The prominent South African sociologist, poet, writer, dramatist, and civic activist was born in Cyprus and earned his PhD in sociology and political philosophy on the emergence of trade unions and social movements among black urban and migrant workers (1960s-1980s) under the supervision of Eddie and the late David Webster from the University of the Witwatersrand. He is considered a significant “southern theorist” and works actively with African, Latin American and Asian networks to establish, in his own words, ‘a new knowledge commons which is sensitive to all nodal points of this shrinking planet.’Sitas has been a recipient of many honours for his interdisciplinary work blending sociology with arts and cultural studies, including the Order of Mapungubwe in Silver and a Lifetime Achievement Award for Creative Work from the Durban International Book Fair. Although he retired from the University of Cape Town’s Sociology Department and from his titular Gutenberg Chair at the University of Strasbourg in 2023, he remains an Emeritus Professor at the University of Cape Town and an Extraordinary Honorary Professor at the Africa Open Institute at the University of Stellenbosch. He has held numerous leadership roles, including Acting Director of the Institute of African Alternatives in Cape Town, Chairperson of the South African BRICS Think Tank, and South African representative on the BRICS Think Tanks Council.As a creative figure, he is known for his poetry, drama, and activism, particularly in the anti-apartheid struggles during the 1980s. He was one of the founders of the Congress of South African Writers (COSAW), COSATU’s Culture and Working Life Unit and the Natal Culture Congress. He was the key creator and author of the Charter for Humanities and Social Sciences and the subsequent National Institute for Humanities and Social Sciences (NIHSS).He recently launched his genre-busting ‘plurimedial’ book, Passageworks, at a lecture series titled Sonic Defiance, which continued the search for a way into music through words. He co-authored Maps of Sorrow – Migration and Music in the Construction of Pre-colonial AfroAsia with Sumangala Damodaran. The book is a journey across the polycentric world involving systems, processes and interactions that were interconnected through long-distance trade, slavery and migration. Sitas was the principal author of Scripting Defiance – Four Sociological Vignettes, the second volume of Gauging and Engaging Deviance, which was positioned between the ideas of deviance and defiance.Other creative works include:s 2024: University of Cape Town, Institute for Creative Arts, Writers Series, poetry with the Insurrections Ensemble (with Tina Schouw, Reza Khota, Kathyayni Dash and Lungiswa Plaatjies)s 2023: Beauty can be a Riot and a Dream: About Words and Sound, Not Just any Words, Not Just any Sound. With Reza Khota (Guitar) and Atiyyah Khan (soundscapes), Red Wheelbarrow Poetry Collective, Album Pending Release, June 2024.s 2023: Story of a Strike, Director of Performance, Durban University of Technology, Recording Mixed by Andries Bezuidenhout.s 2023: Music Notebook, Cape Town: Chimurenga.s 2022: A Musical Dialogue Between South African and Indian Musicians and Poets, Performance Director with Sumangala Damodaran, International Theatre Festival of Kerala, ITFOKs 2021: Cold is the Ground, with George & Debbie Mari on piano, Herri, no 7.s 2021: Giraffe Humming, Performance Director & Librettist, AfroAsia Ensemble. Premiere Cape Town, re-performed, Kochi Biennale, Kerala, February 2022; Album: Insurrectionsensemble.coms 2020: Sea-Drift of Songs, Performance Director & Librettist, AfroAsia Ensemble, Premiere Cape Town; Album: insurrectionsensemble.com; AppleMusic; Spotify.s 2020: Notes for An Oratorio on Small Things that Fall, Delhi & New York: Tulika & Columbia University Press. (POETRY AND PROSE)o Adapted for the Stage and directed by Anuradha Kapur & Deepan Sivaramanan as Dark Things, Premiere, Ambedkar University, 2019; Thrissur International Theatre Festival, 2019.Poetry and almost poetry books:s 1989: Tropical Scars (Johannesburg: Congress of South African Writers)s 1992: Songs, Shoeshine and Piano in Essential Things, edited by Andries W. Oliphant (Johannesburg: Congress of South African Writers)s 2000: Slave Trades (Grahamstown: Deep South)s 2004: The RDP Poems (Durban: Madiba Press)s 2008: The Book of Accounting (Unpublished)s 2012: Insurrections (CD + booklet, Centre for Humanities Research, University of the Western Cape)s 2014: Around the World in Eighty Days – The India Section (Pretoria: University of South Africa Press)s 2014: Rough Music; Selected Poems 1989 -2013 (Grahamstown: Deep South)s 2018: Vespa Diaries (Cape Town: SAHO Publications)s 2020: Notes for an Oratorio on Small Things That Fall (like a Screw in the Night) (India: Tulika Books)s 2022: Mapping Gondwana with Subhro Bandopadhyay (Mumbai: Poetrywallah/ Paperwall Publishers)Theatre WorkWith Junction Avenue Theatre Company (The Collected Plays At the Junction were published by the Witwatersrand University Press in 1995)s 1976: Fantastical History of a Useless Man (Published in 1978 by Ravan Press, Johannesburg)s 1978: Randlords and Rotgut (Published by Cape Town: David Philip, 1980-Olive Schreiner Award.)s 1979: Will of a Rebel (1979) (Directed by William Kentridge, Nunnery Theatre)s 1981: Dikhitsheneng (Directed by William Kentridge, Toured Community Venues and Market Theatre)1981: Howl At the Moon (Film directed by Hugo Cassirer, Red Ribbon Award, New York, International Video Festival)1982: Marabi (Directed by Malcolm Purkey, Workshops for the creation of the play directed by Ari Sitas, Market Theatre. Culture and Resistance Festival, Gaborone)Worker and Community Plays (Direction, Co-direction, Script Development Workshops)1980: Ilanga Lizophumela Abasebenzi (Vosloorus Hostels, East Rand)1982: Dunlop Play1984: Why Lord? Durban Workers’ Cultural Local1985: The Long March, Sarmcol Workers’ Culture Co-operative1988: Bambatha’s Children, Sarmcol Workers’ Culture Co-operative1993: Mbube, Sarmcol Workers’ Culture Co-operative1995: RDP Play, Culture and Working Life Project2005: Wonderwoman vs. the World Bank for the Southern Trade Union Initiative (SIGTUR)- unperformed but published in F. Kahn and R Pattman (eds) Undressing Durban, Durban: Madiba Press.Solo Workss 1991: Charred Loving (Directed by Junaid Ahmed and Linda Price, Grahamstown Festival)s 2018: Dark Things (Directed by Anuradha Kapur and Deepan Sivaraman, Delhi, Ambedkar University and 2019, Kerala International Theatre Festival)Editor: Poetry bookss 1986: Black Mamba Rising, Culture and Working Life Publicationss 2016: Mafika Gwala – Collected Poems, edited by Mandla Langa and Ari Sitas, Cape Town: SAHO Publications.s 2016: Alfred Temba Qabula – Collected Poems, edited by Ari Sitas, Cape Town: SAHO PublicationsNovellas and Long Storiess 1991: William Zungu – A Xmas Story, Cape Town: Buchu Bookss 1993: Etopia- A Week in the Life of a Worker in 2025, Durban: Madiba Press,s 2018: Dr K- A poem, Delhi: India Cultural Forum, 2018s 2018: Listening to the Sea – Cadences, Journal for Literature and the Arts in Cypruss Cold was the Ground – Herri: Issue 5 (with George and Debbie Mari on piano)Music and Librettifor Jurgen Brauningers (1992) dUrban Noise and Scraps (Durban Music School, University of Natal)s (1994) Dead Fish and Dreams of Love Again, Opera to be performed by the Howard College School of Music and the KZN Philharmonic Orchestra.for Insurrections and AfroAsia Ensembless (2012) Insurrections, Fugard Theatre (Spotify or Insurrectionsensemble.com)s (2014) The Gathering, District Six, Homecoming Centres (2015) The Storming, District Six, Homecoming Centres (2018) Threads of Sorrow, Centre for the Less Good Idea, Johannesburg, Kerala: Cochi Biennalea and Goa Serendipity Festivals (2019) Transgressions, Cape Arts, Cape Towns (2020) Sea-drift of Songs, Roedebloem Studioss (2021) Giraffe Humming, Roedebloem Studios and Kerala, Kerala: Cochi Biennale, Kerala: International Theatre Festival, Greatmore Centres (2021) Gabriel’s Odyssey, Roedebloem Studioss (2021) Of Wounds and Hands, PanAfrican Space Stations (2023) The Story of a Strike, Durban University of Technologys (2024) Must Gandhi Fall? Durban, Cape Town, JohannesburgAcademic Bookss Co-Editor (with Faisal Garba) (forthcoming) Reading Africa in the World and the World in Africa, London: Routledge, African Humanities Association Reflections Seriess Editor and Principal Author (2024) Bandungs of the Mind-BRICS and the Reconfiguration of the World’s Knowledge System, Pretoria: HSRC Presss Co-Author (with Sumangala Damodaran) (2023) Maps of Sorrow, Delhi and New York: Tulika and Columbia University Presss Principal Author (2021) Scripts of Defiance, Delhi: Tulika and New York: Columbia University Presss Author (2016) The Flight of the Gwala-Gwala Bird, Cape Town: South Africa History Online Publicationss Principal Author (2013), Gauging and Engaging Deviance, 1600-2000s, Delhi: Tulika Academic Press; Columbia University Presss Principal Author (2011), The Charter for the Future of the Humanities and the Social Sciences, Pretoria: The Department of Higher Educations Author: (2010, 2012) The Mandela Decade 1990-2000, Unisa Press, Pretoria/Brill Academic Publisherss Author (2008) The Ethic of Reconciliation Madiba Press, Durban/New Delhi; translated and republished in Turkey (2015) Barisma Etigi, Istanbul: Bayaz Baykuz Publishers. Editor and author (2008- Reissue), Managing Change in KwaZulu-Natal’s Industries, Pretoria: HSRC, 1995, now Critical Studies Series, University of KwaZulu-Natals Author: (2004) Theoretical Parables: Voices that Reason, Unisa Press and Brill Academic Publishers: Pretoria and Leidens Co-Author, William Kentridge (2001), Chicago Museum of the Arts: Harvey N. Abrams
