YOUNG VOICES - THE 2004 SOUTH AFRICAN ONLINE WRITERS' CONFERENCE

(Young - 35 and younger - writers*, publishers and editors on South African life, and on writing, publishing, performing and reading)

(*will include scriptwriters, playwrights, oral poets etc)

Socio-cultural background

South African languages and literatures often operate in separate spheres. Critics, teachers, readers and writers from the respective languages write, read and teach within their particular systems. Often writers, critics or readers from a particular language meet to discuss cultural issues, but mostly to the exclusion of authors in other languages. The need for an inclusive writers' conference, drawing together the best young talents from all South Africa's official languages, has often been touted. The web offers a cost effective way of celebrating culture and stimulating vigorous debate. Moreover, conference proceedings are open to interested parties worldwide, and not limited to the brick and mortar confines of a conference hall in the real world.

Members of the organising committee

Etienne van Heerden	Jakes Gerwel	Henrietta Rose-Innes	K. Sello Duiker

Etienne van Heerden is Hofmeyr Professor in the School of Languages, University of Cape Town. He is founder-editor of LitNet and an internationally known novelist whose work is published in eleven languages.

Jakes Gerwel is Nelson Mandela Professor of the University of the Western Cape and Chancellor of Rhodes University.

Henrietta Rose-Innes's debut novel, Shark's Egg, was nominated for the 2001 M-Net Book Prize, and a second novel is due for publication in September. She also writes scripts for TV and film, and works as freelance book editor.

K. Sello Duiker is one of the leading new voices in South Africa. His first novel, Thirteen Cents, was awarded the 2001 Commonwealth Writer's Prize for Best First Book, Africa Region. His second novel, The Quiet Violence of Dreams, was awarded the 2001 Herman Charles Bosman Prize for English Literature.

The conference administrators will be Nčlleke de Jager, publisher at NB publishers, and LitNet's Sharon Meyering.

Proceedings

50 of South Africa's most prominent young figures in the field of writing, publishing and reading are invited to each participate by writing an essay on one of the topics.

Essays may not exceed 2500 words.

If a given contributor writes in a language other than English, his or her essay will be translated into English by a member of the translation panel.

The translations will be monitored by the authors.

The essay will then be published in the original language alongside its English translation in the conference's virtual seminar room.

LitNet aims to engage authors who work in Xhosa, Afrikaans, Sotho, and other languages, and hopes that a substantial portion of the participating authors will be writing in the indigenous languages, although their papers or essays will also be published in English.

The individual authors hold copyright on their essays, and the original author plus the translator hold joint copyright of translated essays.

The conference will stretch over approximately six to eight weeks.

The opening address, by an invited "speaker" will be published on the first day of proceedings.

On the next day the first conference topic will be addressed by two authors delivering their virtual papers to LitNet's readers.

Conference goers - i.e. readers - will be invited to respond immediately by e-mail, and responses will be published on LitNet as soon as they arrive and have been cleared of linguistic errors or legal impediments, such as incidents of slander or plagiarism.

Thereafter, more writers will deliver their papers on the same topic at the rate of approximately ten papers per week.

This will then be followed by the next topic.

After the fifth and last topic has been covered, specific respondents will be invited to react on each of the five topics.

The conference will undoubtedly be closely monitored by other media. If the energy generated by the previous (Afrikaans) writers' conference is to be taken as a precedent, lively debates should carry on outside the parameters of virtual space.

Topics

Week 1: My memory
Snapshots, trauma, dissociation, inheritance, history

Jaco Botha,
Zazah Khuzwayo,
AR Krueger,
Izak de Vries,
Arja Salafranca,
Isobel Dixon,
Nokuthula Mazibuko,
Ashraf Johaardien,
Alan Finlay,
Nini Bennett

Week 2: My place
On xenophobia, location, ideology, culture, immigration, emigration, naming, Europe vs Africa vs Asia vs etc.

Mary Watson,
Sonja Loots,
Sam Naidu,
Saartjie Botha,
Sello Duiker,
Wonderboy Peters

Week 3: My generation
On heritage, linguistics, guilt, identity, prospects, typicalities, culture

Karen Jeynes,
Carina Diedericks-Hugo,
Nadine Botha,
Ntsiki Mazwai,
Jo Prins,
Gabeba Baderoon,
Clive E Smith,
George A Hill,
Herman Wasserman,
Jaco Jacobs,
Khulile Nxumalo

Week 4: My body
On sexuality, erotics, disease, aging, privacy, piercing, abuse

Diane Awerbuck,
Stacy Hardy,
Ilse van Staden,
Jackie Nagtegaal,
Pumla Dineo Gqola,
Toast Coetzer,
Justin Nurse
Lebogang Mashile

Week 5 and 6: My voice
Publishing (educational/general trade); (self vs trade publishers), rewards of publishing, mediums, genre (paper/oral/digital), audience (e.g. bookselling), exposure (media), literary magazines, grassroot publications, educating writing (creative writing courses), beyond post-colonialism, new nationalism, new media, role of the editor

Niq Mhlongo,
Michiel Botha,
Nčlleke de Jager,
Linda Nell,
Richard Fox,
Henrietta Rose-Innes,
Rudi MR Venter,
Dave Chislett,
Megan Hall,
Michelle Matthews,
Sarah Johnson,
Sarah Britten,
Vonani waka Bila,
Phaswane Mpe,
Dumisani Sibiya,
Eugene Ashton,
Anita Pyke

Post-proceedings

LitNet has the right to publish the specific essay in the conference seminar room, but the originating parties are free to, after the conference, publish their essays elsewhere, as they are copyright holders of their work.

If the book is accepted for publication, African Sun Media will negotiate copyright separately with each contributing party before the book, under the editorship of Etienne van Heerden, is published in digital and paper form. (African Sun Media is the university publisher of the University of Stellenbosch.)

Conference background

In 2000, LitNet offered an online writers' conference in association with the Department of Southern African Languages and Literatures at the University of Cape Town and the Illwimi Centre at the University of the Western Cape.

Amongst the 44 authors participating, were literary greats such as Antjie Krog, Achmat Dangor, Elsa Joubert and Breyten Breytenbach. The conference ran over eight weeks and drew a high of two hundred and seventy seven thousand page withdrawals per month from all over the world.

Authors submitted contributions on six topics, which were published on the Web, and readers responded in LitNet's online letters column. South Africa's online bookshop, Kalahari.net, offered a book exhibition in the conference's virtual foyer, where the authors' books were on sale, and the lively online debates spilled over into the regular media, such as television, paper press and radio.

The conference proceedings were published in book form as Briewe deur die lug (Editor: Etienne van Heerden) by Tafelberg publishers, Cape Town - a book which received excellent critical acclaim in press reviews. Cover: Briewe deur die lug ("Letters through the Air")

The 2000 organising committee consisted of Professors Jakes Gerwel, Nelson Mandela Professor at the Universities of Cape Town and the Western Cape, Etienne van Heerden (Hofmeyr Professor, School of Languages and Literatures, University of Cape Town and Executive editor of LitNet) who chaired the committee, and Dr Christa van Louw, at the time Director of the Illwimi Centre at the University of the Western Cape.


The Young Voices Writers' Conference has opened, click here to attend




LitNet: 02 September 2004

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