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Meditations on African Literature
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Dubem Okafor
ISBN: 0-313-29866-1
ISBN-13: 978-0-313-29866-0
208 pages
Praeger Publishers
Publication: 2/28/2001
List Price: $110.95 (UK Sterling Price: £76.95)
Availability: In Stock
Media Type: Hardcover
Trim Size: 6 1/8 x 9 1/4
Subjects:
Description: While African literature is presently enjoying much attention from the scholarly community, its heritage and identity are becoming less clearly defined. While Africa has a rich oral tradition, African writers find themselves writing in the languages of their colonial oppressors. So too, many of the best African writers now live outside Africa, particularly in North America. Much of the criticism of African literature is written by American professors, African writers sometimes teach their literature at American universities, and American publishers issue African literary works. At the same time, the political climate of many African countries has been detrimental to literacy and writing. This book explores many of the issues currently facing African literature.

Each chapter is written by an expert contributor, to provide the volume with a broad coverage of numerous topics related to the present state of African literature. The opening chapters examine issues of language and postcoloniality in African literary works. Later chapters discuss such concerns as the formation of an African literary canon, representations of history and ideology in African writing, the role of women in African literature, and African ritual theater. Through its various chapters, the volume makes clear that African writers continue to engage pressing social and political issues, and that they are intellectuals rather than entertainers.
Table of Contents:
  • Preface by Femi Osofisan & Dubem Okafor
    The Cacophonous Terrain of Nigerian/African Literature by Dubem Okafor
    Language, Theory, and Modern African Literature: Some More Questions by Wole Ogundele
    On the Concept "Commonwealth" Literature by Isidore Okpewho
    Who Counts? De-Ciphering the Canon by Bernth Lindfors
    Five Nigerian Novel by Romanus Egudu
    Things Fall Apart: Problems in Constructing an Alternative Ethnography by Charlie Sugnet
    Historicity and the Un-Eve-ing of the African Woman: Achebe's Novels by Chimalum Nwankwo
    Over-Determined Contradictions: History & Ideology in a A Man of the People by Dubem Okafor
    The True Fantasies of Grace Ogot, Storyteller by Peter Nazareth
    The Anglo-African, the "Woman Question," and Imperial Discourse by Michael J.C. Echeruo
    Impersonation in Some African Ritual Theater by Sam Ukala
    Exile and Home: Africa in Caribbean Theater by Osita Okagbue
    One Year in the First Instance by Biodun Jeyifo
    Select Bibliography
    Index
About the Author: DUBEM OKAFOR teaches world literature and African and postcolonial literatures at Kutztown University of Pennsylvania./e
LCC Class: 820
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