UKZN Press has made PDFs of the first five volumes published under the Thinking Africa Imprint freely available. In order of publication, the five volumes are:

1.     The Return of Makhanda: Exploring the Legend, Julia C. Wells (2012)

“In a work of brilliant scholarship, combining both popular and academic history, Julia Wells has given us a new and deeper appreciation of the amaXhosa’s struggle to defend their land. In the process she demolishes many of the myths surrounding the historical figure of Makhanda and the battle of Grahamstown”. Jacklyn Cock, Professor Emeritus, University of the Witwatersrand For the full manuscript, click here.

2.     On African Fault lines: Meditations on Alterity Politics, V-Y Mudimbe (2013)

“This book is highly innovative in its re-evaluation of alterity. It marshals a broad range of theories from Adorno to Marx to Walter Benjamin, all the while ‘grounding’ it in African politics and aesthetics through the lens of Yacouba Konate. A veritable tour de force, if ever there was one.” Kgomotso Masemola, associate professor of English, University of South Africa For the full manuscript, click here.

3.     Violence in/and the Great Lakes: The Thought of V-Y Mudimbe and Beyond, Farred, Kavwahirehi, Praeg (eds), 2014

“One of the most noticeable qualities of the book is its exploration of suffering and trauma from a local and global perspective and its highlighting of the fact that, although geographically circumscribed, the many conflicts that have disfigured the Great Lakes regions for more than a century, demand a novel reading grid to attend to the epistemological, spatial and temporal complexities of the Central African context.” Pierre-Philippe Fraiture, author of V.Y. Mudimbe: Undisciplined Africanism (2013) For the full manuscript, click here.

4.     A Report on Ubuntu, L. Praeg (2014)

“This is one of the most profound, most foundational discussions of the concept of Ubuntu to date. The unusually thoughtful essays take the question of Ubuntu further than it has ever been taken before. It is highly recommended reading for anyone concerned about the present and future – political, material, social, legal, and ethical – of life in the global South. And elsewhere.” John Comaroff, Hugh K. Foster Professor of African and African American Studies and of Anthropology, Oppenheimer Research Fellow in African Studies, Harvard University For the full manuscript, click here.

5.     Ubuntu: Curating the Archive, Praeg and Magadla (eds), 2014

“This is the most brilliant work of postcolonial philosophy I have read in years. The way Praeg integrates Ubuntu in order to rescue its emancipatory potential is mind blowing. This is radical postcolonial philosophy at its best, drinking in the deep waters of irredeemable losses and absences.” Boaventura de Sousa Santos, professor of sociology, University of Coimbra, Portugal. For the full manuscript, click here.

For more titles and information about the Thinking Africa Imprint, go here.