The Sudanese Writers Union was founded in Khartoum in 1985, the year that democracy was restored in Sudan for a short period. The Union promotes dialogue and seeks solutions for conflicts in Sudan. It emphasizes freedom of expression within a multicultural society and tries to bring together writers of different cultural groups. The first secretary-general until 1986 was Ali El-Maak. [1]
In 1989, four years after the Union's founding, a coup d'état took place, resulting in the organization being banned and expelled from the historic building in Khartoum. Members of the Union were arrested and tortured. It took until shortly after the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement of 2005/06 that the union could be revived again. A year later, in 2007, the union again consisted of fifty members; some members were located within Sudan, while others lived in exile. Altogether it lasted twenty years until the organization was able in 2009 to reopen a settlement in the capital of Sudan. The same year, the union claimed back its building in Khartoum. [2]
In 2007, the Sudanese Writers Union was honored with a Prince Claus Award from the Netherlands. The jury presented the award under the theme Culture and Conflict and praised the work of the union, stating that its members "are working against huge odds to providea Space of Freedom for debate." [3]
On 29 January 2015, the Sudanese Writers Union was dissolved again and its cultural activities banned by the Ministry of Culture of the government of Omar al-Bashir. [4] [5] At the end of 2016, an administrative court of appeal in Khartoum annulled the Ministry’s decision and ordered the security apparatus to return the Union’s property, as well as to allow them to resume their activities. [6]
Sudanese writer, translator, and scholar Ali El-Maak led the Union from its founding in 1985 through 1986. [1] Renowned Sudanese novelist Ibrahim Ishag served as chairperson of the Union starting in 2009, [7] and Ahmed El Safi, a Sudanese anesthesiologist, researcher and writer, was president of the Union in 2017. [8]
Another founding member is Buthaina Khidir Mekki, who was dubbed an "icon of the Sudanese feminist novel" for her narratives about negative social stereotypes towards the education of young girls and the consequences of conflict and war for women. [9]
Tayeb Salih was a Sudanese writer, cultural journalist for the BBC Arabic programme as well as for Arabic journals, and a staff member of UNESCO. He is best known for his novel Season of Migration to the North, considered to be one of the most important novels in Arabic literature. His novels and short stories have been translated into English and more than a dozen other languages.
The Justice and Equality Movement is an opposition group in Sudan founded by Khalil Ibrahim. Gibril Ibrahim has led the group since January 2012 after the death of Khalil, his brother, in December 2011. The JEM supported the removal of President of Sudan, Omar al-Bashir and nation-wide government reform.
El-Obeid, also romanized as Al-Ubayyid, is the capital of the state of North Kurdufan, in Sudan.
As of the early 2000s, Sudan had one of the most restrictive media environments in Africa. Sudan's print media since independence generally have served one of the political parties or the government in power, although there occasionally were outspoken independent newspapers.
The Prince Claus Fund was established in 1996, named in honour of Prince Claus of the Netherlands.
Sudanese literature consists of both oral as well as written works of fiction and nonfiction that were created during the cultural history of today's Republic of the Sudan. This includes the territory of what was once Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, the independent country's history since 1956 as well as its changing geographical scope in the 21st century.
Malkat al-Dar Mohamed Abdullah, also spelled as Malikah ad-Dar, was a Sudanese literary writer, educator and women's rights activist. Her novel written in the 1950s, "Al-Faragh al-'arid", has been characterized as the first Sudanese novel in the style of social realism. Sudanese literary critic Lemya Shammat called her "a pioneer of the literary feminist renaissance and a woman of spirit and courage."
The Central Bank of Sudan was the central bank of Sudan. The bank was formed in 1960, four years after Sudan's independence. It was located in the capital Khartoum. In April 2023, the Central Bank of Sudan was hit, and destroyed.
Rania Ali Musa Mamoun is a Sudanese fiction writer and journalist, known for her novels, poems and short stories. She was born in the city of Wad Medani in east-central Sudan and was educated at the University of Gezira.
Ibrahim El-Salahi is a Sudanese painter, former public servant and diplomat. He is one of the foremost visual artists of the Khartoum School, considered as part of African Modernism and the pan-Arabic Hurufiyya art movement, that combined traditional forms of Islamic calligraphy with contemporary artworks. On the occasion of the Tate Modern gallery's first retrospective exhibition of a contemporary artist from Africa in 2013, El-Salahi's work was characterized as "a new Sudanese visual vocabulary, which arose from his own pioneering integration of Islamic, African, Arab and Western artistic traditions."
Hammour Ziada is a Sudanese writer and journalist, born in Omdurman. He has worked as a civil society and human rights researcher, and currently works as journalist in Cairo. Before, he had been writing for a number of left-wing newspapers in Sudan. Two of his novels were selected for Arabic literary awards and appeared in English translations.
Kamala Ibrahim Ishaq is a Sudanese painter and art teacher, known as one of the founders of The Crystalist conceptual art group in Khartoum. This group rejected common conventions in Sudanese modern painting of the 1960s and strived to find "an aesthetic and critical language that would emphasise the notions of pleasure and knowledge in order to permanently abolish differences and boundaries". Based on her artistic career spanning more than fifty years, Ishaq has been called one of the most important visual artists in Africa.
The 2019–2022 Sudanese protests were street protests in Sudan which began in mid-September 2019, during Sudan's transition to democracy, about issues which included the nomination of a new Chief Justice and Attorney General, the killing of civilians by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), the toxic effects of cyanide and mercury from gold mining in Northern state and South Kordofan, opposition to a state governor in el-Gadarif and to show trials of Sudanese Professionals Association (SPA) coordinators, and advocating the dismissal of previous-government officials in Red Sea, White Nile, and South Darfur. The protests follow the Sudanese Revolution's street protests and civil disobedience of the early September 2019 transfer of executive power to the country's Sovereignty Council, civilian prime minister Abdalla Hamdok, and his cabinet of ministers. Hamdok described the 39-month transition period as defined by the aims of the revolution.
Stella Gaitano is a literary writer and pharmacist from South Sudan. She is known for her stories, often dealing with the harsh living conditions of people from southern Sudan, who have endured discrimination and military dictatorship, or war and displacement in the northern part of Sudan. Since the independence of South Sudan in 2011, she has also published short stories about life in her new nation.
Abdelaziz Baraka Sakin is a Sudanese fiction writer with roots in Darfur in western Sudan, whose literary work was banned in Sudan in 2011. Since 2012, he has lived in exile in Austria and later in France. He is mostly known for his novels The Messiah of Darfur and The Jungo, translated from the original Arabic into French, English, Spanish and German.
Ibrahim Ishaq, also referred to as Ibrāhīm Isḥāq Ibrāhīm, was a Sudanese novelist, short story writer and literary scholar.
Ann El Safi, full name Ann Adil Ya’Seen Hajj El Safi is a Sudanese journalist, writer, novelist, and engineer. Up to 2019, she has published poems and novels as well as articles on mass media in modern societies in her native Arabic.
The visual arts of Sudan encompass the historical and contemporary production of objects made by the inhabitants of today's Republic of the Sudan and specific to their respective cultures. This encompasses objects from cultural traditions of the region in North-East Africa historically referred to as the Sudan, including the southern regions that became independent as South Sudan in 2011.
Soudan 2019, année zéro is a book about the Sudanese revolution, published in French in 2021. It contains descriptions, commentaries and photographs of the protestors' sit-in area during the weeks in May and June 2019 that led up to the Khartoum massacre. As additional visual documents, the book contains images by Sudanese documentary photographers, illustrating different stages and social backgrounds of the revolution up to the destruction of the sit-in by security forces on 3 June 2019.
On 25 October 2021, the Sudanese military, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, took control of the Government of Sudan in a military coup. At least five senior government figures were initially detained. Civilian Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok refused to declare support for the coup and on 25 October called for popular resistance; he was confined to house arrest on 26 October. Internet outages were reported. Later the same day, the Sovereignty Council was dissolved, a state of emergency was put in place, and a majority of the Hamdok Cabinet and a number of pro-government supporters were arrested. As of 5 November 2021, the list of those detained included "government ministers, members of political parties, lawyers, civil society activists, journalists, human rights defenders, and protest leaders", who were held in secret locations, without access to their families or lawyers.