Infrastructures of utopia: ruination and regeneration of the African future

Abstract

AbstractRuination has recently received much attention as a defining aspect of the materiality of modernity. Less attention is given to the processes of regeneration that occur within sites of ruination. In this article, we examine how processes of ruination and regeneration are folded into each other, by looking at the materiality of a single site, a small village in the vicinity of Dakar, Senegal. By building the University of the African Future at Sébikotane, the Senegalese president has sought to rekindle the spirit of excellence that inspired education at the École normale William Ponty in a Pan-African spirit. As part of a larger plan for urban expansion, the site of Sébikotane has inspired hope for development. Examining how the different temporalities of utopian modernism and Afro-nostalgia intersect in the ruined site, this article reflects on the ruination of African futures on a site of ever renascent utopian infrastructures.