Susan Nalugwa Kiguli

Susan Nalugwa Kiguli (born 24 June 1969 in Luweero District, Uganda) is an Ugandan poet and literary scholar.^[1] Currently (as of 2011) a senior lecturer at Makerere University, Kiguli has been an advocate for creative writing in Africa, including service as a founding member of FEMRITE,^[2] as a judge for the Commonwealth Writers' Prize (African Region 1999), and as an advisory board member for African Writers Trust.^[3] As a poet, Kiguli to date remains best known for her collection The African Saga ;^[4][5] as a scholar, for her work on oral poetry and performance.^[6]

Education

• 2005 Ph.D. English. The University of Leeds. Leeds, United Kingdom.
• 1996 M.S. Literary Linguistics for Teaching English Language and Literature. University of Strathclyde. Glasgow, United Kingdom.
• 1994 M.A. Literature. Makerere University. Kampala, Uganda.
• 1991 B.A. Education. Makerere University. Kampala, Uganda.

Poetry and Performances

Kiguli has participated as a poet and reader in numerous literary festivals and conferences, including most prominently the International Literature Festival Berlin (2008);^[1] the Poetry Africa Festival in Kwazulu –Natal, South Africa (2009);^[7] the World Social Forum in Nairobi, Kenya (2007);^[5] and the Leeds Centre for African Studies, University of Leeds, United Kingdom (2005).

In addition to her critically acclaimed collection The African Saga,^[8] which won the National Book Trust of Uganda Poetry Award (1999),^[9] Kiguli has also written poems for children – four of which were featured by Books LIVE, as "Animal Portraits by Susan Kiguli (Note of Affection No. 4, Love Africa Carnival)"^[10] and selected by readers as "one of the most loved Love Notes of its month."^[11] Kiguli has discussed her own childhood reading experiences in an interview with BooksLIVE.^[12]

Kiguli has also contributed poetry for children to the collection Michael's Eyes: The War against the Ugandan Child,^[13] an international collaborative effort "intended to raise the global awareness of the situation in Northern Uganda," particularly concerning the troubles caused by the Lord's Resistance Army.^[14]

Kiguli poem’s were also featured in Eye of the Storm: A Photographic Journey Across Uganda,^[15] with photography by David Pluth and Pierre-Francois Didek.

Kiguli has also been featured by Ultra Violet: Indian feminists unplugged,^[16] and by Department of English & Creative Writing, Lancaster University.^[17]

Scholarship and criticism

Praised by the poet and critic Alex Smith as "the leading intellectually astute voice in contemporary East African poetry,"^[11] Kiguli was an American Council of Learned Societies Fellow for 2010, with her research focusing on "Oral Poetry and Popular Song in South Africa and Uganda: A Study of Contemporary Performance.”^[6]

On the same general topic, Kiguli’s recent intellectual contributions include “The Symbolism of Music Festivals in Buganda: The case of Ekitoobero and Enkuuka y’omwaka,” in Performing Community^[18] (2008) and "Mapping the Dream of Cultural Continuity: Songs at Enkuuka y’omwaka” in Performing Change^[19] (2009).

Alex Smith also found noteworthy Kiguli's comments on A Hundred Silences,^[20] the third collection of poems by Gabeba Baderoon.^[11]

Published works

Anthologies

• Home Floats in the Distance. Wunderhorn; Auflage. 2012. ISBN 978-3884234044. 
• The African Saga. Femrite Publications. 1998. ISBN 9789970901005. 

Poems

• "I laugh at Amin","My mother in three photographs" in Beverley Nambozo Nsengiyunva, ed. (2014). A thousand voices rising: An anthology of contemporary African poetry. BN Poetry Foundation. ISBN 978-9970-9234-0-3. 
• "Weeping landa" in Painted Voices: A collage of art and poetry, volume II. Femrite Publications. 2009. ISBN 978-9970-700-18-9. 

References

External links

• "When Kiguli treated us to a poetry fest "
• "Animal Portraits by Susan Kiguli (Note of Affection #4, Love Africa Carnival)"
• "Susan Kiguli’s formative reading experiences"
• Webcast at the Library of Congress 16 November 2011