Caroline Mudingo Dipanda

Caroline Mudingo Dipanda

Afro-diasporic stories, arts.

Episodes

  1. Transcontinental- Labdi Ommes

    09/04/2025

    Transcontinental- Labdi Ommes

    Labdi Ommes is a brilliant multidisciplinary artist from Kenya. Her practice includes composing, singing-songwriting, visual art, sound installations. Last year, she released her latest EP, Pakruok. " Pakruok is about self-praise. This EP is a confirmation and appreciation of oneself. The music takes on a satirical stance and Labdi addresses different societal issues." In Kenya, she currently stands as one of the very few women who plays the orutu professionally, alongside Omwa Owbara. The orutu is a single-stringed fiddle originating from Kenya ( Luo people).  In this episode Labdi Ommes reflects on her artistic journey - from the challenges she's faced as an orutu player in a patriarchal society, to claiming back the instrument, to preserving the Luo culture. We discuss her notable works including Unganisha, and the music score for award-winning National Geographic Society's documentary Nkashi: Race for the Okavango.  Nkashi: Race for the Okavango was created by the National Geographic Society's Impact Story Lab, in close collaboration with Batswana filmmakers and local production company, Parable Motion. The film score features tracks by Nature, Environment and Wildlife Filmmakers' Composers Lab.The Lab includes musicians from around the African continent - Labdi Ommes, Thato Kavinja, Prince Bogosi, Ania Safa, Patrick Sainton, Neil. With thanks to Pragna Parksotam-Kok for permitting the use of tracks composed by Nature, Environment and Wildlife Filmmakers' Composers Lab

    29 min
  2. Transcontinental, Episode 1: Aby Ngana Diop

    02/25/2025

    Transcontinental, Episode 1: Aby Ngana Diop

    The programme explores the unprecedented recording of griotte Aby Ngana Diop, who performed taasu over mbalax music ( "taasu is a form of oral poetry spoken to the rhythmic accompaniment of sabar and tama drums [...]It is a rhythmically declaimed speech in call-and-response with a small chorus of female vocalists'' Patricia Tang for Awesome Tapes From Africa). She released her only album in 1994 in Senegal, which Awesome Tapes From Africa distributed in 2014." The combination of Diop and her backup vocalists with their powerful taasu, along with the driving, complex rhythms of the sabar and tama drums, mixed with key elements of mbalax (such as the syncopated, polyphonic marimba sounds played on the Yamaha DX7 keyboard) was something the Senegalese public had never heard before" P.Tang Guests: Marame Gueye is Associate Professor of African and African Diaspora literatures in the department of English at East Carolina in Greenville, NC.Her research interests include African women’s art, African oral literatures, translation and immigration studies. Her articles have appeared in Research in African Literatures, African Studies Review, the Journal of Pan African Studies.ABA DIOP is a Senegalese master sabar percussionist, vocalist and composer who comes from a lineage of griots ( griot: musicians, oral historians, poets, storytellers) . Aba Diop & the Yermande Family is a music ensemble that consists of Aba Diop (sabar, vocals), Noumoucounda Cissoko (kora, vocals), Samba Ndokh (tama), and Jason Hosier (electric guitar).Amadou Bator Dieng is the founder of  Kirinapost, a pan-African newspaper. He worked as a correspondent for Pan African Music( PAM) in Dakar, Senegal. PAM is an online music magazine in both French and English, dedicated to promoting music from the African continent and diaspora.

    52 min
  3. 10/17/2022

    Black and Irish, Navigating Racism in Ireland

    " Black and Irish, Navigating Racism in Ireland" examines how institutional racism affects Black Irish, Mixed-Race Irish and African migrants within the industrial care system, the direct provision system and the education system. Assistant Professor of Black Studies Dr. Philomena will give an in-depth look at her childhood in the Irish industrial school system to depict race relations in the 1960s and 1970s and how they affected the construction of Mixed- race women’s identity. We also discuss the recent introduction of Black Studies in Ireland’s curriculum. We delve into the impact of encounters with racism on Mia O’Neill, who took her own life in 2019. Her mother, Aisling O’Neill, shares an emotional testimony as she sheds light on the trauma inherent to racism. She reflects on the role of the education system to foster a better understanding of race and racism. We talk to Bukky Adebowale, born in Ireland, President of the student life at Maynooth University); Sandrine Ndahiro, PhD student in African Literature originally from Kenya; Cameroon-born artist Alicia Raye, who spent her teenage years in Direct Provision centers. They share personal stories to explain how racism and discrimination is prevalent in their daily interactions in colleges and universities. We meet Black Irish teacher Alex Mbowua, activist Myriam Poizat (Youth Against Racism and Inequality), Adult learner advocate and Africa-Ireland Network’s founder Joy-Tendai Kangere to give an overview of the education system: curriculum, income disparity, lack of opportunities. The Policy Officer for the Irish Network Against Racism, Patricia Munatsi, shares her determination to call for a national action plan against racism. Credits: “Black and Irish, Navigating Racism in Ireland” was produced by Caroline Mudingo Dipanda and was funded by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland

    48 min
  4. Conversations - Dr. Philomena Mullen: Experiences of Mixed Race Irish Women in Irish Industrial Schools

    08/30/2022

    Conversations - Dr. Philomena Mullen: Experiences of Mixed Race Irish Women in Irish Industrial Schools

    Dr Philomena Mullen discusses her investigation into the identity construction of women of mixed African-Irish descent, with white Irish mothers and African fathers, who grew up in the Irish institutional care system. This crucial research explores how racial /ethnic identities are shaped by Irish society and how we read racialisation in White Irish culture. She also provides context for her short story entitled " Black Baby box", an insightful account of her early years in an industrial school in Booterstown ( Ireland). Philomena Mullen is the spokesperson for the Association of Mixed Race Irish. Her research links into the campaign of the Association of Mixed Race Irish seeking recognition and justice for past violations and racism. She'll focus on the conflicting statements published in The Final Report of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes.   Institutionalised, Parentless, and Racialised as Other: Understanding the Formation of a Racialised Self for Women of African-Irish Descent who grew up in the Irish Industrial School System." Dr Phil Mullen http://www.tara.tcd.ie/handle/2262/96083 "Black baby box[ed]" , Philomena Mullen Home / Irish University Review / List of Issues / Volume 50, Issue 2 / https://www.euppublishing.com/doi/abs/10.3366/iur.2020.0463 - The Association of Mixed Race Irish https://www.mixedraceirish.ie/ - The Final Report of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes is available here: https://www.gov.ie/en/publication/d4b3d-final-report-of-the-commission-of-investigation-into-mother-and-baby-homes/ Additional music is composed by Microgramme. '' We Are Starzz", Angel Bat Dawid.

    20 min

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Afro-diasporic stories, arts.