Quito J. Swan
Moderator: Awam Amkpa
04 May 2026 | 6:00 PM Gulf Standard Time (4:00 PM CEST) | Zoom (Webinar)
Black Internationalism, Oceania and the Caribbean
Delivering a keynote address at Port Moresby’s 1976 First Independent Papua New Guinea Writers’ Conference, Australian Aboriginal poet Oodgeroo Noonuccal called for Black artists of the Pacific to meet annually to “celebrate in a Black Pacific Festival of Arts.” Speaking before a room full of Black Power artists, activists, and protagonists of Negritude from across Oceania and the broader Black Diaspora, she described Papua New Guinea's crucial cultural and political relationships to global Black liberation.
Decades later, Black Pacific Studies is engaging questions of Blackness via the geopolitical, transoceanic, and epistemological dynamics of the Pacific Ocean world.
Quito J. Swan’s talk also explores the Black Pacific through the lens of Black internationalism and decolonization. It discusses how liberation struggles in Oceania actively engaged Black internationalism in their diverse battles for self-determination.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Quito J. Swan is Professor of History and Director of Africana Studies at The George Washington University in Washington DC.
He has single authored a number of books on Black internationalism, the latest being Born a Sufferah: Dancehall Music’s Insurgent Soundscapes (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2025). His Pasifika Black: Oceania, Anti-Colonialism and the African World (NYU Press) received ASALH’s 2023 Best Book in African American History Award. His Pauulu’s Diaspora: Black Internationalism and Environmental Justice (University Press of Florida) won the AAIHS 2022 Pauli Murray Book Prize.
Swan has garnered fellowships from prestigious institutions such as the National Endowment for the Humanities, Harvard University’s Radcliffe Institute, and Australia’s University of Queensland. His writings have appeared in the Radical History Review, the Journal of Civil and Human Rights, the Journal of African American History and the International Journal of Africana Studies.
MODERATOR
Awam Amkpa is Vice Provost for the Arts and Dean of Arts and Humanities at New York University Abu Dhabi, where he is also Professor of Drama and Social and Cultural Analysis. He holds a BA from Obafemi Awolowo University (Ile-Ife), an MA from Ahmadu Bello University (Zaria), and a PhD from the University of Bristol.
A scholar, filmmaker, and curator, Amkpa’s work focuses on modernisms in film and theater, postcolonial performance, Black Atlantic visual cultures, and the arts of Africa and its diasporas. He is the author of Theatre and Postcolonial Desires (Routledge, 2003) and has published widely on representation and performance across global contexts. In addition to his academic work, he directs documentary films and curates photographic exhibitions and film festivals, bringing a rich interdisciplinary perspective to his role as a moderator.