Abstract
The ‘youth are leaders of tomorrow’ is a statement with gerontocratic connotations and temporal implications denoting societies’ inherent tensions with its young people, but underscoring stereotypes about African youth. According to Schwarz & Oettler (2017), ‘youth are appreciated as an innovative human resource, as talented, dynamic, inspired and productive.’ This acknowledges the essentialism of ‘youth’ as a temporal phenomenon, a time-constructed subject, acting within and against time in pursuit of agency. Yet, temporal realities of youth antagonise these socially constructed peculiar potentials. That is, youth exist in a precarious time and space, where experiences of their time, and before them, impede negotiations of progressive agenda needed in the moment and future. Besides, societies fear youth, perceiving them as dangerous, hostile, violent, vulnerable, helpless and disoriented, hence needing outside protection (Schwarz & Oettler, 2017). Constructionists theorise ‘youth’ as a period where age as an institution becomes an interpretive discourse that centres young people’s existence in the community as a social problem, among other meanings (Devlin, 2009). Nevertheless, African youth are actively subverting temporal obstacles in their societies. We draw attention to the critical role of African youth as actors in social movements, particularly in the struggle for press freedom, the rights of sexual minorities and ecological goals, bearing in mind that temporal states and conditions reinforce and control these areas. Notably, our interpretations of ‘youth’ and ‘time’ are from a Foucauldian lens. West-Pavlov (2013) avers that time ‘is riddled with issues of power and hegemony, is at stake in much political struggle.’ Considering this, we propose investigating the nature and course of African youth-oriented subversion of temporal states, traditions and cultures. We posit that a meaningful understanding of African youth in activism is appraised by a temporal conceptualisation of this demographic group as a product of the past, present and future realities. We also hold that youth-engineered social movements struggle against time and are captured by countering temporal institutions, systems or traditions. Even so, African youth exist in a special epoch (their temporalities), uniquely availing themselves of the tools that intersect with the characteristically political ‘space of the everyday’ (Berents & McEvoy-Levy, 2015) to unsettle, alter and subvert hegemonic or normative traditions.
Keywords
Temporalities, subversion, youth, time, social movements
Presentations
James O. Ogone
Jaramogi Oginga Odinga University (Kenya), University of Mainz (Germany)
Gen-Z Protests in Kenya: Temporalities of Digital Mobilization and the Subversion of State Power
Although the Kenyan political scene is not new to protests, the anti-Finance Bill revolts witnessed in the country in June 2024 were unprecedented in several ways. In a radical departure from their previous role as mere pawns in political contests, the youth moved to the forefront of issue-based activism in the country. It is further notable that the uprising was driven by digital activities of the Generation Z born between the mid 1990s and early 2010s. The Gen Z protests were the culmination of generational tensions in a country where meaningful youth participation in decision making has been kept in abeyance since independence. The local perception of youth as future leaders is thus underpinned by linear temporalities. Being digital natives, Gen Zs leveraged technologies, such as social media and generative artificial intelligence, to mobilise support against the government’s controversial economic policies. The digital fluency of the Gen Zs across various platforms, their innovative tactics, and decentralised approach were a major challenge to the repressive state authorities. This paper perceives Kenyan youth as thriving within the nexus of tensions “between future orientation, postponement, and linearity on the one hand, and present orientation, acceleration, and simultaneity on the other” (Walther & Stauber, 2024). This understanding enables the interrogation of the actions of Gen Z protesters in the digital space as aimed at disrupting the prevailing linear temporal perceptions of youth in mainstream discourse. The paper investigates how Gen Zs assert their presence in the political scene by rebranding the expression of discontent into something trendy. In the process, the digital agency of the Gen Zs will be read as attempts to supplant the normativity of their temporal alienation in pursuit of contextually blurred temporalities.
Keywords: Protests; temporalities; social media; digital space; agency
Obala Musumba
Moi University (Kenya), University of Bayreuth (Germany)
It is a Youths’ World: Subverting anti Homophobic Cultures in East Africa
Homophobia has been thought of as an acceptable culture in East Africa given the outrage with which the society receive any public expression of activities by the members of LGBTQI community in the region. The micro-culture of intolerance permeates the region from Uganda’s enactment of laws that outlaw activities by LGBTQI to Kenya’s banning of films believed to be imbued with LGBTQI tropes to Tanzania’s banishment of perceived members of LGBTQI community. This culture is also cemented by an active anti- LGBTQI campaign driven by leaders of mainstream religious bodies such as priests, as well as political leaders and other opinion leaders in the society. The homophobic culture that is generally propagated by people belonging to the middle and old age is facing serious challenges from the youth. East African youth have adopted multifaceted approach to challenge homophobia ranging from public parade and demonstration by members of the gay community to use of art and film where misconceptions about LGBTQI are corrected or countered. In this presentation, we are going to discuss the strategies employed by the youth in subverting the culture of homophobia in East Africa. Our presentation is anchored on the basis that both homophobic culture and its subversion in East Africa are shades of temporalities in sync with dictates of time. Whereas the people who are deeply immersed in the homophobic culture are yesterday’s youth, the agents of change in this kind of attitude are today’s youth.
Keywords: homophobia, LGBTQI, youth, culture, temporality
Daniel O. Otieno
University of Bayreuth (Germany)
“Evergreen?”: Representation of the Temporal Concerns in Youths’ Struggle against the Anthropocene in Selected Contemporary African Novel
In the age of the Anthropocene, when planetary concerns arise from the direct impact of human activities on Mother Nature, contemporary African novels have been characteristically vocal in artistic representation of these ecological realities. Notably, recently published novels subvert gerontocratic perspectives on environmental concerns by relying on youthful narrative voices to represent the continent’s concern about the planet’s future. In doing so, they situate African youths at the centre of an ecological battle, attributing more power and control to their character, and portraying them as bearers and enactors of agency in traditionally gerontocratic societies. This literary study proposes a close-text ecocritical reading of three contemporary African novels whose protagonists are African youths: How Beautiful We Were (2021), In the Company of Men (2021) and War Girls (2014). In addition, the researcher reinforces ecocriticism with postcolonial and feminist theoretical arguments in analysing gender and gerontocratic (temporal) influences on the depicted power struggle in the novels, thereby critiquing the novelistic representation of African youth against the Anthropocene as complicated by the temporal realities of their time. The point is that African youths’ aspiration and vision for a greener environment encounter obstacles from the realities surrounding their juniority in ages within societies that subjectively rest power at the hands of its more senior members. In conclusion, this study will demonstrate that these contemporary novels represent an African youth’s ecocritical stories as complex scenarios that demand a prerequisite subversion of temporal drawbacks in the struggle against the Anthropocene.
Keywords: temporalities, subversion, gerontocratic, Anthropocene, ecocriticism