Language and normalised abnormalities in the world today

University of Manchester School of Social Sciences

Join us for Professor Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o's public lecture addressing coloniality and the harms of imperialism/colonialisation.

The University of Manchester, Theatre B University Place

In this lecture, Professor Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o will address topics of coloniality and harms of imperialism/colonialisation. He will, in particular, focus on the lasting impact on colonialism and imperialism on native languages, African knowledge, memory, genocide and harms against the environment. In the latter part of the event, Professor Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o will move towards addressing African-centred solutions to these lasting legacies. The lecture will be followed by a conversation with Esther Stanford-Xosei, community advocate and international expert on reparatory justiceT﻿he lecture and following discussion will be chaired by Professor Gary Younge from the University of Manchester Department of Sociology.

<h2>B﻿iography</h2>Professor Ngugi wa Thiong’o was born in Kamirithu near Limuru, in 1938, in the ‘white’ highlands of Kenya, the heart of the colonised landscape. The colonial regime shaped his family’s life: one brother joined and died fighting in the Gĩkũyũ Land and Freedom army and the other was shot, point blank by colonial police as a result of his disability. These and other events of his life: studies at Makerere University and education by missionaries shaped his thinking throughout his studies and his writings as James Ngugi, as he communicated his insights through his early writing in English. In particular ‘Weep Not Child’(1964) and ‘The River Between’ (1965) which explored his colonial childhood.All of this intensified after his studies at Leeds University, where his encounters with Fanon’s writings and studies of George Lamming reactivated his commitment to the role of writing for his people and at the final stages of his dissertation, decided to recommit to his decolonial mission by writing ‘A Grain of Wheat’ (1967) which brought him back into prominence as a decolonial scholar. He returned to Kenya and in the early 70’s, he went on to denounce his colonised Christian name reclaiming his Gĩkũyũ name as Ngugi wa Thiong’o - recognising his father and embracing his cultural roots by subsequently deciding to write in the language into which he was born: Gĩkũyũ.As a writer featured in school curricula and a lecturer at the University of Nairobi, Ngugi’s grassroots activities in the arts, and agitating for changes in the literature department led to him becoming hounded by and finally arrested by the Kenyan government of the 70’s and spending a year in prison. He continued to write in his own tongue and ‘Petals of Blood’ and ‘Devil on the Cross’ were released during that period. Upon release from prison he and his family’s hostile experiences led him to exile in London, then Stockholm and later the United States where, after professorships at Yale, at New York University, periods of activism spent in South Africa and speaking tours in Asia, he eventually took up residency as professor at the University of California, Irvine, up until recently. Professor Ngugi has received many distinguished awards, honorary doctorates and prizes between 1964 and 2022, acknowledging his unrelenting campaign against ‘normalised abnormalities’ resulting from colonisation. He is one of the few remaining scholars and activists whose work defines the grand eras of decolonisation of the African and global diasporic mind and we celebrate and honour his life’s work in Gukunguira.His works include essays, plays, memoirs and fiction, a selection of which are:Homecoming: Essays on African and Caribbean Literature, Culture, and Politics (1972)Writers in Politics: Essays (1981) Education for a National Culture (1981),Barrel of a Pen: Resistance to Repression in Neo-Colonial Kenya (1983), Globalectics: Theory and the Politics of Knowing (2012), In the Name of the Mother: Reflections on Writers and Empire (2013) and Secure the Base (2016) The Trial of Dedan Kimathi (1976) Ngaahika Ndeenda Ithaako ria ngerekano (I Will Marry When I Want)(1977). Detained: A Writer’s Prison Diary (1981)Dreams in a Time of War: a Childhood Memoir (2010), In the House of the Interpreter: A Memoir (2012). Weep Not, Child (1964), The River Between (1965) A Grain of Wheat (1967, 1992)Petals of Blood (1977) Caitaani Mutharaba-Ini (Devil on the Cross (1980) Matigari ma Njiruungi (1986) Mũrogi wa Kagogo (Wizard of the Crow) (1981)Njamba Nene and the Cruel Chief (1988) Njamba Nene’s Pistol (1990) His most recent book: Kenda Muiyuru: Rugano Rwa Gĩkũyũ na Mumbi, was translated into English by him as: The Perfect Nine: The Story of Gĩkũyũ and Mumbi

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