Dr. Renzo Baas

Short Bio

Renzo Baas was a wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum from 03.2020 until 08.02022. He received his PhD at the Bayreuth International Graduate School of African Studies in 2017 and was a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of KwaZulu-Natal from 2018-2020.

He has published articles on memorial cultures, Afrofuturism, and post/-colonialism. His focus is the intersection of spatial theory and speculative narratives and has taught courses ranging from Moby Dick and Shakespeare to Black Panther and Afrofuturism. Although literature is his field of inquiry, he is also interested in film, art, as well as popular and memorial cultures.

Currently, he is working on his second monograph, tentatively called Speculative Spatialities. 

Selected Publications

Monograph:

• R. Baas. Fictioning Namibia as a Space of Desire. Basel: Basler Afrika Bibliographien (BAB). 2019.

Articles:

• R. Baas. “The Rider and the Coffee Maker. Sites and Practices of Remembrance in Contemporary Namibia.” In: Journal of African Cultural Studies, vol. 34 no.1. 2022: 48-67. 
• Baas, Renzo. “Travel Beyond Stars: Trauma and Future in Mojisola Adebayo’s STARS.” In: Journal of Contemporary Drama in English, vol. 9, no. 1. 2021: 95-113.
• R. Baas. “Fictional Dreams and Harsh Realities. Linking Joseph Diescho’s Born of the Sun, Kaleni Hiyalwa’s Meekulu’s Children, and Neshani Andreas’ The Purple Violet of Oshaanti to the Current Namibian State.” In: Matatu Journal for African Culture and Society. vol. 50 no.2. 2018: 407-429.

Book Chapter:

• R. Baas. “Surrounded by Ghosts: My Life in the Bush of Ghosts. Amos Tutuola and the Persistence of the Ghostly.” In: Fink, Katharina, Marie-Anne Kohl and Nadine Siegert (eds.). Ghosts, spectres, revenants: Hauntology as a means to think and feel future. Bayreuth and Johannesburg: iwalewabooks. 2020: 189-199.