Book Launch: Paperless
| When: | Tuesday, 21 November 2023 - Tuesday, 21 November 2023 |
| Where: | Parktown Management Campus The Southern Centre for Inequality Studies, North Lodge (Annex Lecture Theatre) 2 St David's Place Parktown 2193 |
| Start time: | 17:30 |
| Enquiries: |
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| RSVP: | Time: 17:30 for 18:00 RSVP to this in-person event by 17 November to: kitso.kgaboesele@wits.ac.za or pauline.dhlamini@wits.ac.za |
| Cost: | Free but you need to RSVP |
The Southern Centre for Inequality Studies in partnership with Jacana Media invite you to the launch of Paperless - a novel by Buntu Siwisa on 21 Nov '23
Paperless is an émigré, coming-of-age, campus novel with a dash of espionage. It centres on Luzuko Goba, a South African doctoral student at Oxford University. Set almost entirely in Oxford at the turn of the twenty-first century, Luzuko rides three Oxfords – white Oxford, black Oxford, and the underbelly of illegal Oxford.
He navigates the worlds of Africans in Oxford – the illegal immigrants, the undocumented, and the students. Mired in these worlds, he also grapples with his own personal struggles. The writing of his debut novel is a failure. His thesis is not taking shape. His romantic relationship has ended. And then he must also figure out the meaning of his relationship with his political exile father who has just died, a man he had only seen once in his life.
Siwisa captures the tensions between the relentless immigrants’ pursuit of a secure and comfortable livelihood, the complexities of migration, and how you find home in a place set on highlighting why you don’t belong. The novel explores identity and belonging against the canvass of racism and class. It delves deeper into finding oneself in personal and political spaces that collapse into one. It also takes up on the meaning of exile and exilic consciousness against shifting interpretations of African democracies.
This is a book about migrants, legal and illegal, out of time, out of place, on the wrong side of the UK’s department of immigration. Embark on a journey that is anything but straight through these individuals united by their 'paperless' status.
Dr Buntu Siwisa is a Senior Researcher at the Southern Centre for Inequality Studies. With a D. Phil. In Politics and International Relations from the University of Oxford (St. Peter’s College), he has varied work experiences in academia (Politics and International relations), civil service (Foreign relations in southern Africa), and civil society (Peace and Security in Africa; conflict analysis and management).
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