Wangari Maathai’s legacies ‘are not just for future generations of Kenyans – her influence was global. We have lost her far too early,’ writes Shailja Patel.
‘Whether we are aware of it or not, in our daily negotiations with modernity and tradition, with selfhood and community, with partnership, family, society and state, we swim in waters changed forever by the battles she fought, writes Shailja Patel.
‘Congratulations’ is a wholly inadequate accolade for Pambazuka's 500th issue.
It's hard to capture the breadth and importance of what Pambazuka does. It is a space, a community, a movement. It is a clearing-house, an archive, a resource base, a forum for radical scholarship, analysis and debate that is not occurring anywhere else.
And of course, it's a journal, and a platform for action, that never compromises on a vision of justice and self-determination for all Africans.
Although supportive of the right of South Africa’s public workers to strike, Shailja Patel says there's no excuse not to protect and defend the country’s most vulnerable.
For all it cost. For all we've lost. For all who persisted, decade upon decade, in the face of every defeat. For the invisible heroes of four generations, who brought it to fruition. For those taken by the struggle, whose spirits we carry with us. For those who laboured for this and did not live to see it realised. For the bereaved, displaced, dispossessed, raped, whose blood and suffering have watered this moment. If victory means anything, it must mean the beginning of restitution…
Howard Zinn, 87, an activist historian whose 'People's History of the United States' resurrected neglected stories of the country's past and became a surprise bestseller in the 1980s and beyond, died of a heart attack on 27 January in Santa Monica, California, where he was on a speaking tour.
Stockholm's International Poetry Festival in October had a special focus on Kenyan women poets. and Shailja Patel shared poems and reflections on 'Literature and independence in Kenya' at the festival's headline seminar. The audience represented a sizeable contingent of Africans based in Stockholm, including Okoth Osewe, whose read more
Stockholm's International Poetry Festival in October had a special focus on Kenyan women poets. and Shailja Patel shared poems and reflections on 'Literature and independence in Kenya' at the festival's headline seminar. The audience represented a sizeable contingent of Africans based in Stockholm, including Okoth Osewe, whose Kenya Stockholm Blog is the go-to resource for all things Kenyan in Sweden. Osewe videotaped portions of the seminar, and has generously made them available to the public.
Stockholm's International Poetry Festival in October had a special focus on Kenyan women poets. and 
© Poet and performer Shailja Patel celebrates the life of Bantu Mwaura (1969-2009) – Kenyan artist, activist and academic – through a series of reminiscences about what he meant to different people. Mwaura, husband of Susan and father of Makeba and Me Katilili, died on 26 April. ‘He was expression without hindrance; the way Africa used to be. He left behind power and ener
