Remembered Intimacies: Tradition and Gendered Power in Tanzanian Creative Expression

Swahili was one of the cornerstones of the project of creating a Tanzanian national consciousness alongside Ujamaa or African Socialism. At the same time, however, "traditional" and frequently ethnic cultural systems are brought into play by expressive artists in order to renegotiate senses of identity and to record, display, and debate the ways in which apparently traditional and nontraditional practices of power perpetrate traumatizing violence in communities where they are carried out. Euphrase Kezilahabi and Saida Karoli are two artists whose works, created in different media, provide compelling commentaries on the role of systems of authoritative force and how their deployment has and continues to promulgate traumatic memories in both perpetrators and victims.