How or why should scholars invested in the cultural politics of space undertake practices that centre Africa? This roundtable convenes an interdisciplinary group of scholars on the occasion of the first workshop of the CCA-Mellon multidisciplinary research program Centring Africa: Postcolonial Perspectives on Architecture. The discussion will interrogate the politics and possibilities inherent in the real and metaphorical spaces of pan-African agency. Within the context of architecture and urbanism on the continent, space is not only an essential locus of design, but also a means of discursively defining and making room for historically neglected forms of decolonial agency. Christina Sharpe, Itohan Osayimwese, Anooradha Iyer Siddiqi, and Centring Africa Mellon-CCA researchers Ikem Okoye and Huda Tayob will engage in a conversation ranging from the reconstitution of lost spaces of pan-African import, from landmark architectural conferences to neglected local typologies, to the theoretical stakes of centring African spatialities across a Black diaspora that can build a trans-national and historical understanding of solidarity.

Attendance to this event is free and open to all.

Itohan Osayimwese is an associate professor at Brown University.
Anooradha Iyer Siddiqi is an assistant professor at Barnard College.
Ikem Okoye is an associate professor at the University of Delaware.
Huda Tayob is a senior lecturer at the University of Johannesburg.
Christina Sharpe is a professor at York University.

The CCA offers free, fully-insured, pop-up play sessions for children three years old and up who can use the washroom independently, in collaboration with The Lion and The Mouse.