African Identity In Literature

1
African Identity In Literature

• Resource Portfolio
• By
• Melissa Kandido

2
Books on African Identity

• Moetsabi, T. (1992) Fruits and other Poems.
  Harare Zimbabwe Publishing House
• A collection of seventy-two poems in eighty-six
  pages, broken into four sections Fruits, Solemn
  Psalms, Crossroads and Faces of Home. This book
  brings a better understanding to someone learning
  about political struggle in an African country
  that fought for independence from a colonization.
  He speaks of Cecil Rhodes, townships, what it is
  like to face death and revolution.

3
Books on African Identity

• Staunton, I.(Ed.). (1990). Mothers of the
  Revolution. Harare Baobob Publishing
• This is a collection of first-hand stories from
  thirty Zimbabwean women from different parts of
  the country and their role in the liberation
  struggle. Because Zimbabwe gained independence in
  1980 and this book was published only ten years
  later, the stories were considered a fresh
  perspectivefrom the inside of the villages and
  from the women who held together the country.
  There are small black and white pictures of each
  woman at the beginning of the chapter and a map
  to show from which part of the country they
  experienced the war.

4
Books on African Identity

• Kassindja, F. and Bashir, L. M. (1998). Do They
  Hear You When You Cry. New York Dell Publishing.
• A moving memoir about a girl fleeing from Togo
  before she was to be circumcised. She fled to
  Germany and then to the United States. When
  arriving in the U.S., she was taken to prison as
  her immigration documents were not in order. This
  book tests her faith, and the readers beliefs in
  what is right, fair, logical and just. It is
  eye-opening and astonishing that such a story
  would happen in the land of the free and home of
  the brave. Her time in prison feels like a
  lifetime as you read her experiences in jail.

5
Books on African Identity

• Marechera, D. (1990) The Black Insider. Harare
  Baobob Books.
• Dambudzo died in 1987 and this book is edited by
  his biographer, Flora Veit-Wild reads like a
  stream of consciousness from a man who has been
  deeply affected by the racism in Zimbabwe as well
  as the racism abroad. There are poems
  interspersed throughout the book and he breathes
  his exorcism of feelings into his words. His
  physical exile is exasperated by a sense of
  personal exile. Powerful and disturbing.

6
Books on African Identity

• Mezlekia, N. (2002). The God Who Begat a Jackal.
  New York Picador.
• A rich story based in historical truths about
  Ethiopia. Feudal masters with ambitious imperial
  power running their fiefs like small kingdoms,
  equipped with slaves. Underage marriage, and
  marriage by abduction are clear indications of
  the treatment of women in the timeframe of the
  bookaround 1750-1850. There are descriptions of
  deep religious beliefs. As one reads this novel,
  the reader must remind her or himself that it is
  fiction and not a biography or non-fiction. It is
  written in a way that allows the reader to
  believe the story is fact.

7
Books on African Identity

• Farah, N. (1996). Maps. London Penguin Books.
• This book is the first in the Blood in the Sun
  Trilogy by Farah. The story is about identity.
  Askar is an orphan because his mother died in
  childbirth and his father died in war. He is
  raised by a woman who is later questioned for her
  loyalty to her country and to her tribe. This
  affects Askar as he is politically-driven as a
  young man and therefore torn to understand
  himself as loyal to a cause. It is also a
  metaphor for the many children born into war,
  orphaned by war as well as the countries torn
  apart by war, held together by blood of family
  and the blood of culture and continent.

8
Books on African Identity

• Okri, B. (1992). The Famished Road. London
  Vintage Books.
• Rich, poetic writing so dense with imagery, the
  reader must read each paragraph and sentence
  twiceonce for the pure beauty in use of language
  and once for the meaning and the story itself.
  The story of Azaro who is a spirit child born
  into the earthly world repeatedly, never wanting
  to stay, always wanting to go back to his spirit
  friends, finally decides to stay with a family.
  The long novel is his story with the living world
  with his family and village.

9
Books on African Identity

• Pierce, J. R. (1999). Speak Rwanda. New York
  Picador Press.
• Each chapter told by one of the ten survivors of
  the Rwanda genocide. Stories from both Hutu and
  Tutsi, from soldiers and civilians, from mothers
  and children. Their stories intertwine chapter by
  chapter. A challenging book because the
  experiences seems to be too horrendous to be
  real. Most interesting is reading perspectives
  back-to-back rather than from one angle of the
  war.

10
Books on African Identity

• Dangaremba, T. (1988). Nervous Conditions. New
  York Seal Press.
• This book takes a critical look at a young girls
  life in a culture and time when women were
  confined by the patriarchal old Shona ways. Tambu
  also has difficulty in accepting the white
  Rhodesians colonization of her country. One
  nervous condition is that of a Zimbabwean living
  with white colonizers the other nervous
  condition is a young woman suffocating when
  trying to breathe in patriarchys toxins.
  Tambudzai continues to unravel throughout the
  novel.

11
Books on African Identity

• Andreas, N. (2001). The Purple Violet of
  Oshaantu. London Heinemann
• Sprinkled with small pieces of Oshiwambo (one of
  the seven languages from Namibia), Meme Alis
  story is one of a rural Namibian woman married
  and abused by her husband. She also experiences
  the small town mentality of the village life
  whereby rumors fly when her husband dies. Her
  friend tries to help her navigate the rumors and
  maintain her sense of self amongst the
  bombardment against women. In many ways, women
  stand by each other in this book. In the same
  breath, women are as detrimental to their gender
  as men can be.

12
Movies that Examine African Identity

• Hotel RwandaBased on the genocide in Rwanda
• Power of Onebased on book by Bryce Courtenay of
  Peekay, a British boy growing up in Apartheid
  South Africa
• Yesterdaythe story of Yesterday, a woman living
  with HIV
• Blood Diamonda story about the lives lost due to
  war and diamond dealing in Sierra Leone (but is a
  story happening in many parts of Africa)
• Catch a FireStory about South African Apartheid

13
Movies that Examine African Identity

• Cry FreedomA film about Steve Biko, based on a
  true story
• SarafinaA musical revolving around the times
  before Mandela was freed in South Africa
• Totsi-A South African modern story about the life
  of a thief.
• The Wooden CameraTwo fourteen-year-old South
  African boys find a gun and a camera. The movie
  focuses on the artistic endeavors of the new
  young camera man.

14
Educational Websites