1st Edition
Autobiography, Memory and Nationhood in Anglophone Africa
This book provides an important critical analysis of the autobiographies of nine major leaders of national liberation movements in Africa. By examining their self-narratives, we can better understand how decolonisation unfolded and how activist-politicians sought to immortalise their roles for posterity.
Focusing on the autobiographies of Peter Abrahams, Albert Luthuli, Ruth First and Nelson Mandela (South Africa), Nnamdi Azikiwe (Nigeria), Kenneth Kaunda (Zambia), George Mwase (Malawi), Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana), Maurice Nyagumbo (Zimbabwe), and Oginga Odinga (Kenya), the book uncovers the social and cultural forces which galvanized the anti-colonial resistance movement in African societies. In particular, the book explores the disdain for foreign domination, economic exploitation and cultural imperialism. It delves into themes of African cultural sovereignty before the colonial encounter, the disruptive presence of colonialism, the nationalist ferment against European imperial domination, the achievement of political autonomy by African nation-states and the corpus of contradictions which attended postcolonial becoming.
With important insights on how these key historical figures navigated the process of self-determining nationhood in Africa, this book will be of interest to researchers of African literature, history, and politics.
1. Introduction: Autobiographies, Colonisation and Decolonisation, 2. Autobiography, Self-making and National Be-Coming: From Theory to Practice, 3. Imagining a Continental Statehood: The Autobiographies of Kwame Nkrumah and Nnamdi Azikiwe, 4. Narrating Violence and Non-Violence as Roadmaps to Nationhood: Not Yet Uhuru (NYU), Strike A Blow and Die (SBD) and Zambia Shall Be Free (ZSBF), 5. Narrating Apartheid State Violence: The Autobiographies of Albert Luthuli and Nelson Mandela, 6. ‘"The Negro is not Free"’: Visualising a Humane Nationhood in Abrahams’ Tell Freedom and Maurice Nyagumbo’s With the People, 7. Life Narratives, the Female Voice and the National Liberation Experience: Ruth First’s 117 Days: An Account of Confinement and Interrogation Under the South African 90-Days Detention Law, 8. Conclusions: Autobiographies, Memories and the Making of Nationhood
Biography
David Ekanem Udoinwang is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of English, Akwa Ibom State University, Nigeria where he teaches Black and African autobiography, digital and eco-critical literatures. In 2017, he was AHP/ACLS Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Centre for African Studies, University of Cape Town, South Africa.
James Tar Tsaaior is a Professor of English, Media and Cultural Studies and a Senior Associate Research Fellow in the Department of English of The University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa. Until recently, he was Alexander von Humboldt Experienced Research Fellow and Visiting Professor in the Centre for Anglophone and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Germany.
"Autobiography, Memory, and Nationhood in Anglophone Africa is a generous gift of committed research and dedicated scholarship. The academic community and commonwealth of letters have a treasure trough in this tour de force. With remarkable skill and salutary, clear vision, the co-authors have assembled in one volume the self-testimonies of a galaxy of nationalist figures whose pioneering leadership and patriotic fervour galvanised the anti-colonial movement and resistance project in their respective national communities against imperial domination for the achievement of national liberation. The result is a seminal contribution to the genre of autobiographical writing and criticism in Africa and beyond."
David Iyornôngu Ker, Professor of English and former Vice-Chancellor, Benue State University, Makurdi, Nigeria and Veritas University, Abuja, Nigeria and author, The African Novel and the Modernist Tradition
"This book is a significant achievement in Colonial and Post-Colonial research and scholarship on African Nationalist Autobiographies. It is lucid, profound, and eloquent. Udoinwang and Tsaaior have in this seminal book an important scholarly accomplishment that is groundbreaking, subversive, and counter-hegemonic. Scholars and practitioners alike will appreciate their superb depth of analysis where historical fact and literary fiction inhere and interpenetrate."
Iyorwuese Harry Hagher, Professor of Theatre and Drama, President African Leadership Institute, USA and former Senator, Federal Minister and Nigeria’s High Commissioner to Canada/Ambassador to Mexico
"Autobiography, Memory, and Nationhood in Anglophone Africa brings history, politics, and literature together in a comprehensive study that draws in the reader to re-live the fervour, temperament, and hopes of eminent African leaders’ respective nationalist struggles. David Ekanem Udoinwang and James Tar Tsaaior define, theorize, and contextualize African nationalist autobiography to highlight the immense contributions of this interdisciplinary genre to African and postcolonial studies. The writing captures the nationalist struggle in a compelling and inspiring manner. All interested in Africa’s postcolonial history, politics, and literature must read this excellent work of scholarship."
Tanure Ojaide, NNOM, FNAL, Frank Porter Graham Professor of Africana Studies, The University of North Carolina, Charlotte
"This book provides invaluable and refreshing conceptual, theoretical and pedagogical insights into scholarship negotiating auto-writing, memory and the fabrication of nationhood in Africa during the epochal moment of the nationalist ferment against British imperialism. It is a compelling critical resource for biographical writers, critics, scholars, and researchers interested in this field of African studies."
Harry Garuba, Professor of African Studies and English, Centre for African Studies, University of Cape Town, South Africa and author, Animist Chants and Memorials
"…this book intentionally sets parameters for assessing both the Autobiographical genre and the critical attention it has provoked…in a deliberate effort to re-read auto-narratives with particular revisionist intent. It contains its multi-disciplinary leanings in a trompe l’oeil that will dazzle both serious scholars and pedestrian readers alike. Its sophistication lies in its simplicity. A book apt for our times!"
Kgomotso Michael Masemola, Professor of English and Executive Dean, College of Human Sciences, University of South Africa, Pretoria and author, Black South African Autobiography After Deleuze: Belonging and Becoming in Self-Testimony.
"This gem of a book provides a well-researched and eloquent investigation into the hitherto neglected field of Anglophone African autobiographies of national liberation. One of the many strengths of the in-depth analyses of the well-chosen examples of this genre lies in the exploration of their usefulness not only for understanding how past anti-colonial struggles played out but also in delineating the different ways in which nationhood was constructed. This excavation of the different decolonisation strategies aimed at overcoming colonialism and racism surely has repercussions today by providing a valuable tool to understand how national becoming is memorised as well as advanced."
Anke Bartels, Associate Professor of English and Coordinator DFG Research Training Group "Minor Cosmopolitanisms", University of Potsdam, Germany
