Beyond Empire and Nation

Postnational Arguments in the Fiction of Nuruddin Farah and B. Kojo Laing
Erscheinungsjahr 2004
ISBN: 978-90-420-0970-7
Verlag: Brill | Rodopi

Buch, Englisch, Band 70, 168 Seiten, Format (B × H): 155 mm x 230 mm, Gewicht: 336 g

Reihe: Cross/Cultures

The impact of nationalism on the emergence and development of African literature is now well documented. Globalization or the postnational state it seems to herald, the emblematic phenomenon of our era, has not received much attention. Using a cultural studies approach, Beyond Empire and Nation is a fascinating account of the process of globalization in African Literature.

The book starts with an analysis of nationalist rhetoric and ideology as exemplified by works such as Things Fall Apart. Thereafter, it dedicates a chapter each to B. Kojo Laing's novels and Nuruddin Farah's Trilogy (Maps, Gifts, and Secrets) as articulations of a globalized, postnational reality. At the heart o the book is an analysis of a nuanced and complex experience of global modernity as Africans reassess the constants of nationalist discourse: culture, identity, locality, and territoriality. Ngaboh-Smart does not believe that the postnational phenomenon is necessarily detrimental to the national-state and argues that it may well be capable of generating a new form of individual agency, although he is critical of those writers who ignore the new power dynamic inherent in globalization. Moving beyond the “clash of cultures” paradigm, Ngaboh-Smart's account of the renegotiation of national identity and ideology is a significant contribution to the criticism of African literature and its link to global social processes.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Ngaboh-Smart, Francis

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Sprachwissenschaft Einzelne Sprachen & Sprachfamilien
• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Englische Literatur Postkoloniale Literaturen in Englisch, Englische Literatur außerhalb Europas
• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Literaturen sonstiger Sprachräume Afrikanische Literaturen
• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Vergleichende Literaturwissenschaft

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Acknowledgements
Introduction
1 Nationalism and the Aporia of the National Identity Nuruddin Farah's Maps
2 Gifts, Narratives, Identitities, and the Postcolonial Nuruddin Farah's Gifts
3 Desire and the Limits of the Modern Nation Nuruddin Farah's Secrets
4 Counter-Nationalist Narrative B. Kojo Laing's Search Sweet Country
5 Beyond Empire and Nation: Re-Narrating Identity in B. Kojo Laing's Woman of the Aeroplanes
6 Science and the Space of the Modern African Nation B. Kojo Laing's Major Gentl and the Achimota Wars
Conclusion
Works Cited

Über Autor(innen)

Francis Ngaboh-Smart is a graduate in English and African Literature of Fourah Bay College, University of Sierra Leon, and holds a doctorate in Comparative Literature from the University of Georgia. He taught in both African Literature and African Studies before coming to the English Department of the University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh, where he teaches African and postcolonial literature and composition, and World Literature.