Badilisha Poetry X-Change is a platform dedicated to showcasing poetry from Africa and the African Diaspora. The project came out of recognising the lack of documentation of African poets, on the African continent and in the rest of the world. Its aims are to fill this void as well as create a comprehensive global archive of Pan-African poets that can accessed internationally. First launched in 2008 as a poetry festival, the Spier Poetry Exchange.The Africa Centre. by nonprofit organisation Africa Centre in Cape Town, the festival centred on various aspects of developing, celebrating, archiving and documenting poetry and voices.Malika Ndlovu In 2009, the Spier Poetry Exchange changed to the Badilisha Poetry X-Change (taking its name from the kiSwahili expression "Badilisha", which means to change, exchange and transform). Although different in name, Badilisha Poetry X-Change continues the "exchange" between poets, creating spaces and platforms for programmed poetry interventions, workshops and presentations. Its existence continues to provide new and established Pan-African voices a space of celebration, documentation, proliferation, and self-reflection.
