WOMAN ZONE STORIES

It's not often we have a poet as a WZBC Guest Author of the Month - even less often that we have a geographer. So to have geographer and poet Shari Daya come to talk to us about Land | Lines, her debut anthology published by Karavan Press was a double bonus.

Botswana born GOTHATAONE MOENG, although a writer, was not technically a Woman Zone Book Club Guest Author of the Month, but as a speaker at the Open Book Festival in Cape Town, and with a recently published collection of short stories, Call and Response had many a personal story of her own to tell, not least what its like for a young person in Botswana growing up between tradition and modernity.

In the last of the DAISY TALK-workshops for 2024, actor and teacher CELESTE MATTHEWS WANNENBURGH, Woman Zone's very valued Board Chair, shared with the girls from the ISeeU mentoring programme thoughts on how to Figure Out Your Future, while giving us some insight into her own past - and present. Take a listen here...

We first heard Thobeka Yose's story back in 2016 when she shared it at Woman Zone. Eight years later, she has finally had it published in a book called In Silence My Heart Speaks ( Karavan Press ). With all the issues that it touches on, mothers, marriage, mental health, abuse, cultural behaviours and beliefs, as well as gender diversity - it was an appropriate book for us to launch during the...

The Knit & Natter movement, a part of Woman Zone's Everywoman Project, is just growing! And this year in honour of Artscape's Women's Humanity Festival 2024, they dressed the iconic 2m high statue as Wild Woolly Wire Woman and turned their hands to Knitting for Kindness. With love.

‘How can YOU make a difference?’ was the question asked at Artscape ’s Women’s Humanity Festival this year with an invitation to sign the #STEP-UP for CHANGE pledge against Gender Based Violence. Activist PHARIE SEFALI, founder of the Lulibo Project, has found a way through writing AKHONA’s JOURNEY, a simple, insightful book and short 7-part film animated by Greenhouse and produced in partnership...

That Gender Based Violence is an escalating crime the world over is a shocking reflection on humanity. Responding to it as a means of highlighting and addressing it is an international theatre project involving three playwrights from South Africa, Iran and the USA. It's scheduled to be performed in South Africa in 2025, but at a reading recently at Artscape , we listened in to find out more, a...

Not everyone wants to write a whole, full-on book, but in this Daisy Talk, writer-theatrical ANNIE AKINYI KAMYA tells the ISeeU girls how writing for her became a way of life. She went on to explain how, very simply, they can write their own story.

An Uncomfortable Paradise: A History of Dispossession and Slavery in Simon's Town is a book Joline Young based on her Master's Degree in historical studies. As Woman Zone guest author of the month and interviewed by Theresa Smith, she shared the emotional journey involved in writing this book.

In it's 17th year, the upcoming Women's Humanity Festival at Artscape takes one step further in the war against Gender Based Violence, inviting YOU to sign the pledge to #STEP-UP FOR CHANGE!

One thing we all have in common, at any age, is stress. But for young people in particular it can be really hard, both to recognise and to manage. At the Artscape Resource Centre, psychologist, narrative therapist, couples counsellor - and member of the Woman Zone executive committee - DAPHNE COOPER gave this Stress-Less talk-workshop for the young women from ISeeU , but first she talked us throug...

In her career as Head of Training and Development at the Chrysalis Academy , Janine Turner has learnt a great deal about the lives of young people. In one of our Artscape Conversations, we spoke to her to find out more about the achievements and challenges of their work with the next generation.

Now based in the United States, South African born BO PETERSEN, actor, writer, director, voice over artist and theatre teacher, has come back temporarily, to her home country to perform in a play she wrote called Pieces of Me. Opening at the Baxter theatre on July 11, it tells her journey of uncovering a very deeply buried family secret about her father and consequently, about herself. Here she sh...

The Zeitz MOCAA (Museum of Contemporary African Art) is arguably one of the most creative institutions in Cape Town, not just because of what’s on the walls and floors, but because of what is created within it, not least in the educational wing. AND SO THE STORIES RAN AWAY was initially an exhibition of art for children held back in 2019. Four years later it’s become a series of children’s books –...

Irish novelist Cecelia Ahern wrote her first book at 21 and has never looked back. With 25 million books sold in over 40 countries, she is a huge, much sought after, literary success story. A big fan, WOMAN ZONE librarian and publicist Beryl Eichenberger caught up with Cecelia for a chat in the busy Green Room at this years Franschhoek Literary Festival .

With a dizzying number of fans and followers, British Nigerian Bolu Babalola , author of Love in Colour and Honey and Spice, was in Cape Town recently for the Franschhoek Literary Festival . We were delighted to have the opportunity to talk to her at The Women's Library to find out more about the woman and her words - and we invite you to listen in.

A feminist literary scholar and Associate Professor of English at the University of Cape Town, Barbara Boswell ensures that her words are not wasted. Her latest novel The Comrade's Wife ( Jacana) packs a powerful punch, with some messages that should not be ignored, not by academics nor politicians.

Shubnum Khan  is a Durban born author and artist. Her writing has been published widely and her first novel,  Onion Tears  (2011) was shortlisted for the Penguin Prize for African Writing and the University of Johannesburg Debut Fiction Prize. Her essay collection,  How I Accidentally Became a Stock Photo  was published 2021 but just prior to the Franschhoek Literary Festival, Beryl Eichenberger t...

Over thirty years ago Marlene Winberg started listening to the stories of San women from the !xun tribe. Healer and storyteller Meneputo Manunga Manyeka made her promise that one day she would put them together in a book. The Gathering Bag fulfils that promise. And so that they should have wider reach and significance, Marlene worked with Sue Hollingsworth to have them shared by storytellers acros...

With their 25th anniversary around the corner, the Saartjie Baartman Centre for women and children remains a place of safety and care for so many survivors of domestic violence. Together the team from Blocktober who've been fundraising for them, Woman Zone went to visit and deliver books for their new serenity library hub and were invited on a tour. Listen here to join in...

Bringing dance to the people and people to dance, the SboNdaba Dance company tells the story of South Africa’s 30 year old democracy in a production called ! ke e: /xarra//ke or Diverse People Unite.  At Artscape May 24 and 25, three performances only. Sbonakaliso herself shares the back story.

The second in the Daisy Talk series on Money, was given by two professionals in the business, Ethel Hamman of auditing firm Crowe and Yolisa Molefe of SNCTax. They provided invaluable information to the girls of ISeeU mentoring programme. The talk was held in the Isibaya Room at Artscape where we asked Ethel and Yolisa to tell us about their own journeys.

The short story is an increasingly popular medium, both for readers and writers. Dawn Garish , doctor and activist writer in terms of encouraging others through The Life Righting Collective, recently won an NIHSS award for her short story collection WHAT REMAINS ( Karavan Press) . She was an extraordinarily giving and thought provoking Guest Author.

Not technically a WZ Book Club Guest Author of the Month, but a very special guest author at the 2024 Books on the Bay Festival in Simon's Town, writer Margie Orford very honestly shared what went into Love and Fury , her memoir.

The first of the WOMAN ZONE six-part DAISY TALK series for young women learners from the Cape Flats and in partnership with ISeeU , was held at Artscape . The speaker was Dr Mpume Zenda, gynaecologist, obstetrician, sexologist, author of Mommy, My Body's Changing and founder of We See You health and information consultancy. Listen here to find out more. Coming up next in the monthly series, in...