In collaboration with Founders College, African Studies and Canada Research Chair in Youth and African Urban Futures.
Wednesday, April 6 2-4pm EST
Virtual event via Zoom
Recently, various African countries have experienced political instability, including new civil wars, terrorist insurgencies, coup d’états, civil unrests, and mass protests (from #ENDSARS and #FixthecountryGhana to revolutionary movements in Sudan). Meanwhile, some African citizens have resorted to dangerous journeys to the shores of Europe for “greener pastures”. Are these political issues an expression of unresolved underlying discontent and inequality or a reversal of gains made in democratization processes? What has been the role of social movements and young people in framing (in)justice and seeking alternatives? Does this moment present an opportunity to engage questions around resistance, African futurities, and imagination in an era of renewed hopes in transformative decolonization?
Join us for a panel discussion centring frameworks for understanding current realities and methodologies for mapping the (dis)continuities of the colonial present in African affairs.
Chair/Provocateur:
Pablo Idahosa, (Ph.D.) Head, Founders York University
Prof. Pablo Idahosa has been teaching African Studies and Development Studies for over twenty-five years. He has written on the politics of AIDS and disease in Africa, and has published on African modernities, African political thought and development, development ethics, development displacements and inequalities in Africa, national development, and African diasporas. He is currently Head of Founders College at York University.
Panelists:
Thomas K. Tieku, Ph.D.
Dr. Thomas K. Tieku is an African- Canadian international relations and negotiation expert and an Associate Professor of Political Science at King’s University College at The University of Western Ontario in Canada. He is the Former Director of African Studies at the University of Toronto where he won the Excellence of Teaching Award. He is the author of Governing Africa: 3D Analysis of the Performance of African Union, U.S-Africa Relations in the Age of Obama, the co-editor of African Actors in international Security, The Politics of Peacebuilding in Africa and has written 38 refereed book chapters and journal articles. He has consulted for several organizations including the World Bank Group, the UN, and the Canadian as well as U.S governments.
Aminata Cécile Mbaye (Ph.D.)
Aminata Cécile Mbaye is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Queen’s University from May 2021 to April 2023. Previously, she has been Assistant Professor of Romance and Comparative Studies at the University of Bayreuth, and Deputy Director of the Gender and Diversity Office with the Africa Multiple Cluster (Bayreuth). She Studied philosophy and socio-anthropology at the University Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne in France. Her primary research focuses on same-sex intimacy and queer aesthetic in Senegal and francophone African countries.
Temitope Oriola, Ph.D.
Temitope Oriola is joint Editor-in-Chief of African Security journal and associate professor at the University of Alberta. A recipient of the Governor General of Canada Academic Gold Medal (first awarded by the Earl of Dufferin in 1873), Oriola’s book Criminal Resistance? The Politics of Kidnapping Oil Workers is one of a small number of book-length sociological investigations of political kidnapping in the English language. Professor Oriola’s research focuses on policing & use of force by police, terrorism studies, and resource-related conflict (involving tactics like political kidnappings). Oriola regularly contributes to public scholarship through public talks, op-eds, media interviews and expert opinions. A decorated researcher and teacher, Professor Oriola is a two-time Carnegie fellow and past-president of the Canadian Association of African Studies (CAAS). Oriola is a member of the Board of Directors, Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences and has also served as special adviser to the Government of Alberta on Police Act Review.
Bahlelisiwe (Liswa) Luhlanga (Ph.D. Student)
Liswa Luhlanga, is a Graduate student at York University currently pursuing her PhD in Political Science. She recently graduated from the same university with a Master of Political Science and a post Graduate Diploma in Democratic Administration. She holds a double major Honours Degree in Communications Studies and Human Rights and Equity Studies. She is also the Founder and inaugural National Coordinator of the Swaziland Young Women’s Network (SYWON) a feminist organization committed to building leadership skills and advocating for Sexual Reproductive Health Rights of Young Women. She also has a proven history of feminist organizing, lobbying and advocacy at national and regional level. During the period of 2012 to 2014, she served the Swazi civil society as the Chairperson of the Gender Consortium at national level. As a CSO leader, she championed the first ever Swaziland Alternative Shadow report to the UN-CEDAW Committee in Geneva.
Yousif Hassan (Ph.D. Candidate)
Yousif is a PhD candidate (ABD) in the Science and Technology Studies program at York University and a visiting fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Program on Science, Technology and Society. His areas of interests are Black/African studies, critical race theory, critical algorithm studies, the political economy of technoscience, critical innovation studies, and information and communication studies. Yousif’s research is focused on the social, economic, and political implications of digital technology. He founded many activists’ networks to support democracy, freedom, peace, and justice in Sudan, Canada and abroad. He has published in academic journals and presented his work at conferences such as Information Polity, Science in Public, Canadian Congress, Society for Social Studies of Science, and International Studies Association.
Sponsoring Organizations: Resource Centre for Public Sociology (York University); Founders College (York University); African Studies Program (York University); Canada Research Chair in Youth and African Urban Futures (Queen’s University).