Category: Uncategorized

On April 30 at 4.30pm (CET) Koen Bostoen (BantUGent) gives an online talk titled “Kongo Kingdom and Kongo Language: Divergent Pasts, Converging Presents” for the Kongo Academy, a platform created in December 2019 by a group of intellectuals interested in promoting the Kongo culture through research, education and training, cultural events and partnerships with institutions and individuals interested in Kongo culture, history, and language. For more information on the event, including the Zoom link and password, see here. The recording is available here (passcode: S!?aFC5j).

The third Research Day of the Faculty of Philosophy of Arts whose central theme is  ‘research valorisation’ takes place on Thursday April 28, 2022, in the Faculty Library. BantUGent is represented with a talk by Prof. Inge Brinkman on “Het Monster – Other/Alternative project” and with one poster by Heidi Goes and another one by Peter Coutros, Jessamy Doman & Koen Bostoen.

Prof. Igor Matonda (Université de Kinshasa – BantUGent associate), who obtained in 2017 his joint PhD degree at UGent and ULB as part of the KongoKing project and currently is associate researcher of the BantuFirst project, has been nominated Head of the Historical Sciences Department at Kinshasa University (UNIKIN). We wish him congratulations and good luck!

On April 8, 2022, Koen Bostoen (BantUGent) offers an online information session on the Bantu languages for the Service for the Certification of Social Interpreting and Translation (Dienst certificering sociaal tolken en vertalen) for the Integration Agency (Agentschap Integratie en Inburgering) of the Flemish government.

On April 1 2022 both Heidi Goes (BantUGent) and Bruna da Silva (UNISINOS University, Brazil – BantUGent) defended their PhD dissertations.

Peter Coutros (BantUGent) is in Kinshasa from March 21 to April 11 2022 to examine the archaeological data excavated as part of the BantuFirst project during three successive fieldwork campaigns in 2019, 2020, and 2021. This post-excavation analysis is done in close collaboration with Prof. Igor Matonda (UNIKIN) and Isidore Nkanu.

Our dear colleague and BantUGent associate Manoah-Joël Misago (1975-2022), professor at the University of Burundi (Department of Kirundi & Kiswahili), was buried at the Mpanda cemetery in Bujumbura on March 5, 2022 in the presence of his family and many colleagues and friends. Maud Devos (RMCA & BantUGent) and Koen Bostoen (BantUGent) made a (pre-recorded) funeral speech on behalf of the UGent Centre for Bantu Studies (of the Department of Languages and Cultures at Ghent University) and the Department of Cultural Anthropology and History (of the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren). Ferdinand Mberamihigo and Ernest Nshemezimana, his colleagues from the University of Burundi and also BantUGent associates, were amongst the pallbearers and laid a mortuary crown on behalf of our team and department.

 

On March 10 at 6pm CET, Koen Bostoen (BantUGent) will give a guest lecture on “The antipassive in Cilubà and Bantu” at the University of Toronto as part of Suzi Lima‘s “Field Methods” class, which focuses this year on Cilubà. The talk can be attended online through Zoom.

Our Burundian colleague Manoah-Joël Misago (1975-2022), professor at the University of Burundi (Department of Kirundi & Kiswahili) and BantUGent associate, passed away in Bujumbura on February 25, 2O22. He obtained his PhD degree in African Studies at Ghent University in 2018 with a dissertation on motion verbs in Kirundi and was a Kiswahili lecturer in the UGent African Languages and Cultures study program in 2016-2017. He leaves a wife and three children aged 12, 7 and 3. May he rest in peace! Wiruhukire amahoro!