Whats Happening: February 2024 Events
2024 is rounding up to be a busy year here at Jacaranda, so we thought we'd give you a monthly event guide to help you keep track of all the places, people and books you get to discover all year long. Want to know what's happening February 2024, here's the event list:
12th February 2024
American Fiction Film Screening + Q&A with Jacaranda Books
African Odysseys presents screening of American fiction plus Q&A with award-winning Black female publishing house Jacaranda Books. On the panel will be Magdalene Abraha [Non-fiction editor], Niki Igbaroola [Campaigns Manager] and Dr Michelle Asantewa of WaywivWords publishing. The panel will be hosted by Kunle Olude.
AMERICAN FICTION is Cord Jefferson’s hilarious directorial debut, which confronts our culture’s obsession with reducing people to outrageous stereotypes. Jeffrey Wright stars as Monk, a frustrated novelist who’s fed up with the establishment profiting from “Black” entertainment that relies on tired and offensive tropes. To prove his point, Monk uses a pen name to write an outlandish “Black” book of his own, a book that propels him to the heart of hypocrisy and the madness he claims to disdain.
22nd February 2024
Rinsing Mukami's Soul Private Launch
Select guests will join author Njambi McGrath to celebrate the launch of her debut novel Rinsing Mukami's Soul.
An incisive novel laying bare the contradictory societal response to gender, sex and redemption. Rinsing Mukami's Soul looks at revenge as a powerful tool for reclamation when young Mukami's carefully ordered life is cruelly thrust into scandal.
Shop Rinsing Mukami's Soul and any of our 2024 titles and get 25% off all January.
29th February 2024
The Little Mermaid's Real Black History and the Books to Prove it
The Little Mermaid’s first iteration (1989) as a white woman stole concepts from Ancient African history. The new version of her as a Black woman was condemned and trolled in certain quarters and affected its box office performance
Hollywood has a long history of strip mining Black history and re-presenting it as generic, with no reference to its source material.
In this interactive presentation we will cover:
- Racism in film production/distribution
- White versions of African history and legends that make big money for Hollywood
- African civilisations pre-European invasion
- Brazil, Cuba, Nigeria, Panama and Streatham
- Why ‘we don’t want a Black mermaid’ and who is ‘we’
- Black rip off historians and sell outs
- Black Goddesses and White Patriachy, can they co-exist
- Black women in publishing successes and inspiration
- Twenty in 2020, twenty black British authors published in the year 2020
We cannot wait to see you!