Marx in campus: print cultures, nationalism and student activism in the late 1970s Kenya

ABSTRACT

The Anvil was a student newspaper at the University of Nairobi launched in the mid-1970s after its predecessor The Platform was shut down and its editors suspended from the university. Initially designed to be less militant, The Anvil forged a quasi-Marxist identity at a time of both widespread post-colonial disillusionment in Kenya and a largely conformist ‘patriotic’ press. In this context, the paper shows how ‘Marx’ became a symbol through which The Anvil, arguably the most fearless publication of its time, summoned a politicized ‘student’ public by offering alternative imaginaries of the nation. Drawing from literature on nationalism, publics and ideas from media theory, the paper shows how this socialist lens was routinely used to interpret both local and off-shore events as a tool for proximate political agency by drawing on black cosmopolitanisms, anti-colonial sentiment and Cold War politics.

KEYWORDS:

• Print cultures
• Marxism
• publics
• Kenyan nationalism
• student activism

Acknowledgements

This article first appeared as a conference presentation in the biennial Nordic Africa Days on 27 September 2014, in Uppsala, Sweden, as part of a panel co-hosted by the authors on East African Print Cultures and Histories of Governance. The presentation was there titled ‘The Anvil and Imaginaries of Governance: Uncovering Kenya’s Historical Unease with Itself through a University Newspaper’. We would like to thank the Centre of African Studies, Cambridge for awarding the Visiting fellowship, which facilitated the preparation of this manuscript. We also wish to thank Prof. John Lonsdale, of Trinity College, Cambridge for the extremely helpful suggestions in writing this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Interview, December 20, 2015, Eldoret, Kenya.

2. Lonsdale, “Writing Competitive Patriotism,” 251.

3. Ibid.

4. Anderson, Imagined Communities, 6.

5. Ibid., 25.

6. Barber, The Anthropology of Texts, 142.

7. Ibid., 145.

8. Hunter, “Komkya and the Convening of a Chagga Public.”

9. Warner, “Publics and Counter Publics,” 50.

10. James, “Trans Atlantic Passages.”

11. Müller, “Signs of time,” 4.

12. Frederiksen, “Joe, the Sweetest Reading in Africa”; Frederiksen, “Print, Newspapers and Audiences”; Frederiksen, “The present battle is the brain battle”; Wangara-Muoria-Sal et al., Writing for Kenya; Lonsdale, “Listen While I read.”

13. Odhiambo, “Democracy and the Ideology of Order,” 178.

14. Ogola, “The Political Economy of the Media in Kenya,” 80.

15. Klopp and Orina, “University Crisis, Student Activism,” 50.

16. McKnown, “Kenya University Students and Politics,” 244.

17. Klopp and Orina, “University Crisis, Student Activism,” 49.

18. Ibid., 46. See also Andrew Ivaska, ‘Movement Youth in a Global Sixties Hub’, for more details on Dar es Salaam Students’ activism.

19. Lonsdale, “Writing Competitive Patriotism,” 253.

20. Most of the copies of The Anvil used are those that were given to me by K.S. Buigutt, who was the Editor in Chief of The Anvil at this time. In total, about 40 issues were analysed, which adequately comprise the sum total of the two academic years he served as Editor. This copies still held in the personal collections of K.S. Buigutt in Eldoret, Kenya.

21.  See note 17 above..

22. Mackay, Presidential Working Party.

23. Ochieng, I Accuse the Press, 70.

24. The Daily Nation and The Standard, still the two biggest papers in the Kenya.

25. See note 23 above..

26. Joe's actual first name was a shortened anglicised version of the ‘difficult’ to pronounce Jawaharlal.

27. The Daily Nation, November 2, 1976

28. Ochieng, I Accuse the Press, 29.

29. Ogola, “The Political Economy of the Media in Kenya,” 81.

30. Klopp and Orina, “University Crisis, Student Activism,” 48.

31. Odhiambo, “Matunda ya Uhuru,” 41.

32. Ibid., 42.

33. Clough, “Mau Mau,” 251.

34. Ochieng, I Accuse the Press, 36.

35. Ogula, “History of the KPU.”

36. Ng’ethe, “Kimathi and Mau Mau Struggle,” 3.

37. Muthee, “Come out in the Open,” 1.

38. When contacted for comment, Muriuki welcomed the intellectual challenge from the students, although he accused the drafters of the document of being disciples of the ‘Dar School’, a leftist leaning school under the influence of John Saul (Ibid, 8).

39. Ley, Underdevelopment in Kenya, 170.

40. Rodney, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa.

41. ‘Citizen’, but often connotes an ordinary countryman.

42. This debate was part of several debates with the first the Kenya we want debate held in 1962. Since then, several, often disparate and competing, have been held to date. For details on the first see Kenya Government, ‘The Kenya we want.’

43. Editorial, The Anvil, 30 January 1978, 1.

44. Ibid.

45. Ibid.

46. Chemirmir, “The Kenya We Want,” 2.

47. Munvi, “Who Are We?,” 2.

48. Mdlongwa, “The Kenya We Have,” 1.

49. Ibid., 1

50. Ibid., 2.

51. Dr Mutunga later became the chief Justice of Kenya and retired in June, 2016.

52. Mdlongwa, “Kenyan Laws are Vehicles of Imperialism,” 1.

53. Interview with former Anvil editor K.S. Buigutt, May 2015, Eldoret, Kenya

54. Public lecture by Adebayo Olukoshi, CODESRIA writing Workshop, Mukono (Uganda), 18 September 2007

55. Editorial, The Anvil, 23 January 1978, 1.

56. Ngugi was detained by the Kenyatta government and released almost a year later, three months after Kenyatta's death together with 25 other detainees as part of newly installed president Daniel arap Moi's to endear himself to the Kenyan masses.

57. Newell, “Articulating Empire,” 29.

58. See note 31 above..

59. Odinga, Not Yet Uhuru, 304.

60. Klopp and Orina, “University Crisis, Student Activism”.

61. Mdlongwa, “Students Condemn Chilean Trade Mission,” 1.

62. Ibid., 1.

63. Buigutt, “Cuba-Africa’s Decolonization Catalyst,” 4.

64. South West African People's Party (SWAPO).

65. Kazungu, ‘The People of Namibia are Backing Swapo,’ 5.

66. Mugarura, “Violence is the Only Way to Liberate South Africa,” 6.

67. Nyaga, “Rename These Halls,” 2

68. Ibid., 2

69. Editorial, The Anvil, May 15, 1978. 1.

70. Mdlongwa, “Selling Zimbabwe ‘For a Few Cosmetic Changes,” 4

71. Peterson and Hunter, African Print Cultures.

72. Gichuki, “Cubans are a Latin African People,” 2.

73. Ibid., 2.

74. Ibid., 2.

75. The Daily Nation, 14 October 1975; See also Ochieng, I Accuse the Press, 76.

76. Gichuki, “Cubans are a Latin African People,” 2. May 8, 1978. 2.

77. Editorial by K.R. Buigutt, “The South African Connection,” 4.

78. One of the earliest political newspapers in Kenya to craft a nationalism beyond its local confines was muigwithania, edited by Jomo Kenyatta. For more details see Lonsdale, ‘Listen While I read’.

79. Murage, “Andrew Young,” 1

80. Ibid., 1

81. Editorial, The Anvil, May 29, 1978. 1.

82. Kenya Parliamentary Debates, Hansard, May 11, 1994.