Abstract:
Over the past decade youth activism has seen a wellspring of movement across Africa and her diaspora. From the Black Lives Matter movement to youth protests in Kenya on the finance bill, uprisings in Uganda, Nigeria, Mozambique, South Africa, Kenya, Ghana, Uganda and Nigeria to protests in the Sahel which preceded and perhaps heralded the new wave of popular military coups, we see new generations of African youth rising to take back their countries. But what does the new wave of Pan-Africanism look like? Is it what we see in the increasing collaborations between Africa-based and diaspora artists, or the growing trends of travel like ‘Detty December’. What can we learn from recent uprisings in the African Arab spring and the counter revolution and war in Sudan? What will be the response to the right-wing waves of anti-immigrant sentiment and anti-Blackness emerging from changes in government in North America and Europe? This talk examines trends and asks some critical questions about the hopes and dreams for a revival of Pan-Africanism reflected in recent youth uprisings and suggestions for what the new Pan-Africanists can learn from history.

Bio:
Nanre Nafziger is an educator-organizer-scholar who serves her various communities through writing, research, teaching, and pan-Africanist organizing. Nanre’s research contributes to debates and collective knowledge making in the areas of critical education policy studies, Black/African Studies in Education, critical youth studies, Black/Africana social movements, youth participatory action research; and the role of civil society in public education and democratic nation-building.