zen08

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zen08@arizona.edu
Phone
(520)-621-5665
Office
Learning Services Building
Office Hours
Please email professor to schedule a meeting or refer to class syllabus.
Zenenga, Praise
Department Head

Praise Zenenga holds an Interdisciplinary PhD in Theater and Drama from Northwestern University. He is a theater historian and dramatic literature specialist with a strong interdisciplinary training and background. His research and teaching focus on interdisciplinary approaches to understanding issues of identity, race, aesthetics, politics, social change and social justice in the literature, music, visual arts and performance arts of Africa and African Diaspora communities. He is also interested in Digital Africana Studies and the various Elements of Global Hip-Hop. Several of his publications focusing mostly on masculinities, censorship, avant-gardism, political expression and modes of protest in Zimbabwean, art, theater, dance, sport and everyday life performance have appeared in internationally renowned journals like Theater History, Theater, African Identities, the South African Theater Journal and the Dance Research Journal and various edited books and volumes from reputable international publishers like Oxford, Cambridge, Rodopi and Routledge. He is currently completing a monograph on contemporary popular theater in Africa focusing on the relationship between artists, donors and the state.

Currently Teaching

AFAS 475 – USA & South Africa: Comparative Historical & Political Perspectives

This course will focus on the historical and political developments of colonialism, racism, and racial segregation in the United States and in South Africa *(Azania) since the beginning of the colonialism-slavery epochs to the present. It will illumine the striking similarities and differences particularly between the slave and Jim Crow South and apartheid South Africa and between dispossession of Indigenous peoples in North America and those of Azania, paying special attention to issues of ideology, color, class, and gender. This class does satisfy requirements for the Africana Studies minor, Study Area I, Africana History, Politics and Economics.

This course will focus on the historical and political developments of colonialism, racism, and racial segregation in the United States and in South Africa *(Azania) since the beginning of the colonialism-slavery epochs to the present. It will illumine the striking similarities and differences particularly between the slave and Jim Crow South and apartheid South Africa and between dispossession of Indigenous peoples in North America and those of Azania, paying special attention to issues of ideology, color, class, and gender. This class does satisfy requirements for the Africana Studies minor, Study Area I, Africana History, Politics and Economics.

AFAS 400 – African Aesthetics: Pan-African Dance Language of Liberation

This course is geared toward illuminating the relationship of dance and music through a theoretical and technical examination of historical Pan African dance forms from the African continent, through the Diaspora and the Americas. A range of Black and other thinkers and artists from Indigenous cultures in Africa and the Diaspora will be discussed in this course.

This course is geared toward illuminating the relationship of dance and music through a theoretical and technical examination of historical Pan African dance forms from the African continent, through the Diaspora and the Americas. A range of Black and other thinkers and artists from Indigenous cultures in Africa and the Diaspora will be discussed in this course.

AFAS 498 – Senior Capstone

A culminating experience for majors involving a substantive project that demonstrates a synthesis of learning accumulated in the major, including broadly comprehensive knowledge of the discipline and its methodologies. Senior standing required.

AFAS 218 – Introduction to Hip-Hop Dance

When you think of hip-hop, you often think of gangsters, thugs, pimps, drugs, crime, wealth, violence ,and misogyny. Students taking this course will be expected to take the artist perspective to dig deeper into the historical underpinnings of where this contemporary art form comes from as well as its evolution and proliferation nationally and beyond(globally). This beginning level class combines practical movement practices based on actual hip-hop dance styles with straight lectures and lively discussions that help students to be critical, analytical, logical, questioning, reflective and evaluative thinkers This holistic approach which combines theory and practice, will furnish learners with the relevant cultural, historical, and practical knowledge of hip-hop dance and cultures in general. Similarly, in order to fully examine and acquire the different hip-hop dance and movement styles, skills, techniques, vocabulary, and cultures emanating from particular historical and evolutionary periods and geographic regions in the USA and globally, the course will adopt ahistorical-geographical approach. The ultimate objective is to challenge and encourage students to take on the lens of the artists and independently create final dance projects where they dig deeper and get immersed in to the core values, knowledge, theories, world views, concepts, and ideas specific to the Africana Studies discipline. Students are not required to have prior dance knowledge to enroll in this class and will participate at their ability levels. To demonstrate the student's mastery of disciplinary content, methodologies, skills, knowledge and value systems, the class will culminate with an independently conceived practical performance, or a digital project accompanied by a critical/analytical write up.

When you think of hip-hop, you often think of gangsters, thugs, pimps, drugs, crime, wealth, violence ,and misogyny. Students taking this course will be expected to take the artist perspective to dig deeper into the historical underpinnings of where this contemporary art form comes from as well as its evolution and proliferation nationally and beyond(globally). This beginning level class combines practical movement practices based on actual hip-hop dance styles with straight lectures and lively discussions that help students to be critical, analytical, logical, questioning, reflective and evaluative thinkers This holistic approach which combines theory and practice, will furnish learners with the relevant cultural, historical, and practical knowledge of hip-hop dance and cultures in general. Similarly, in order to fully examine and acquire the different hip-hop dance and movement styles, skills, techniques, vocabulary, and cultures emanating from particular historical and evolutionary periods and geographic regions in the USA and globally, the course will adopt ahistorical-geographical approach. The ultimate objective is to challenge and encourage students to take on the lens of the artists and independently create final dance projects where they dig deeper and get immersed in to the core values, knowledge, theories, world views, concepts, and ideas specific to the Africana Studies discipline. Students are not required to have prior dance knowledge to enroll in this class and will participate at their ability levels. To demonstrate the student's mastery of disciplinary content, methodologies, skills, knowledge and value systems, the class will culminate with an independently conceived practical performance, or a digital project accompanied by a critical/analytical write up.

When you think of hip-hop, you often think of gangsters, thugs, pimps, drugs, crime, wealth, violence ,and misogyny. Students taking this course will be expected to take the artist perspective to dig deeper into the historical underpinnings of where this contemporary art form comes from as well as its evolution and proliferation nationally and beyond(globally). This beginning level class combines practical movement practices based on actual hip-hop dance styles with straight lectures and lively discussions that help students to be critical, analytical, logical, questioning, reflective and evaluative thinkers This holistic approach which combines theory and practice, will furnish learners with the relevant cultural, historical, and practical knowledge of hip-hop dance and cultures in general. Similarly, in order to fully examine and acquire the different hip-hop dance and movement styles, skills, techniques, vocabulary, and cultures emanating from particular historical and evolutionary periods and geographic regions in the USA and globally, the course will adopt ahistorical-geographical approach. The ultimate objective is to challenge and encourage students to take on the lens of the artists and independently create final dance projects where they dig deeper and get immersed in to the core values, knowledge, theories, world views, concepts, and ideas specific to the Africana Studies discipline. Students are not required to have prior dance knowledge to enroll in this class and will participate at their ability levels. To demonstrate the student's mastery of disciplinary content, methodologies, skills, knowledge and value systems, the class will culminate with an independently conceived practical performance, or a digital project accompanied by a critical/analytical write up.

When you think of hip-hop, you often think of gangsters, thugs, pimps, drugs, crime, wealth, violence ,and misogyny. Students taking this course will be expected to take the artist perspective to dig deeper into the historical underpinnings of where this contemporary art form comes from as well as its evolution and proliferation nationally and beyond(globally). This beginning level class combines practical movement practices based on actual hip-hop dance styles with straight lectures and lively discussions that help students to be critical, analytical, logical, questioning, reflective and evaluative thinkers This holistic approach which combines theory and practice, will furnish learners with the relevant cultural, historical, and practical knowledge of hip-hop dance and cultures in general. Similarly, in order to fully examine and acquire the different hip-hop dance and movement styles, skills, techniques, vocabulary, and cultures emanating from particular historical and evolutionary periods and geographic regions in the USA and globally, the course will adopt ahistorical-geographical approach. The ultimate objective is to challenge and encourage students to take on the lens of the artists and independently create final dance projects where they dig deeper and get immersed in to the core values, knowledge, theories, world views, concepts, and ideas specific to the Africana Studies discipline. Students are not required to have prior dance knowledge to enroll in this class and will participate at their ability levels. To demonstrate the student's mastery of disciplinary content, methodologies, skills, knowledge and value systems, the class will culminate with an independently conceived practical performance, or a digital project accompanied by a critical/analytical write up.

AFAS 230 – Introduction to African Literature

Anglophone and Francophone literature. Focuses on major authors; Achebe, Soyinka, Head, Wa Thiong'O, Brutus, Emecheta. Employs bio-literary analysis.

Anglophone and Francophone literature. Focuses on major authors; Achebe, Soyinka, Head, Wa Thiong'O, Brutus, Emecheta. Employs bio-literary analysis.