One\n of the difficult challenges facing many African countries today is the \nproblem\n of negotiating successful transitions from histories tainted variously \nby colonialism\, racial segregation\, oppression and conflicts to a truly \ndemocratic dispensation.\n \;South Africa\, Rwanda and Sierra Leone are representative \nexamples of countries on the continent that have attempted to confront \nviolent and fractious histories of Apartheid\, Genocide and Civil War \nrespectively through the establishment\n of reconciliatory processes. The success of these processes are \ndebatable and many of the problems that continue to plague African \ncountries may well be attributed to the failure of post-colonial\, \npost-conflict and multi-ethnic African states\, to fully integrate.\n How new dispensations deal with an oppressive past will have a huge \nimpact on how they consolidate their democratic gains.
\nThe 18th annual conference of the International Society of African Philosophy\n and Studies hosted by the School of Philosophy and Ethics of the \nUniversity of KwaZulu-Natal (Pietermaritzburg campus)\, South Africa\, \nfrom the 16th to the 18th of April 2012\, will \nbring together scholars from a variety of intellectual\n backgrounds to explore the question of reconciliation in \n(post-colonial\, post-conflict and multi-ethnic) Africa. The conference \nwill enable participants to explore this broad theme in relation to \nnation-building and democratic sustainability in Africa
\nThe\n organizers welcome ground-breaking contributions in African philosophy \nand African\n studies and in general the humanities and social science disciplines\, \naddressing issues such as reconciliation and forgiveness as contested \nnotions\; transitional justice and\, in particular\, restorative and/or \nretributive justice\; international conflicts and\n reconciliation\; the role of the international community in attaining \nreconciliation\; interpretations of truth and the success of \ntruth-commissions in bringing about reconciliation and integration\; \nethnic jingoism\, conflict transformation and nationhood\; the\n possibility of nation-building and national unity\; strategies of coping\n with the past\; the nexus between trauma and forgiveness\; collective \nmemories\, narrative self-understanding and reconciliation\; traditional \napproaches to justice and reconciliation in Africa\;\n the nexus between political apology and reconciliation. In addition\, \npapers that take a multi-disciplinary approach will be most welcome. \nHence presentations could range from the psychology of forgiveness or \nreconciliation to the sociology of reconciliation\;\n from the history of reconciliation to the politics of nation-building\; \nfrom the anthropology of healing to how popular culture/music responds \nto issues of healing\; from literary fictional narratives of war and \nreconciliation to &lsquo\;big screen&rsquo\; representations\n of reconciliation.
\nAbstracts of no more than 500 words in Word and Rich Text formats\, with the name and\n institutional affiliation of the author should reach the local organisers no later than the 31st of January 2012. Email your abstract to the following email contacts: Bernard Matolino (matolinob@ukzn.ac.za)\n and Oritsegbubemi Oyowe (oyoweo@ukzn.ac.za)
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