On December 13, 2023 an online guest lecture by Professor Avril Joffe took place (Head of Department for Cultural Policy and Management, Wits School of Arts, South Africa). Professor Avril Joffe presented her insights on intercultural relations between Africa and Europe and will discuss how EU funding schemes affect local stakeholders.
Much has been written about what international cultural relations is, why it is vital for organisations to engage (enhance local public space, break down geographic or linguistic silos, enable encounters for interaction, peer learning and networking, build agency for local actors), but much less has been written about the challenges that emerge when engaging in international cultural relations This talk unpacks how EU funding schemes and international policy discourses on cultural and creative industries (especially those of the European Union) influence the emergence of a pan-African intercultural public space on the continent. I will consider six areas to be aware of when engaging in international cultural relations taking into account the views of the beneficiaries and intermediary actors themselves on the creation process of an emerging intercultural African public space. Enlarging the African public space for dialogue, debate and a robust creative economy is defined by two mutual dynamics: the discourse and ambitions of international institutions (in this case the EU and intermediary agencies) and the creativity and resilience of locally embedded creative and cultural individuals and entities.
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Professor Avril Joffe is a development economist with more than twenty years of professional experience in the fields of art and culture, development in cultural and creative industries and more than 35 years of experience in project management, organizational management and policy development. She currently heads the Cultural Policy and Management Department at the Wits School of Arts, University of the Witwatersrand. There she conducts research in the field of cultural policy, cultural economy and the intersection with cities and urban development. She is also an advisor to the Arts Council and a member of the UNESCO Commission in South Africa