Afropolitanism and Ada’s Realm: A conversation with Sharon Dodua Otoo
Join prizewinning writer Sharon Dodua Otoo as she speaks with literary researcher Chalo’a Waya about the recently published English-language edition of her critically acclaimed novel Ada’s Realm. The novel was first published in German as Adas Raum in 2021.
The conversation will explore, among other things, the Afropolitan aspects of Ada’s Realm and address the multiple intersectionalities – of class, race, gender, and disability – in Otoo’s remarkable novel.
This event is being cohosted with the DAAD Research Hub for German Studies, the German Department, and the CAPONEU project (Cartography of the Political Novel in Europe) at the University of Cambridge.
About the Speakers
Sharon Dodua Otoo is a novelist and a political activist. She is editor of the English-language book series Witnessed and curates the German-language literature festival ‘Resonanzen’ (‘Resonances’). Her first novel, Adas Raum, was published in German in 2021 and in English translation in 2023. Otoo won the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize in 2016, a major international literary award in German-speaking countries. She was elected a Visiting Fellow at Jesus College in 2021 and was the Schroeder Writer-in-Residence at Cambridge in the 2021-2022 academic year.
Chalo’a Waya is a PhD student at St Catharine’s College, Cambridge, writing on Critical Afropolitanism and epistemic injustice in contemporary novels.
