Oguine 1
Contemporary African Literature
Syllabus
by
Dr. Oguine
Spring 2007
Class Meetings: T & TH: 10:00-11:15AM in Room JH 212
Office Hours: T & TH: 9:00-9:45AM
Office: Arts and Sciences Hall Room 214
E-mail: Website: pirate.shu.edu/~oguinepr
Course Objectives:
Contemporary African Literature will help students to develop a greater appreciation of cultural, thematic, and aesthetic representations in African Literature, starting from a quick revision of the classic, but concentrating mostly on the contemporary texts from different countries. Students will also improve their critical thinking skills by engaging in concrete observations, interpreting facts and fiction, evaluating details, and using meaningful connections in comparative and contrasting analysis of the texts. There will be a quick survey of popular critical approaches such as formalist, deconstructionist, archetypal, historical, biographical, psychoanalytical, and feminist criticisms to identify Euro-American influences on Contemporary African Literature. One of the main objectives of this course, therefore, is to equip students who have a flair for literature with skills to enable them make accurate judgments of both style and meaning in three genres of African literature – fiction, drama, and poetry. In addition, this course will guide students in exploring various artistic devices in character development such as shifting points of view, sarcastic humor, irony, and stream of consciousness; and in plot development such as suspense, foreshadowing, symbolism, and extended metaphor – all characteristics of contemporary African literary texts. Finally, this course will also provide students exciting and challenging learning experiences they can easily apply to their own speech and creative writing, even after graduating from the university.
Required Texts:
Fiction – West Africa:
Nigeria – Chinua Achebe :
Anthills of the Savannah (1987) portrays modern, independent, post-colonial, urban
Africa. It presents the general social, political, and personal struggles among
Africans, and shows the continuing British and Western economic and cultural influences.
As an introduction to the course, a brief summary of Achebe’s Things Fall Apart provides, among other features, the historical and cultural basis for studying African literature. In addition to illustrating the traditional collective will to die rather than be subjected to humiliation and dehumanization, it confirms Achebe’s claim that English language can be tamed to accommodate African world view and the nuances of various African languages. Okonkwo, the protagonist’s suicide marks the defeat and colonization of the natives, and the beginning of the struggles for independence in his subsequent novels. Anthills of the Savannah is, therefore, the climax of mismanagement of government affairs by the same African leaders that have replaced the colonial masters, social and economic corruptions among the army officers and the civilian leaders, and a total collapse of the entire system, leaving a woman, Beatrice, to pick up the pieces of all the things that have fallen apart.
Ghana – Yaw O. Agyeman: A Big Elephant Has been Killed (2003) presents stories of ordinary friendships, love affairs, and sexual relationships with the setting in Ghana, and discussions on poverty, underdevelopment, religious identity, social revolution, and Africa’s relationship with the West.
Focus:
Students will focus on cultural and historical changes between Things Fall Apart and Anthills of the Savannah, the gender characterizations in the two texts with the powerful male figure, Okonkwo, in Things Fall Apart, the dynamic female figure, Beatrice, in Anthills of the Savannah, and the transliterations of Igbo expressions and proverbs into English language. Students will be encouraged to discover other elements of fiction, and the differences and similarities between Achebe’s Anthills of the Savannah and Agyeman’s A Big Elephant Has Been Killed in terms of setting, language and theme.
Fiction – East Africa:
Kenya – Koigi wa Wamwere: I Refuse to Die; my Journey for Freedom (2003) is an uncensored account of Kenya’s blood-stained past, and how one man withstood the horrors of colonialism and the corruption of the post independence Kenyan leaders. Following the publication of this autobiography in October, 2002, wa Wamwere won the reelection to the Kenyan Parliament, and returned to his homeland, after previously spending thirteen years in prison.
Focus:
As an introduction, students should focus on a brief commentary on Ngugi’s Devil on the Cross first written in his native language, Gikuyu, and translated into English by the author, who claims that writing in English is a sign of intellectual colonization; but when he sees the limited audience, he translates it into a language that has a wider audience. Students can explore the differences between Achebe’s and Nguigi’s choices of languages. The cultural, social, and political similarities and differences between West and East Africa, represented in their novels, will form interesting and engaging background for the study of wa Wamwere’s autobiography. His strong determination not to stop at exposing the corruption, but to be a part of the government in a position to help clean it up is highly a mark of an African hero. Students can begin to relate these experiences to real life situations in America.
Fiction - Southern African:
Zimbabwe – Yvonne Vera: The Stone Virgins (2002) portrays the sister and the aunt as the women who have the power to give a voice to the next generation, at the background of the reign of terror in Matabeleland.
Focus:
Students should focus on Vera’s symbolism and descriptions which evoke the experience of intense and delicate sensations, and the juxtaposition of balance and natural beauty, violence and peace, suffering and endurance, sadness and joy, real and unreal, and life and death. What type of feminism is Vera advocating in The Stone Virgins?
Short Stories:
West Africa:
Senegal - Mariama Ba: So Long a Letter (1980) translated from French: In letting one woman eloquently tell the anguish of her heartbreak in a Muslim society, Ba suggests that all women have important stories to tell so that their plight should be given a voice.
North Africa:
Egypt – Ashley Markar: Egyptian Poetry and Stories (2003) depicts a Christian woman’s voice in predominantly Arab society in contrast to Ba’s voice, especially in family members’ relationships and the funeral rituals in “Mina’s Funeral” (2001).
Focus:
Students will focus on sharp contrasts and similarities between Ba’s manipulation of gender roles in the context of muslim society as a victim, a religious feminist, by showing sympathy and forgiveness to her adversaries; and Marker’s portrayal of sarcastic humorous, complementary gender roles, and reverence to religion. Both of them have references to American influences in their characterization and in resolving conflicts. Students will be encouraged to explore psychoanalytical traces in Ba’s story that are indicators of her real life problems that must have led to her suicide. They should examine some nuances of French language in Ba’s story, and intrusions of Arabic language in Markar’s stories.
Drama:
South Africa – Fugard et al :“Sizwe Bansi Is Dead” – is a social parody on Ford Motor Company in South Africa about the racial tensions between the “masters” and the “boys.”
Focus:
Students should engage in the controversies over what qualifies as African literature – must it be written by an African, must it deal with African experience, and must the writer speak one or more African languages? South African experience is partly the opposite of American situation and partly similar to it. Let students examine these similarities and differences.
North Africa –
Algeria – Kateb Yacine: “Intelligence Powder” – explores the connections between Algerian traditional plays, hence the use of choruses, and written plays for intellectual analysis. Kateb and Ngugi are advocates of writing for masses and engaging the audience in their own African languages as a sign of patriotism; and a protest against the language and theatrical conventions of the colonial masters.
Poetry – Selected Poems from Different parts of Africa: To be complied and posted
on BB Course Documents .
Focus:
Students will focus on Soyinka as a prolific writer, a playwright, a novelist, and a poet through biographical approach to literary criticism. Because Soyinka and Achebe develop their creative artistry from traditional oral literature of two different Nigerian languages – Yoruba and Igbo – they believe literature must be didactic, and not “Art for art’s sake.” Students should appreciate the sarcastic humor, the intense dramatic and emotional effects, and the realistic portrayal of real life situations in the above plays as warnings to African corrupt and oppressive leaders – the type of leaders in Achebe’s Anthills of the Savannah, wa Wamwere’s I Refuse to Die: My Journey to Freedom, and Vera’s The Stone Virgins.
Focus:
Students will focus on the universality of thematic concerns and poetic techniques in diction and free verse in Soyinka’s “Death in the Dawn,” & “Hamlet” (Nigeria), Ouologuem Yambo’s “When Black Men’s Teeth Speak Out” (Mali), Sipho Sepamla’s “To Whom It May Concern” (South Africa), Leopold Senghor’s “The Black Woman,” & “I Am Alone” (Senegal), Breyton Breytenback’s “The Black City” (South Africa), Bernard Binlin Dadie’s “I Give You Thanks My God” (Ivory Coast), Kofi Awoonor’s “Night of My Blood” (Ghana), and Jeremy Cronin’s “A Person Is a Person Because of Other People” (South Africa). Do the poems portray similar or different issues from those of the plays, novels, and short stories? What defines them as African poems?
Policies: Excused absences are only those documented and excused by either the Athletic Department or the Dean for Community Development, Dawn Williams. Doctor’s notes and so forth are not proof of an excused absence. If you have a significant medical or family problem that you suspect will occasion more than four absences, speak with your mentor and/or someone in Dean Williams’ office (x9076) to obtain assistance and excuses for these classes. I do not have the authority to excuse you. Only these two offices have that power. Not attending peer review days (see below), even if you send a hard copy of your paper in your absence, means not completing part of the paper assignment. In short, attendance on these days carries a double impact on your grade.
Lateness will be acknowledged and factored into your final grade – two times will amount to one absence which will affect your attendance grade. Therefore attendance will be taken within the first five minutes of the start of class. Anyone coming after it will sign a late attendance sheet. I will take lateness as a sign that you are not committed to this course or to the community that this class represents. If you are late on the day a paper either draft or final copy is due, your paper will be counted as late, as well. Your work should be printed out the night before it is due.
Cellphones must be turned off prior to the start of class. Each time your phone goes off in class will negatively affect your Attendance and Participation grade.
Attendance with Participation is also crucial to course success. FOUR unexcused absences may result in failure according to English Department’s policy. Participation means contributing to discussion, whether on the electronic discussion boards, in class, or in small groups during class. The essence of participation is preparedness and courage. Do the work due on the date and offer us your ideas, and you will go far in your evolution as a critical reader, writer, and thinker. Not to participate is to miss a substantial aspect of this course, to forgo a significant opportunity to improve your skills at the same time that your classmates are seizing that opportunity. You are not alone in having questions, opposing viewpoints, observations, or objections raised by the reading and by discussion, so we want to share your views.
Safe Space: Our classroom is a safe space, which means that everyone is obliged to listen and respond respectfully to everyone in the class. You do not have to agree with everything you hear, but we are all expected to direct disagreement as well as agreement to the ideas and not the person addressing them. That applies to comments written on papers as well as spoken in class.
Blackboard: We will be using our blackboard site extensively throughout the semester. Course syllabus, all course assignments, sample essays, and sample power point presentations will be listed under Assignments. We will be using the Discussion Boards for discussions both in and out of class; and presentation in electronic discussion counts towards your Attendance with Participation grade. Writing assignments will also emphasize sound principles of English. To this end, students will be taught how to use the steps of the writing process—prewriting, thesis-based outlining, drafting, peer-reviewing and revising – to develop their ideas. To prepare students for college-level interpretation and literary criticism, they are required to use their reading texts as the basis for their literature assignments.
All written assignments are to be composed on the computer using 12-pt. font, justified on the left using standard margins (at top, bottom, and left and right sides), and double-spaced. Your name, my name, the course number, the type of paper, and the date that it is due should appear double-spaced in the upper left-hand corner of the first page. All assignments must have a title of your own creation based on the operative words in each essay question, and MLA pagination with your last name and the page number at the top of the right-hand corner of each page. I will not accept any multiple-page assignment that is not stapled. Mechanical errors weaken the effectiveness of your argument and therefore lower your grade, so proofread carefully. I will not accept electronic forms of your written work unless it is a BB Discussion Board, or a Digital Drop Box assignment. Hard copy only, so I can write enough comments to enable you improve on your rewrites.
Late Assignments and Presentations: Late assignments will be penalized by one grade. A late paper can therefore drop from a B to a C. Papers that are not handed in because of an excused absence (see Attendance with Participation) may be handed in at the start of the next calendar day without penalty. If you are going to be absent, excused or otherwise, you can still get credit for the work due by sending it through a classmate to the class for which it is due.
Plagiarism: English Department Plagiarism Policy document will be distributed and explained to students on the first day of class.