Black History Month 2025 - Communities Across Cultures

Since transforming the focus of the Negro History Week to a month-long celebration of African American history and achievement in the 1970s, the theme of the annual celebration has varied globally. Last year, Lekan Balogun, lecturer in the School of Performance and Cultural Industries, University of Leeds, organised a one-day event to mark the 90th year birthday celebration of Wole Soyinka, the first African to win the Nobel Prize in Literature (1986), with speakers highlighting the contributions of Soyinka to politics, art and literature in his own country and beyond. This year’s event, which honours the memory of the late Kenyan writer, polemicist, and social critic, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, will include live performances and paper presentations highlighting the role of culture, art and literature, and performance in addressing issues such as refugee and humanitarian concerns, dysphoria, violence and the challenges being faced globally today.

Programme:

1. “Black History: Of Labels, Identity, and the Masquerade of Thought” by Lekan Balogun, PhD

2. “Nedunalvāḍai: Rivers, Rains, and Resilience: A Shared Language of Survival” by Prathiba Batley, PhD

3. “Performances of Solidarity – Arab and Black Performance Dialogues” by Dani Abulhawa, PhD

4. “When Sacred Texts Take the Stage: A Producer’s Perspective” by Babatunde AbdulGaniyu Adegbindin

5. Readings from Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s Decolonizing the Mind by Ajemina Ogan

Performances

1. Clapathon by Ajide Adeyemi (Ajidans Studios Production)

2. Short film “Dirty Secrets” & Nedunalvāḍai (Dance) by Eyakkam Dance Company featuring Prathiba Batley. 

Please contact Lekan Balogun (O.Balogun@leeds.ac.uk) if you have any questions.