sissy ; Transregional Sightlines: Visualising Dialogues between Asia and Africa in Photography ; Wednesday, March 12, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur
Helff, Sissy ; Transregional Sightlines: Images of Asia in African Photography ; Wednesday, August 7, 2013 ; St. Lucia
Karugia, John Njenga ; Transregional Research in Trans-Areas: Methodological Reflections ; Monday, December 14, 2015 ; Universität Hamburg
Karugia, John Njenga ; Towards a Braver History of the Indian Ocean ; Thursday, November 26, 2015 ; Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, Barcelona
Karugia, John Njenga ; The Indian Ocean as Memory Space ; Thursday, November 12, 2015 ; Institut für Poskoloniale & Transkulturelle Studien, Universität Bremen, Bremen
Karugia, John Njenga ; Successes, Challenges and Paradoxes of China-Africa Relations ; Thursday, October 24, 2013 ; Goethe Universität Frankfurt am Main
Karugia, John Njenga ; Multidirectional Afrasian Mnemoeconomics ; Sunday, July 10, 2016 to Friday, July 15, 2016 ; Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch, South Africa
Karugia, John Njenga ; Memory, Migration and Politics in Asia-Africa Relations ; Wednesday, April 2, 2014 ; Jindal School of International Affairs, O.P. Jindal Global University Delhi, New Delhi,
South Africa and China - Politics and Perspective ; Mageza-Barthel, Rirhandu & John Njenga Karugia, SoSe 2015 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; KiswaChin - Sinokiswahili in Kariakoo Chinatown ; Sunday, June 8, 2014 to Monday, June 9, 2014 ; University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany
Karugia, John Njenga ; Indischer Ozean ; Thursday, December 10, 2015 ; Auswärtiges Amt, Berlin
Karugia, John Njenga ; Indian Ocean Migrations and Impacts in the 21st Century: China and India in East Africa ; Friday, April 4, 2014 ; Department of African Studies, Delhi University, New Delhi, India
Erll, Astrid ; Indian Ocean Memories, WiSe 2014/15 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Indian Ocean Mega Projects vs. Human Rights in Africa Within a Global Perspective of Asian Engagement ; Saturday, October 29, 2016 ; Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung, Berlin
Karugia, John Njenga ; Indian Ocean as a Memory Space in the Context of South Africa and India ; Tuesday, October 25, 2016 ; Centre for African Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, India
Karugia, John ; In (Visible) Imperial Indian Ocean Memories ; Thursday, June 25, 2015 to Wednesday, March 30, 2016 ; University of Amsterdam
Karugia, John Njenga ; East Africa, South Africa and the Indian Ocean in a Global Context ; Saturday, June 6, 2015 ; Niederndodeleben, Germany
Karugia, John Njenga ; Discussing China in Tanzania's Parliament ; Friday, January 17, 2014 ; Konfuzius Institut, Frankfurt am Main, Germany.
Karugia, John Njenga ; Dignity for Self and Others: Insights from Memory Studies ; Saturday, April 25, 2015 ; Prynnsberg Estate, Clocolan, South Africa
Karugia, John Njenga ; Contested Heritage Politics Across the Indian Ocean ; Thursday, January 14, 2016 ; Martin Luther Universität Halle-Wittenberg
Karugia, John Njenga ; Connective Indian Ocean Memories: Towards a Braver Indian Ocean History ; Friday, September 25, 2015 ; Goethe Frankfurt University
Karugia, John Njenga ; Connective Indian Ocean Memories ; Wednesday, March 25, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Connective Afrasian Ocean Memories in Pheroze Nowrojee's 'A Kenyan Journey': Between Competitive and Multidirectional Remembering ; Thursday, October 13, 2016 ; Diasporic Constructions of Home and Belonging Indian Diaspora Centre, University of Mumbai, Mumbai, India
Karugia, John Njenga and Erll, Astrid ; Connective Afrasian Memories: Between Competitive and Multidirectional Remembering ; Wednesday, September 28, 2016 to Friday, September 30, 2016 ; Goethe University Frankfurt, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
Karugia, John Njenga, Erll, Astrid & Sissy Helff ; Collective Amnesia, Denial or Disavowal of History? The Indian Ocean Islands of Mauritius and its Colonial Past ; Tuesday, May 19, 2015 ; The Frankfurt Memory Studies Platform, Goethe University Frankfurt
John Njenga Karugia ; Civilizational Dialogues Between Asia and Africa: Asia in East Africa's Parliaments ; Tuesday, March 11, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Karugia, John Njenga ; Chinesische Migration nach Tansania ; Wednesday, February 20, 2013 ; Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum – Kulturen der Welt, Köln
Karugia, John Njenga ; Baohan Street: An African Community in Guangzhou (China) ; Thursday, October 16, 2014 ; Global South Studies Center Cologne, Cultures and Societies in Transition
Karugia, John Njenga ; Asiatische Akteure in Afrika im globalen Kontext ; Saturday, November 23, 2013 to Sunday, November 24, 2013 ; Herbert-Wehner-Bildungswerk, Dresden
Karugia, John Njenga ; African Memories of Visits to China ; Thursday, January 15, 2015 ; Konfuzius Institut, Frankfurt am Main, Germany.
Karugia, John Njenga ; Afrasian migrations across transregional spaces and places: East Africans and Chinese Migrants ; Thursday, May 15, 2014 to Saturday, May 17, 2014 ; Centre for Interdisciplinary African Studies, Goethe University of Frankfurt and Centre for the Study of Contemporary Africa at the University of Naples “L´Orientale”, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
Karugia, John Njenga ; Afrasian Memory Interviews: Complexities in Afrasian Spaces ; Tuesday, May 3, 2016 ; University of Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Afrasian Literature, WiSe 2015/16 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Afrasia: Justice and Ethics Within a Multidirectional Mnemoeconomics Framework ; Thursday, October 27, 2016 to Saturday, October 29, 2016 ; Department of Socio-Cultural Diversity, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
Karugia, John Njenga ; „China in Afrika – Chancen, Herausforderungen, Perspektiven ; Thursday, May 22, 2014 ; Leipzig, Germany

S4-A: Indian Ocean Imaginaries in East African Literature and Oral Culture

Übersicht: 

The project addresses the transformation of Indian Ocean imaginaries in East African literature and oral culture. The central research question focusses on the connections between the imaginaries of the Indian Ocean region generated by historical African-Asian interactions on the one hand and the representation of today’s African-Asian interactions in contemporary East African literature on the other. With its focus on Indian Ocean imaginaries, the project targets a key issue with regard to the historical emergence and contemporary constitution of new transregional concepts of space (AFRASO Key Area 4); with its historical focus, the project contributes to lending historical depth to the analysis of African-Asian interactions within the AFRASO research programme as a whole.

The project is based on the assumption that Indian Ocean imaginaries differ widely throughout East Africa and that in historical terms coastal regions and landlocked regions distant from the sea have generated particularly divergent cultural constructions of the Indian Ocean. To utilize these differences for an analysis of the transformation of Indian Ocean imaginaries, exemplary field research on images of the Indian Ocean in oral culture will be conducted in rural Uganda and in Zanzibar. An analysis of literary representations of the probably best-known Indian Ocean icon – the dhow – will establish which Indian Ocean imaginaries are generated by the specific experience of travelling on the Indian Ocean by dhow. Representations of the lived experience of dhow voyages on the Indian Ocean will be analyzed in historical perspective in reports, travelogues and biographies in English and Swahili and will be contrasted to current literary renderings of the dhow topos. Finally, the corpus of East African literature in East Africa (Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda) from 1960 to the present day will be analyzed with a special focus on concepts and images of the Indian Ocean area as a transregional cultural contact zone, representations of Asians, Asian culture and Asian countries and different versions of Indian Ocean imaginaries in coastal regions and the East African hinterland. The combined analysis of oral culture, dhow literature in English and Swahili and the corpus of anglophone East African writing is designed to produce new insights into the complex genesis and transformation of Indian Ocean imaginaries and to provide differentiated answers to the question if and how contemporary images and concepts of the Indian Ocean as transregional contact zone build on earlier Indian Ocean imaginaries, or whether representations of current  African-Asian interactions are characterized by a break with these historically generated imaginaries.

A dhow on the Indian Ocean waters next to Zanzibar in 2013. © Karugia, John Njenga

A Zanzibar Government document associated with the Dhows season in 1947-1948 © Zanzibar National Archives, photo by Karugia, John Njenga.

The novel, Nairobi to Shenzen: A novel of Love in the East by Mark Okoth Obama Ndesandjo © Mark O. Obama Ndesandjo

The Mtepe, a sewn craft mainly built in Lamu on the Indian Ocean coast © Fort Jesus Museum Mombasa, photo by Karugia, John Njenga.

 

Mao Zedong and Jomo Kenyatta as portrayed on Kenyan and Chinese currency in "Selling World Power" (short story) in Kwani? 04, Kwani, 2007 by Billy Kahora.

 

Kontakt: 

Ort: 

Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

Schulze-Engler, Frank ; 2015 ; Once Were Internationalists? Postcolonialism, Disenchanted Solidarity and the Right to Belong in a World of Globalized Modernity ; Reworking Postcolonial-ism: Globalization, Labour and Rights ; Malreddy, Pavan Kumar; Heidemann, Birte; Laursen, Ole Birk & Janet Wilson ; Palgrave Macmillan ; London & New York ; 19–35
Karugia, John Njenga ; 2017 ; Indischer Ozean ; Handbuch Postkolonialismus und Literatur. ; Hg. von Dirk Göttsche, Axel Dunker und Gabriele Dürbeck ; Metzler ; Stuttgart
Karugia, John Njenga ; 2016 ; Indian Ocean Mega Projects in East Africa vs. Human Rights ; Megaprojekte Contra Menschenrechte - Fortschritt um jeden Preis? ; Braun, Naima ; No. 4 ; Tanzania-Network ; Berlin
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; 2014 ; Africa’s Asian Options: Indian Ocean Imaginaries in East African Literature ; Beyond the Line: Cultural Constructions of the Southern Oceans ; Michael Mann, Ines Phaf-Rheinberger ; Neofelis ; Berlin ; 159-179

Talks and Lectures

Karugia, John Njenga ; Writing Back to Whom? East African Literature in a Multipolar World, WiSe 2013/14 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Writers in African Politics, WiSe 2014/15 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Wissensproduktion in der geteilten transregionalen Forschung ; Friday, December 4, 2015 ; AFRASO, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt, Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Wissensproduktion in der geteilten transregionalen Forschung ; Friday, December 4, 2015 ; Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Wealth in China’s ‚Colonies‘ in East Africa ; Monday, April 14, 2014 to Friday, April 18, 2014 ; University of Innsbruck, Innsbruck, Austria
Karugia, John Njenga ; Travelling Afrasian Objects ; Friday, May 6, 2016 ; University of Augsburg
Schwarz, Julia ; Transregionale Kontaktzone Indischer Ozean: Afrikanisch-asiatische Interaktionen in Uganda und Sansibar ; Saturday, January 31, 2015 ; Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Transregional Research in Trans-Areas: Methodological Reflections ; Monday, December 14, 2015 ; Universität Hamburg
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; Towards a New Global South? Afrasian Imaginaries in East African Literature ; Monday, March 9, 2015 ; University of Western Australia, Perth
Karugia, John Njenga ; Towards a Braver History of the Indian Ocean ; Thursday, November 26, 2015 ; Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, Barcelona
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; Spectres of Solidarity: Transregional Interactions in East African Literature ; Wednesday, March 25, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; Spectres of Solidarity: Asian-African Interactions in East African Literature ; Tuesday, October 7, 2014 ; Centre for Indian Studies in Africa (CISA), University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; Spectres of Solidarity: Asian-African Interactions in East African Literature ; Thursday, October 9, 2014 ; University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, South Africa
Karugia, John Njenga ; Multidirectional Afrasian Mnemoeconomics ; Sunday, July 10, 2016 to Friday, July 15, 2016 ; Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch, South Africa
Karugia, John Njenga ; Memory, Migration and Politics in Asia-Africa Relations ; Wednesday, April 2, 2014 ; Jindal School of International Affairs, O.P. Jindal Global University Delhi, New Delhi,
South Africa and China - Politics and Perspective ; Mageza-Barthel, Rirhandu & John Njenga Karugia, SoSe 2015 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; Looking Sideways: African-Asian Literary Relations in the 'Global South' ; Monday, March 16, 2015 ; Monash University, Melbourne
Schulze-Engler, Frank ; Looking Sideways: Afrasian Imaginaries and the Remaking of World Literature ; Thursday, January 21, 2016 ; Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; KiswaChin - Sinokiswahili in Kariakoo Chinatown ; Sunday, June 8, 2014 to Monday, June 9, 2014 ; University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany
Beek, Jan & Julia Verne ; Introduction: Geteilte Forschung ; Friday, December 4, 2015 ; Goethe University, Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Indischer Ozean ; Thursday, December 10, 2015 ; Auswärtiges Amt, Berlin
Karugia, John Njenga ; Indian Ocean Migrations and Impacts in the 21st Century: China and India in East Africa ; Friday, April 4, 2014 ; Department of African Studies, Delhi University, New Delhi, India
Karugia, John Njenga ; Indian Ocean Mega Projects vs. Human Rights in Africa Within a Global Perspective of Asian Engagement ; Saturday, October 29, 2016 ; Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung, Berlin
Karugia, John Njenga ; Indian Ocean as a Memory Space in the Context of South Africa and India ; Tuesday, October 25, 2016 ; Centre for African Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, India
Karugia, John ; In (Visible) Imperial Indian Ocean Memories ; Thursday, June 25, 2015 to Wednesday, March 30, 2016 ; University of Amsterdam
Karugia, John Njenga ; Discussing China in Tanzania's Parliament ; Friday, January 17, 2014 ; Konfuzius Institut, Frankfurt am Main, Germany.
Karugia, John Njenga ; Dignity for Self and Others: Insights from Memory Studies ; Saturday, April 25, 2015 ; Prynnsberg Estate, Clocolan, South Africa
Karugia, John Njenga ; Contested Heritage Politics Across the Indian Ocean ; Thursday, January 14, 2016 ; Martin Luther Universität Halle-Wittenberg
Karugia, John Njenga ; Connective Indian Ocean Memories: Towards a Braver Indian Ocean History ; Friday, September 25, 2015 ; Goethe Frankfurt University
Karugia, John Njenga ; Connective Indian Ocean Memories ; Wednesday, March 25, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Connective Afrasian Ocean Memories in Pheroze Nowrojee's 'A Kenyan Journey': Between Competitive and Multidirectional Remembering ; Thursday, October 13, 2016 ; Diasporic Constructions of Home and Belonging Indian Diaspora Centre, University of Mumbai, Mumbai, India
Karugia, John Njenga, Erll, Astrid & Sissy Helff ; Collective Amnesia, Denial or Disavowal of History? The Indian Ocean Islands of Mauritius and its Colonial Past ; Tuesday, May 19, 2015 ; The Frankfurt Memory Studies Platform, Goethe University Frankfurt
John Njenga Karugia ; Civilizational Dialogues Between Asia and Africa: Asia in East Africa's Parliaments ; Tuesday, March 11, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Karugia, John Njenga ; Chinesische Migration nach Tansania ; Wednesday, February 20, 2013 ; Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum – Kulturen der Welt, Köln
Karugia, John Njenga ; Baohan Street: An African Community in Guangzhou (China) ; Thursday, October 16, 2014 ; Global South Studies Center Cologne, Cultures and Societies in Transition
Karugia, John Njenga ; Asiatische Akteure in Afrika im globalen Kontext ; Saturday, November 23, 2013 to Sunday, November 24, 2013 ; Herbert-Wehner-Bildungswerk, Dresden
Karugia, John Njenga ; African Memories of Visits to China ; Thursday, January 15, 2015 ; Konfuzius Institut, Frankfurt am Main, Germany.
Prof. Dr. Frank Schulze-Engler ; Africa's Asian Options: Indian Ocean Imaginaries in East African Literature ; Tuesday, August 6, 2013 ; Gros Islet, St. Lucia
Karugia, John Njenga ; Afrasian migrations across transregional spaces and places: East Africans and Chinese Migrants ; Thursday, May 15, 2014 to Saturday, May 17, 2014 ; Centre for Interdisciplinary African Studies, Goethe University of Frankfurt and Centre for the Study of Contemporary Africa at the University of Naples “L´Orientale”, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
Karugia, John Njenga ; Afrasian Literature, WiSe 2015/16 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Karugia, John Njenga ; Afrasia: Justice and Ethics Within a Multidirectional Mnemoeconomics Framework ; Thursday, October 27, 2016 to Saturday, October 29, 2016 ; Department of Socio-Cultural Diversity, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
Karugia, John Njenga ; „China in Afrika – Chancen, Herausforderungen, Perspektiven ; Thursday, May 22, 2014 ; Leipzig, Germany