Comparative Literature 205 - TWENTIETH CENT LIT OF AFRICA

A study of the major writers of contemporary Africa. Focuses on several key questions: Is the term African literature a useful category? How do African writers challenge Western representations of Africa as they confront over a century of European colonialism on the continent? How do they represent the postcolonial experience on the continent? Is there a correlation in their writing between life and expression and between oral cultures and written literature? Texts will include Achebe's Things Fall Apart, Ngugi wa Thiong'o's The River Between, Tsitsi Dangarembga's Nervous Conditions, Mariama Ba's, So Long a Letter, Ndebele Njabulo's The Cry of Winnie Mandela, Ama Ata Aidoo's Our Sister Killjoy, Wole Soyinka's Death and the King's Horseman. We will also watch films such as Red Rubber, White King, Black Death, Totsi, and Kenya: Whiteman's Country.