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Date
July 10, 2026

10 books every Kenyan should read to understand memory, resistance and democracy

The problem is not that young people have forgotten. It is that too few of us have been taught what came before. History and Government is treated as an elective in our schools, even though understanding a nation's past is as essential to citizenship as reading or writing. A society that leaves its history to choice should not be surprised when collective memory begins to fade.

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Featured
Date:
July 8, 2026
By
Ted Malanda

But the Creator instinctively knew that would be a waste of time. As time would demonstrate, corporal punishment, or the rod if you may – and counselling – are ineffectual when certain children mysteriously develop a trouble-causing worm in their brains. They will swallow intoxicants, stick syringes into the veins, bum, fight and drop out of school, wander into crime and seek death, sex and its diseases with a vengeance. You will cry, curse, whip them, call the police, take them to the witchdoctor, and it will do you and them no good.

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Featured
Date:
June 26, 2026
By
Tracy Ochieng

"The Art Deco Buildings of Nairobi" is the latest work by South African writer Barbara Adair. More than a study of architecture, the book documents the memories and histories of Nairobi's African Asian communities, particularly Indian Kenyan families who transformed Art Deco designs into spaces that reflected their own traditions, aspirations and ways of life.

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Featured
Date:
June 22, 2026
By
Tracy Ochieng

Anthropologists and historians have long distinguished between polygyny—the practice of one man having multiple wives—and infidelity or promiscuity. Across many African societies, polygyny operated within communal structures. Wives generally knew one another. Senior wives held authority. Children belonged not only to parents but to extended families. Marriage itself was understood as a union between lineages rather than merely two individuals.

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Featured
Date:
June 12, 2026
By
Tracy Ochieng

Theatre is like juggling multiple balls at once. You’re in character, but you’re also aware of the audience, your scene partners, and the technical aspects of the show. Occasionally, there’s a moment—maybe fifteen minutes in a two-hour performance—when everything aligns, and you’re fully inside the character. Those moments are magical.

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Featured
Date:
May 28, 2026
By
Kari Mutu

Shiko’s passion for books began in childhood. As a child, she would sometimes fake being unwell at school just so she could sit in the secretary’s office and read the books kept there.

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Featured
Date:
May 21, 2026
By
Edith Temba

Panellists shared how social media has made us have “brain rot”. It has shaped our perceptions and ideologies and made us rely on small talk and conversations that don’t build but rather take away our knowledge.

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