Dzekashu MacViban One of the most anticipated movie sequels in Cameroon perhaps delivers as much as it falls short. Thierry Ntamack (middle) The desire to leave Cameroon for greener pastures, an issue which is ingeniously documented in the…
From Afrocentrism to Afropolitanism: Subcultural Journeys in Minna Salami’s Poetry
Dzekashu MacViban Cache by Minna Salami: Weedmark Publishing; 2013, ISBN-13: 978-1-291-31161-7. When Nigerian-Swedish writer Minna Salami released a slim collection of poetry on Valentine’s day last year, I immediately recalled that I’d read her poems sometime in 2010 on the…
The Joys of Somali Poetry: the Beauteous Melancholy of Warsan Shire’s Poetry
Dzekashu MacViban Warsan Shire at the Kwani? 2012 Literary Festival. Photo credit: Paul Munene & Kwani Trust 2012 With the clarity of retrospection, when I look back at the 2012 Kwani? Literary Festival which took place in Nairobi, I realize…
Culture Ebene, Stone Karim and a Revenge Narrative
Dzekashu MacViban Stone Karim at the Institut Français de Haïti Writing for Culture Ebene in 2012, Tatla Mbetbo’s piece “Le slam camer est stone” (Cameroonian spoken word is Stone) reads more like a “revenge narrative” rather than a journalistic piece.…
Afrikan Luv Unapologetically Flaunts its African-[ness]
Dzekashu MacViban As a latecomer to the Cameroonian musical scene, hip-hop has been on a gradual but steady rise in an over-congested milieu where, according to Kangsen Feka Wakai, “for at least two decades, it would play fifth fiddle to…
The Spoken Word Scene in Cameroon: From Poetry to Poetography
A shorter version of this article was originally commissioned by the Goethe-Institut and published on www.goethe.de Dzekashu MacViban Black Alice. Photo Credit: Black Alice For many years, spoken word in Cameroon was like the anecdotal man with the iron…
Q & A with Ntone Edjabe on Chimurenga, Fela, and Politics
“By developing editorial projects together and assisting each other in areas such as distribution, we quietly mainstream our own aesthetics and reduce our dependency on the global publishing system” Ntone Edjabe Interviewed by Dzekashu MacViban Ntone Edjabe was…
Two Poems by Dzekashu MacViban
After the Lobotomy I’ve known auto-proclaimed ministers, merchants of salvation whose hearts are wildernesses in a modern day wild See them revel in a hermetic ornanistic bacchanalia after a daily battle of wits to which they impose taxes— for knowledge…
