ktravula – a travelogue!

Blogging in Klieg Lights

A while ago, while pondering the changing landscapes of contemporary media, I suggested that many things have irrevocably changed enough to warrant a different attitude, especially by prize-giving bodies, towards alternative media and publishing outlets. I must have said it in many other different ways afterwards. It was true then as it is now, that the democratisation of the media which has given rise to many new voices and expressions that would otherwise remain silent has not received much of its due respect from the traditional gatekeepers.

A number of times on this blog and elsewhere, I’ve made a case for blogging as “the future, or at least the way to it.” I believe this to be true, although the Booker, The Nobel, among other literary prizes have however not yet taken any relevant cues from this reality enough to change the traditional nature of their annual winner selection. Rational people expect the changes to be slow. However, great, brilliant and beautiful work is still being done everyday on web platforms by writers who either can’t find publishers, or don’t think that the traditional route of print publishing is effective in reaching their audiences. The earlier we begin to recognise them in spite of their refusal or inability to comply with traditional methods, the better. The world is now a different place.

I want to say though – some of you probably know where I’m going with this – that I’ve received recently some encouraging validation for that aspiration. This blog has been nominated for the CNN/Multichoice African Journalist of the Year 2015 for a travel report I did for this blog a while ago. (I’ll tell you which one it is, shortly). And for that, I’ve been invited for an all-expense paid to Nairobi, Kenya – this October – to writing workshops, networking, and the gala night to hear the name of the winners. (I also found it incredibly gratifying to be returning to Kenya exactly ten years since my first visit in March 2005. Yay for travel, nyama choma, and meeting old friends. Habari yenu, Kenya!).

More enchanting for me, however, is a possibility for the future. We’ve seen it with Uber successfully subverting the idea of organised traditional taxi service, and of AirB&B helping people turn their home and apartments into “hotels” without having to get a licence or own properties like the Hilton or Trump. It has happened with radio vs podcasts, and with music companies vs Pandora, Spotify, etc, and with e-Books helping writers reach their audiences faster and more affordably. Everywhere we turn, new ways are challenging the old and forcing us to negotiate the world in a lot of different, less cumbersome ways. I see blogging in the same way: a platform that is accessible to all, can be set up at no cost, and yet can be incredibly powerful in transmitting and interpreting the human experience across boundaries like never before. This has certainly been my experience here and it’s hard not to be excited for the attention of traditional media giants, CNN and Multichoice, to this new reality.

As for you, dear readers, whose constant presence in my analytics make sure that I keep coming back here, it’s all your fault! So, thank you! Now, let’s go have some East African fun.

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References

Blog, Writing, and Real Life (October, 2009)

A Case for Blogging (June, 2010)

Book, Blook, Bloog, Blog… (October, 2011)

A Little More than Fun (December 2012)

Blogging and Other Botherations In Saraba Issue 7b. Page 10 (December, 2012)

An e-Book is a Book (September 2013)

Interview with Eghosa Imasuen

PUBLISHING IS PERILOUS, BUT ALSO SOMETIMES REWARDING. SINCE MOVING FROM FULL-TIME WRITING TO FULL-TIME PUBLISHING, WHAT HAS BEEN YOUR EXPERIENCE, POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE?

Yes. It is perilous. I only had a view of this, barely, because I was a backseat driver, one of those authors who always chided the publisher for not enough publicity, do more, do more. But now that I have taken the wheel, at the firm that published my first two novels, no less, I see things a bit more clearly. It is a difficult business. Both for the pocket and soul. The pirates dictate how you price your books. You are in competition with yourself. Cost of finance in high in Nigeria. There are issues with power and noisy generators that affect productivity in the editorial department. Then there is what reading reams and reams of bad submissions does to someone. It is killing; bad writing kills me.

– Read the rest of the interview on Brittle Paper

On His First (Bilingual) Words

One advantage of having a young child to raise, as a linguist, is the chance to use them as human study materials for language acquisition. It’s so cool I don’t know why I never thought of it before.

In any case, already a little sensitive to the intrusion of English into that early education space that I (and a majority of researchers) believe should be meant for the mother tongue, I’m pleasantly surprised that all of my son’s first words are – so far – in Yorùbá. At eighteen months and a few weeks, we’re now able to recognise “gbà” (take), and “bàbá” (father) out of hundreds of other yet incomprehensible syllables. He, of course, also says “bye-bye”, an English expression, with his wrist flailing up and down in a goodbye wave. The linguistic explanation for his easy acquisition of bilabial plosives first isn’t far-fetched.

However, from the time he was able to listen to instructions, I’d made a habit of regularly prodding him to pronounce those common Yorùbá words. Bàbá (father), Màmá (mother), “gbà (here, have), “wá” (come here), wo (look!), maabọ̀, etc. So far, he hasn’t mastered them all, but he knows what they mean and how they are used. And now, he can already pronounce a few of them. He can also understand equally accessible English words like “no” and “come” and “mummy”, which is helpful, since his mother speaks predominantly in English.

What I’ve come to discover in the end is that this bilingual upbringing will likely follow a similar path as monolingual one as far as the acquisition of complex terms are concerned. No matter what language the child learns first, won’t he still learn the easy, monosyllables first, and then others? And if that’s the case, why not just open him up to as many languages are possible? In any case, pure monolingualism is, these days, likely an impossible eventuality. Not in Nigeria anyway.

Maybe I have a theory here somewhere. In any case, there is hope.

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PS: I’m currently editing Ake Review 2015 – the literary publication of the Ake Festival 2015. If I’m not on this blog as regularly as I’ve always been, this is why. If you are in this area, you should come to Abeokuta in November for a gathering of writers from across the world.

I’m also working on my TED talk meant for delivery at TEDxIfe event in November. It’s a talk I’m tailoring towards this issue of bilingualism, particularly the destructive nature of our current educational policies. I’m currently in-between getting together a sunny speech to convey what is actually the gloom I feel. Not an easy balance.

Also, school has resumed, so plenty busy days lie ahead.

Piorities, Budgets & Decline

The recurring theme in almost all of the academic departments I visited during my trip to the US is the lack of adequate funding. Seeming profligacy from politicians at the capital is forcing academic departments to make drastic changes to their programs, or at best Faustian bargains, because of a budget deficit and accumulating debts at the state level. From foreign language departments to English departments in universities, from the international programs office to elementary schools to high schools in the state, the problem is the same: “tough decisions” are being made by politicians, and teachers are bearing the brunt of it. In most cases, it’s teachers in liberal arts departments.

It’s not just cuts and layoffs, and this doesn’t seem to be a new problem. I remember once worrying about it here a while ago. Whenever money gets low, teachers usually become the easy punching bag, the lowest hanging fruit, the go-to pinata for all that’s wrong with the state. It’s not a uniquely American problem either, but let’s stay on topic. From what I’ve heard from Republican politicians from the mid-term elections in 2010 to date, teachers are all that is wrong with the country. They earn too much, according to politicians, they spend too much time in “teacher lounges”, and they indoctrinate children with “liberal ideology”. Therefore, they should be laid off, reduced of remuneration, and checked in every way possible, leading to horrible working environments.

Now, a couple of courses in my old university will probably be dropped, at some point in time, due to low enrolments this year. This makes me very upset. As far as the university administrations are concerned, low enrolments equal a lack of relevance of said course, leading to reduced funding. I guess it makes sense, if the university is seen as a money-making venture. The more students sign up for a class, the more money that class brings to the department (and the university). But maybe there is a way to see the university differently: as a place for all kinds of knowledge, requiring full and standard funding by the authorities, notwithstanding who is or isn’t showing up to register for them. For instance, I don’t see a whole lot of students trooping in to register for Yorùbá, or Latin, or Greek, or German/French every year, except by some divine intervention or a charismatic teacher. But should this stop an investment in those courses as regular fixture of the foreign language department? Not if we believe in knowledge as being power in itself.

The problem is not an Illinois problem alone either. In this news feature, Indiana is put on the spot for the amount of teachers that has fled the state in recent months due to poor conditions of service. What can I say? Maybe the United States is trying to outdo us in Nigeria by treating public teachers equally as poorly.

Touring America

I’m currently on the 14th day of my trip around particular places of interest in the United States, half for fun and leisure with the family, and half a nostalgia tour for a future book of travel experiences around the midwest. The streets are the same, consistent in their smell and memories they invoke.

The Capitol in Des Moines is still as resplendent standing tall in the sun with a golden cap. The plinth for its Lincoln and Tad sculpture seems to have received a small make-over, and that’s it. Minneapolis remains what it is: a beautiful melange of cultures and tongues. The Metrodome which collapsed in 2011 is now almost complete. I have visited the Walker Art Center and the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, both beautiful and stimulating spaces. I’ve visited the St. Mary’s Basilica, equally as impressive as the St. Louis Basilica. Two days ago, I returned to Oklahoma Joe’s, Kansas’ famous barbecue place. It has now been renamed “Joe’s Barbecue”. The food was good, but I’m convinced that the hype around the first time I visited here has now worn off.

I hope to visit the World War I Museum and Memorial again today with the family.

I’ve been told that Edwardsville has changed a lot in three years from a small university town into a booming city. It will be interesting to see, later this week, what that looks like.

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