Universität Wien

140264 VO Resistance and Social Engagement in Postcolonial African Literature: Africa in the Global Context (2016S)

Afrika im globalen Kontext

3.00 ECTS (2.00 SWS), SPL 14 - Orientalistik, Afrikanistik, Indologie und Tibetologie

Details

Language: English

Examination dates

Lecturers

Classes (iCal) - next class is marked with N

  • Tuesday 08.03. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 15.03. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 05.04. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 12.04. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 19.04. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 26.04. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 03.05. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 10.05. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 24.05. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 31.05. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 07.06. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 14.06. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 21.06. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03
  • Tuesday 28.06. 15:00 - 17:00 Inst. f. Afrikawissenschaften, Seminarraum 1 UniCampus Hof 5 2M-O1-03

Information

Aims, contents and method of the course

This course is a continuation of VO 140066 Contemporary African Literature: Resistance and Social Engagement, expanding the range of texts related to the topic and the context in which this literature will be analyzed. African literature has always been a literature of resistance, since resistance against colonialism was the impulse of its emergence. This course will explore the development of resistance discourse in African literature in English since the 1960s to present, marking a shift from the previous preoccupation with colonialism and its legacy to an interest in the issues of continued social injustice, economic inequality, and the absence of civil society. Authors explore the impact of corruption, neocolonialism, and globalization on the African economies, societies and the environment; organized crime and its eruption in civil wars; ethnic strife, genocide, and gender violence; the exoticization and commodification of Africa in the West; as well as the continuation of corrupt practices in exile and diaspora. At the same time, contemporary African literature, often written by diasporic, mixed-heritage or cross-continental authors, demonstrates changes in thinking about African identity and the nation, Africa and the world, and the meaning of oppression and victimhood. Rather than focusing just on the political aspect of this literature, this course will study postcolonial African literature by emphasizing the relationship between the politics, aesthetics and socio-historical and material context in order to explore the role of the literary text in the circulation of a global image of Africa. We will examine a variety of genres and narrative trends, including the novel, the short story, the memoir, the Bildungsroman, the detective thriller, as well as cross-genre innovations.
On completion of this course the student will have developed the ability to:
identify, analyse and understand key political, sociological and aesthetic issues in contemporary African Anglophone writing
apply close reading skills to a variety of literary texts and be able to analyze them from a literary-critical perspective
reflect critically on the relations between primary texts and relevant secondary texts

Assessment and permitted materials

Final essay (3,500 words), due Sept. 15, 2016. Correction essays can be submitted by the end of January 2017 (3 attempts at correction are possible). January 31, 2017 is the last date for essay submission.

Minimum requirements and assessment criteria

To complete this course, the student must write the final essay on one of the topics given. There will be at least 20 different topics, each of which concerns 1 or 2 novels, and each student is free to choose any topic. This is an argumentative essay supported with evidence from primary texts and engagement with secondary sources. The essay tests the knowledge of the text and context, close reading skills, inference (deduction), ability to think critically, make connections, and express own opinions. Original observations or arguments are not required to pass but are required if the students wants to earn the highest mark.

Assessment criteria (in the order of importance):
1) The soundness and logic of the argument
2) The ability to identify, analyse and understand the theoretical, historical, and political context of the texts and to make connections
3) The ability to read text closely and interpret both form and content
4) The ability to reflect critically on the relations between primary texts and relevant secondary texts, instead of just citing critics as a source of authority and interpretation
5) Grammar and composition
6) Presentation and style

Examination topics

Reading list

Primary texts:
Chinua Achebe, A Man of the People (1966) (Nigeria)
Buchi Emecheta, Second-Class Citizen (1974), In the Ditch (1972) (Nigeria)
Peter Abrahams, Tell Freedom (1954) (South Africa)
Alex La Guma, A Walk in the Night (1962) (South Africa)
Kabelo Sello Duiker, Thirteen Cents (2000)(South Africa)
Damon Galgut, The Good Doctor (2003) (South Africa)
Yvonne Vera, The Stone Virgins (2002) (Zimbabwe)
Chielo Zona Eze, The Trial of Robert Mugabe (2009) (Zimbabwe)
State of the Nation: Contemp. Zimbabwean Poetry (2009), eds. T. Mushakavanhu and D. Nettleingham
Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Wizard of the Crow (2006) (Kenya)
Nuruddin Farah, Crossbones (2011) (Somalia)
Nii Ayikwei Parkes, Tail of the Blue Bird (2010) (Ghana)
Sefi Atta, “News from Home” (2009) (Nigeria)
Hisham Matar, In the Country of Men (2006) (Lybia)
Shailja Patel, Migritude (2010) (Kenya)
Monica Arac de Nyeko, “Jambula Tree” (2007) (Uganda)
Doreen Baingana, “Tropical Fish” (2005) (Uganda)
Taiye Selasi, “The Sex Lives of African Girls” (2011) (Nigeria-Ghana-USA)

Secondary texts:
Madhu Krishnan, Contemporary African Literature in English: Global Locations, Postcolonial Identifications (2014)
Chielozona Eze, Postcolonial Imagination and Moral Representations in African Literature and Culture (2011)
Simon Gikandi, Reading the African Novel (1987)
Mineke Schipper, African Literature and Literary Theory (1989)
Neil Lazarus, Resistance in Postcolonial African Fiction (1990)
Simon Gikandi, Reading Chinua Achebe (1991)
Simon Gikandi, Ngugi wa Thiong’o (2000)
Katherine Fishburn, Reading Buchi Emecheta: cross-cultural conversations (1995)
Derek Wright, The Novels of Nuruddin Farah (1994)
Susan Andrade, The nation writ small: African fictions and feminisms, 1958-1988 (2011)
Ato Quayson, Strategic Transformations in Nigerian Writing (1997)
Brenda Cooper, Magical Realism in West African Fiction (1998)
Michael Chapman, Southern African Literatures (1996)
David Attwell, The Cambridge History of South African Literature (2000)
Jaspal K. Singh, ed., Trauma, Resistance, Reconstruction in Post-1994 South African Writing (2010)
Robert Muponde, Ranka Primorac, eds., Versions of Zimbabwe: New Approaches to Literature and Culture (2005)
JoAnn McGregor and Ranka Primorac, eds., Zimbabwe’s New Diaspora: Displacement and the Cultural Politics of Survival (2010)
Akin Adesokan, Postcolonial Artists and Global Aesthetics (2011)
Tanure Ojaide, Contemporary African Literature: New Approaches (2012)
Tejumola Olaniyan and Ato Quayson, eds., African Literature: An Anthology of Criticism and Theory (2007)

Association in the course directory

ÜAL 1, ÜAL2, EC-148, MA 844 M07

Last modified: Mo 07.09.2020 15:34