ANNOUNCED: Bloomsbury Academic Acquires Essay Anthology

-

 



UPDATE: Cover Reveal April 2024



Great to part of this! Thanks, to Eugen Bacon, who initiated this over a year ago: Bloomsbury Academic will be publishing this essay anthology covering a HUGE range of topics and insights within Afro-Centred Futurisms, including my essay “Cosmologies and Languages Building Africanfuturism”.

Afro-Centered Futurisms in Our Speculative Fiction is an accessible work of criticism that will appeal to scholarly readers and broader enthusiasts of Afrocentric and speculative literature. 

British Fantasy Award winner Eugen Bacon (ed.)'s AFRO-CENTERED FUTURISMS IN OUR SPECULATIVE FICTION, an anthology of original artistic essays infused with creative excerpts from award-winning African writers on the futurisms in their speculative fiction; a new kind of African study in an evaluative gaze at African history, African spirituality, Afrosurrealism, 'becoming', black radical imagination, cultural identity, decolonizing queerness, myths, linguistic cosmologies, and more, featuring an introduction by Suyi Okungbowa, to Amy Martin at Bloomsbury Academic, by Jennie Goloboy at Donald Maass Literary Agency.

This vibrant and approachable book is part of the Black Literary and Cultural Expressions, and engages with difference—featuring  stimulating chapters by Aline-Mwezi Niyonsenga, Cheryl S. Ntumy, Dilman Dila, Eugen Bacon, Nerine Dorman, Nuzo Onoh, Shingai Njeri Kagunda, Stephen Embleton, Tobi Ogundiran and Xan van Rooyen.

Out by Bloomsbury in 2024/25. 

Read more here.


Table of Contents

Preface
The Structure of This Book

Chapter 1. On Afrocentric Futurisms–The Case for an Inclusive Expression
Suyi Okungbowa, Nigeria/Canada
Chapter 2. Cosmologies and Languages Building Africanfuturism
Stephen Embleton, South Africa/UK
Chapter 3. An Afrofuturistic Dystopia and the Afro-irreal
Eugen Bacon, Tanzania/Australia
Chapter 4. The power of African Spirituality in Africanfuturism
Nuzo Onoh, Nigeria/UK
Chapter 5. Black Futurisms vs. Systems of Domination
Shingai Njeri Kagunda, Kenya
Chapter 6. Faith and Fantasy–Afrofuturist and Africanfuturist Spirituality
Cheryl S. Ntumy, Ghana
Chapter 7. Queer Imaginings in Africanfuturism Inspired by African History
Xan van Rooyen, South Africa/Finland
Chapter 8. Afrofuturism and Exploring Cultural Identity as a Process of Becoming
Aline-Mwezi Niyonsenga, Rwanda/Australia
Chapter 9. Fabulist Imaginings in Tales of the Dark and Fantastic
Tobi Ogundiran, Nigeria/USA
Chapter 10. A Vision for Direct Democracy in Yat Madit
Dilman Dila, Uganda
Chapter 11. A Gaze at Post-Colonial Themes That Re-Envision Africa
Nerine Dorman, South Africa
Chapter 12. Denouement: Autoethnography–the Self-As-Research
Eugen Bacon, Tanzania/Australia











Popular posts from this blog

Published Works

-
Image
2015-2024 Fiction: 'Land of Light' : 'Imagine Africa 500' speculative fiction anthology (2015/2016) (Speculative Fiction). 8,000 words. Read more...   (Malawi)/(UK reprint 2017) 'Veiled ':  2016 'Beneath This Skin' Edition of Aké Review (2016) (Fiction). 1,450 words.  Read here...   (Nigeria) 'Water' : 'The Short Story is Dead, Long Live the Short Story! Vol.2' anthology (2017) (Fiction). 3,100 words.  Available on Amazon  or Read Online (South Africa) 'Sub Migratio' : the debut edition of Enkare Review (2017) (Speculative Fiction). 3,500 words.  Read here...   (Kenya) 'Inktober' : 2018 edition of 'The Bloody Parchment' (2018) (SF/Horror). 1,250 words.  Available on Amazon .  (South Africa) 'The Girl with Two Bodies' : The Kalahari Review (Nov 2018) (Fantasy). 7,050 words.  Read here...  (South Africa) 'Journal of a DNA Pirate' : Volume 3 of 'AfroSF' (Dec 2018) (SF). 8,150 words.  ...
Read more

Adinkra Font & Book Title Design

-
Image
It was a real pleasure to be able to create something unique for a friend and Sauúti Collective colleague – Cheryl Ntumy – for her new novella coming out with Atthis Arts press: a custom display typeface and title design. Design & Typography: Stephen Embleton, Illustration: Akintoba Kalejaye Find Atthis Arts here. A latinised version of the Adinkra alphabet from Ghana (because Cheryl is Ghanaian!), it has some fantastic characteristics and a very modular form which made it a fun, yet simple, design to work on. I first focused on the letters needed for Cheryl's book cover, and then fleshed out the other characters, as well as creating a "light" version. One happy accident for the cover design was incorporating the "working" components of each letter in the design itself. i.e. when I work on fonts, I find the common weights (stroke thicknesses) and common shapes, and move these around to exact positions. And by making them separate bright colours enables m...
Read more