The University of Palermo and New York University have just finalised the programme of their conference titled ‘Black Mediterranean: ReSignifications‘ – a topic that is raising widening international interest lately (see amongst others these new publications by Ida Danewid -awarded with the Third World Quarterly Edward Said prize- and Gabriele Proglio, amongst others, as well various posts on the Black Mediterranean on these pages). The international workshop, which will take place between Palermo and Naples on 6-9 June 2018, follows a series of international conversations that are breaking new ground in the fields of African and African Diasporic art, literature, cultural theory, history, and political practice. I will present a paper there titled ‘Permeating Territories: The Mediterranean Threshold and Black African Transformations’ -based on my longitudinal engagement with the African diaspora in Italy. I’m very much looking forward to this experience! Collateral events of the MANIFESTA European Biennial of Contemporary Art, the conference will be accompanied by an exhibition of the works of an array of international artists and the African art collection of Nigerian Nobel Prize for Literature Wole Soyinka, who will open the conference.

frontera (courtesy Fernando Martí)