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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE!!! 8 October 2024
16th Welcome to the 16th Annual Jozi Book Fair (JBF) Festival, on 18 -19 October 2024, at Newtown Park, in Newtown (Workers Museum). The Festival is FREE for the public!
JBF is the only book Festival in South Africa that has met every year for 16 years, to build a reading culture in all our languages, open to all social classes, to build solidarity.
The 2024 theme, ‘Literature and Solidarity in Times of Crises’, is an opportunity to critically reflect on the many crises facing SA and the world: increasing human fragility, unemployment, water & food insecurity, climate change, genocide, and war.
What solace and wisdom does literature offer humanity; and how do we influence literature and engage each other? In Africa, literature is all art forms, and in times of crises we need to draw strength that another world is possible! Join the Festival and movement building!
Who makes up the JBF Partnership?
The JBF creates readers and writers throughout the year and the Festival is a safe platform for children, youth and women, progressive authors, cultural workers, academics, publishers, and the public to engage, debate and strengthen civil society and democracy.
Small and self-publishers will exhibit and sell books at the Festival.
Highlights of JBF 2024
Day 1: JBF Reception is By Invitation Only! Friday, 5.30pm-7.00, 18th October 2024
Bathekgi Fundraiser: Spinning discs for a comrade: The music of Oupa Lehulere.
Friday, 18th October 2024, 7.30pm – 9.30pm. Limited tickets available.
Day 2: Public Programme, Saturday, 19 October 2024, 9.00am – 5.00pm
1. The Children’s Programme (9am-1pm) includes face-painting, storytelling, art, games, reading Gregory Maqoma’s, The Joy Dancer; the launch of the 8th Poetry for Friends, written by children and their performances of dance, poetry and drama.
2. The Schools Youth Programme (9am-1pm) includes Skills Workshops (on Poetry, Theatre, Writing, Chess, Critical Thinking, Cyberbullying & Photography etc). Tsohang Batjha will launch Batjha Kaofela 9, an anthology of short stories written by JBF youth; and TB Performances of poetry and drama.
3. Theatre and Poetry Programme will take place (12.00-5pm), includes Open Mic!
4. Oupa Lehulere Soccer Tournament (10-1.00pm), now in its third year, named for the founder of the JBF, promotes social justice through non-violence. The 5-a-side teams consist of youth, NGOs, social movements and must be 50% women. Everyone is welcome to play. Register by 11 October 2024.
5. Health Screenings (9am-1pm) to promote social well-being is offered by community health activists free: on breast cancer screening and High Blood Pressure.
6. Roundtable Discussions (12.00-4.30pm)
Besides authors, Khanya Study Groups (Eastern Cape, Northern Cape, Free State, North West, Northern Cape and Gauteng) and Khanya Feminist Network will participate in the Roundtable panels.
# Land Dispossession in SA, based on Luli Callinicos’ Gold and Workers. Time: 10.00-10.50am
# Violence against Women based on two books: Nawal Sadaawi’s Women at Point Zero and Bessie Head’s Collector of Treasures. Time: 12.00-12.50
# 40th Anniversary of Vaal Uprising 1984 based on Vaal Uprising by Franziska Rueedi; Time: 1.30-2.20pm
# Government of National Unity: what does it mean for democracy and for working people in SA?
Panellists: Dinga Sikwebu, Mazibuko Jara and Oscar Van Heerden, Time: 2.30-3.20
# Where to with Movement building in South Africa: perspectives & praxis (panel tbc) Time:3.30-4.30
# Book Launches and discussions at various times including an exploration of forgiveness and healing in The Mirror Cracked by Raashida Khan; Umakhwapeni by Thato Seopa Magadlela; A Decision is Spiritual by Kgomotso Lekalake; Resuscitated by Karabo Moshoeshoe; Absent Fathers by Thabile Mange and The Best of Journalism (2023), a selection of writing by Forum of community Journalists by Karibu! newspaper.
# Bathekgi ba Khanya Programme, Coffee Shop & Online bookshop Bathekgi Ba Khanya College Fundraiser: Friday, 18 October 2024, 7.30-9.30pm Spinning discs for a comrade: The music of Oupa Lehulere “…Oupa Lehulere was a public intellectual, theoretician and activist…little is known of how Oupa took his love of musical sounds into his activism.”
Dinga Sikwebu shares the music they listened to as young activists in Cape Town in the 1980s.
Tickets for this event are limited.
Bathekgi makes books affordable and accessible to everyone especially the historically disadvantaged; and includes an online and physical bookshop and Coffee Shop housed at The Cottages, Workers Museum, Newtown. Support this initiative. Build Solidarity! For information: www.bathekgi.org.za
The JBF will also celebrate the lives of dear Patrons and Friends who transitioned this year: James Mathews, Prof. Eddie Webster, Dr. Motsoko Phelo and Ricky Bopape. Forever loved.
- For more info about the Jozi Book Fair and its programs, the JBF Festival, and/or Khanya College, please contact us here:
- Tell: (011) 336-9190
- Cell: 079 101 5880 (JBF Coordinator, Nosipho Mdletshe)
- Email: jozibookfair@khanyacollege.org.za
- Website: www.jozibookfair.org.za
- Facebook: Jozi Book Fair
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