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Gourmet Food-for-Thought at National Arts Festival Think!fest

Released 24 May 2010

Leading thought-leaders, vocal opinion-shapers and charismatic celebrities will be cooking up a storm that will provide much food-for-thought in a series of talks and panel discussions on the National Arts Festival Think!fest programme, from 20 June ñ 4 July. The National Arts Festival welcomes SAfm as the media partner for Think!Fest 2010.

Nine interwoven themes will run through the programme, with experts in their field contributing to pushing the boundaries with their thought provoking talks. Two exhibitions, and a daily session with authors in conversation about their books will compliment the Think! Fest programme. 

Sexuality & identity

Same sex marriages in Africa will fall under Mikki van Zylís spotlight.  Aernout Zevenbergen will explore storytelling and masculinity and Melissa Steyn will explain the influence of heteronormativity on society. In a panel session, these three experts will discuss identity, sexuality and Southern African society.

100 years of South Africa

Paul Maylam, head of the History Department at Rhodes University, will illuminate his audience about the key turning-points and watershed moments in the past hundred years of South Africaís history and he will draw attention to missed opportunities to build a genuinely united, democratic country. Ashley Westaway will pose some fundamental questions about the nature of the contemporary South African nation-state, and Ali Hlongwane will reflect on the contested memory of the shooting of protestors on 21 March 1960 during the Pan Africanist Congressí positive action against the pass laws. Dr Peter Merrington will present two illustrated lectures on the topic of the union of South Africa, and Albie Sachs will reflect on his fifteen years on the constitutional court and the manner, often unexpected, in which subjective life experiences enter into the objective decision-making of a judge.

Adventures & misadventures

Solo-adventurer and best-selling author Riaan Manser will be back by popular demand. His Africa bicycle is hanging on the racks, having been swapped for a kayak in which he paddled around the worldís fourth largest island, Madagascar. Fans of his Around Africa On My Bicycle will be blown away by his latest adventure. Chris Harvie will take the audience on a light-hearted journey of discovery along a 26 000km road through eight countries in Anglophone Southern and East Africa. In May 2006 he set off for 100 days on a road trip with a group of four friends, heading for the Nile in Uganda. This journey was the beginning of his contributions to the Sunday Times and led to his book Do Not Take This Road To El-Karama.

The human brain

Dr. Vivienne Russell will discuss the advances in understanding of the neural disturbances in ADHD that have been made possible by studying animal models of the disorder, and Dr. Georg Fodor will explain how the science of subjectivity, psychoanalysis, and the neurosciences have finally found one another after decades of ignoring each other.

Some sporting thoughts are highly relevant in a season where soccer is the prevalent mood of the country.

Chris Thurman will explore how sport versus art seems to be an innate South African contest. He attempts to answer the question: Have we drawn a false dichotomy between the two pursuits? Neal Collins believes that sport can often lead the way when it comes to social revolution, and Collins will explain why he believes that football, coupled with international boycotts, did exactly that in South Africa.

Hip-hop & happening

In an exploration of the music of Bok van Blerk, Zubz, Fokofpolisiekar and Brown, Adam Haupt poses the question: ìWhat can we learn from a communityís popular culture to explain why atrocities like the ìReitz videoî (University of the Free State) would find an approving audience?î Rapper Tumiís work has been critical of interviewers who expect him to speak on behalf of the ìblack raceî just because he is a hip-hop MC. He will speak about the perils of being ëboxed iní by labels, such as ëconscious rapperí, and talk about the path that he has chosen for himself as an artist. Shamiel X is one South Africaís pioneer hip-hop DJs and has dedicated much of his adult life toward youth development initiatives. His latest mission, the SA museum of hip-hop, marks a new chapter in South African hip-hop activism and youth development. Monishia Schoemanís talk will also focus on social activism or lack thereof within the Hip-hop community, particularly in the South African context. Quentin E. Williams will look at the performance of Afrikaans rap and transgressive literacy in Cape Town.

A panel, made up of Tumi, Shamiel X, Mishonia and Quentin Williams, chaired by Dr. Adam Haupt will attempt to answer the question, is hip-hop transforming SA music?

The democratic governance and rights unit (DGRU) will present a series of panel discussions on Democracy 2010: The State of Politics and Culture in South Africa.

Sport and culture: the politics of transformation, with Richard Calland, Lawson Naidoo and Andre Whaley. The state of sport will help both understand and analyse a nation and even a continent, and it can act as a barometer of society. This seminar will examine the power of sport to unite and divide, and the language of sport.

2010 and The Loss Of South Africaís Constitutional Sovereignty: The Politics Of FIFA, with Richard Calland, Chris Oxtoby And Sophie Nakueira. The panel will discuss how to understand the World Cup as a global event, and how this impacts on our rights as South Africans, and how we are governed.

From Subject To Citizen ñ How Far Have We Come Since 1994? With Dr Saleem Badat, Dr Vinothan Naidoo, Prof Peter Vale, Prof Pumla Gqola, Dr Kristina Bentley. This panel will focus on the change in status of South Africans from subjects of a repressive state to citizens of a democratic one. From the perspective of their disciplinary specialisations, each of the panelists will outline what changes have occurred since 1994 to give effect to this change in status, and what problems and limitations have become apparent in the past 15 years.

Rhodes Investec Business School will present Leadership for Sustainability, with experts applying the principles of sustainability to their specific fields.

Dale Hefer, founding director of the Chillibush group of companies, will speak on sustainable marketing. Keith Coats, co-founder of TomorrowToday and director of Story Telling, on sustainable leadership. Judge Mervyn King, recognised internationally as an expert on corporate governance and sustainability, on sustainable organizations. There is also a panel discussion on Sustainability: Evolution or Revolution? with Dale Hefer, Keith Coats and Mervyn King, chaired by Simon Gear.

The Think!Fest Art Exhibitions will have on display Nanda Soobbenís Sport Cartoons and a Makoya Makaraba exhibition.

Originally started as a community project in the Cape Peninsula, Makoya Makaraba are now at the forefront of creating the noiseless, dazzling fine art of South African soccer, Makarabas. Makarabas can be worn as headgear by both men or women, displayed as works of art in homes, offices, boardrooms, pubs, used as a table centre piËce,  trophies or awards and for any other innovative idea one can think of. In addition to the Makaraba exhibition, Festival visitors will be able to see the process from beginning to end in the company of two of their artists, cutter, Misheck Jararasi, and painter, Nicholas Moyo.

Sports cartoonist Nanda Soobben will be on hand to take audiences on a walkabout of his exhibition and togive them a better picture of his creative processes.

In addition to the lectures, panel discussions and exhibitions, this yearís Think!Fest will also be a platform to engage with authors in daily discussion on their books:

 22 June: Craig Higginson (Last Summer), 23 June: Mikki van Zyl and Melissa Stein (The Prize and the Price: Shaping Sexualities in South Africa), 24 June: Aernout Zevenbergen (Spots of a Leopard ñ on being a man), 25 June: A Book launch by Anton Krueger (Experiments in Freedom: Explorations of Identity in New South African Drama), 26 June: Riaan Manser On Around Africa on my Bicycle and Around the Outside, 28 June: Anton Krueger (Sunnyside Sal), 29 June: Chris Thurman (Sport versus Art), 30 June: Chris Thurman (Guy Butler: Reassessing a South African Literary Life), and 2 July: Chris Harvie (Do Not Take This Road To El-Karama)

Thereís a whole lot more too ñ check out www.nationalartsfestival.co.za for the full programme or pick up a copy of the Booking Kit / Programme at selected Exclusive Books and Standard Bank branches, and Computicket Outlets.

Call the Festival hot line for all enquiries ñ 046 603 1103. Follow us on Twitter @artsfestival or join us on Facebook: facebook.com/nationalartsfestival.

Ends

SAfm is the media partner of Think!Fest 2010. The National Arts Festival is sponsored by Standard Bank, The Eastern Cape Government, The National Arts Council, The National Lottery Distribution Trust Fund, The Sunday Independent and M Net.

About the National Arts Festival: The National Arts Festival, now in its 36th year, has proved its sustainability and has grown to be one of the leading arts festivals in southern Africa. Its objectives are to deliver excellence; encourage innovation and development in the arts by providing a platform for both established and emerging South African artists; create opportunities for collaboration with international artists; and build new audiences.

ISSUED BY        :        THE FAMOUS IDEA TRADING CC
ON BEHALF OF    :        NATIONAL ARTS FESTIVAL, GRAHAMSTOWN
CONTACT        :        GILLY HEMPHILL / CILNETTE PIENAAR
TEL            :        021 886 4900
CELL            :        082 820 8584
EMAIL            :        gilly@thefamousidea.co.za