News & Events

Ton Dietz wrote a new blog about Russia's relationships with African countries. The divide in Africa between pro-Russian and pro-Western countries partly follows the earlier Cold War fault lines.

On 29 September 1914, Afrikaans poet Diederik (or Dirk) Johannes Opperman, commonly referred to as D.J. Opperman was born in Dundee, South Africa. He is considered to be one of the best known Afrikaans poets of the twentieth century. Read the Library Weekly!

On 21 September 2011, Kenyan novelist, pediatrician, and human rights advocate Margaret Atieno Ogola died in Nairobi at the age of 53.  Her literary debut 'The River and the Source' has been on the KCSE syllabus for many years. The novel won the 1995 Jomo Kenyatta Prize for Literature and the 1995 Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book, Africa Region. Read the Library Weekly!

Slam poetry, which combines poetry and performance, is gaining increasing momentum among Africa’s youth as a means of expressing opinions and emotions. In particular, the library’s French-language literature section has seen interesting additions in recent months.

Twenty-five special items from the ASCL Library collection were on display during the ASCL's 75th anniversary celebration on 8 September. They gave an impression of the richness of the collection over the past 75 years. 

This book is based on Tamia Botes's Master's thesis 'Where Have the Midwives Gone? Everyday Histories of Voetvroue in Johannesburg', for which she received the 2021 Africa Thesis Award. The 'voetvrou' is a black autonomous midwife who looks after the health of and nurtures new life in her community in Eldorado Park, Johannesburg.