Taking Liberties was funded by the Leverhulme Trust and is a practice-based research project led by writer and academic Professor Graham Mort from Lancaster University, UK. He was based at the University of the Western Cape, South Africa, from February to May 2018.

The project engaged staff and students and was an exploration of the concept of individual and political liberty through original writing in new configurations, both individual and collaborative. This new writing was enacted through the prevailing multilinguism of a country where there are eleven official languages. Its productions in English, Xhosa and Afrikaans are richly polyphonic – varied, contradictory, even perplexing, but always stimulating, always pointing to the complexity of interlocking human realities.

The site features a writers’ gallery, featuring participants from the project; a gallery of photographic images capturing our activities and others on the UWC campus; the text and recording of a performance poem built by workshop members; special contributions from Kobus Moolman, Julia Martin and Antjie Krog that enrich our understanding of the context for the project.

We hope that you will enjoy exploring the site.