African Women Writing Resistance: An Anthology of Contemporary Voices

by Jennifer Browdy de Hernandez (Editor), Pauline Dongala (Editor), Omotayo Jolaosho (Editor), Anne Serafin (Editor)

Overview

African Women Writing Resistance is the first transnational anthology to focus on women’s strategies of resistance to the challenges they face in Africa today.  The anthology brings together personal narratives, testimony, interviews, short stories, poetry, performance scripts, folktales, and lyrics. Thematically organized, it presents women’s writing on such issues as intertribal and interethnic conflicts, the degradation of the environment, polygamy, domestic abuse, the controversial traditional practice of female genital cutting, Sharia law, intergenerational tensions, and emigration and exile.
    Contributors include internationally recognized authors and activists such as Wangari Maathai and Nawal El Saadawi, as well as a host of vibrant new voices from all over the African continent and from the African diaspora. Interdisciplinary in scope, this collection provides an excellent introduction to contemporary African women’s literature and highlights social issues that are particular to Africa but are also of worldwide concern.  It is an essential reference for students of African studies, world literature, anthropology, cultural studies, postcolonial studies, and women’s studies.     A Choice Outstanding Academic Book

Outstanding Book, selected by the Public Library Association

Best Books for High Schools, Best Books for Special Interests, and Best Books for Professional Use, selected by the American Association of School Libraries

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780299236632
Publisher:	University of Wisconsin Press
Publication date:	08/19/2010
Series:	Women in Africa and the Diaspora
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	337
File size:	539 KB

About the Author

Jennifer Browdy de Hernandez is professor of comparative literature and gender studies at Bard College at Simon’s Rock. Pauline Dongala fled Congo-Brazzaville in 2000 and is working on a book about the importance of traditional African healing practices in the contemporary world. Omotayo Jolaosho, a doctoral candidate in the Department of Anthropology at Rutgers University, works on issues of performance, creativity, and community activism in South Africa. Anne Serafin is an independent scholar specializing in African literatures.

Table of Contents

Foreword
    Abena P.A. Busia       
Preface       
Acknowledgments   
African Women Writing Resistance: An Introduction
    Jennifer Browdy de Hernandez with Pauline Dongala, Omotayo Jolaosho, and Anne Serafin       

Part One. Engaging with Tradition
The Day When God Changed His Mind
    Eve Zvichanzi Nyemba (Zimbabwe)       
The Old Woman
    J. Tsitsi Mutiti (Zimbabwe)       
Interview with Kaya a Mbaya, a Babongo Woman
    Pierre Piya-Bouanga (Congo)       
Interview with Elisabeth Bouanga
    Pauline Dongala (Congo)       

Part Two. Speaking Out: Young Women on Sexuality
Woman Weep No More
    Sibongile Mtungwa (South Africa)       
Letters to My Cousin
    Catherine Makoni (Zimbabwe)       
Story of Faith
    Mamle Kabu (Ghana)       
ReMembering Africa
    Zindzi Bedu (Nigeria)           
It's Not Rape If . . .
    Ann Kithaka (Kenya)       
To Be or Not to Be a Lesbian: The Dilemma of Cameroon's Women Soccer Players
    Sybille Ngo Nyeck (Cameroon)       
My Name Is Kasha
    Kasha N. Jacqueline (Uganda)       
Cosmo Africa and Other Poems
    Cheshe Dow (Botswana)       

Part Three. Challenging the Institution of Marriage
Child
    Ann Kithaka (Kenya)       
Hailstones on Zamfara
    Sefi Atta (Nigeria)       
The Good Woman
    Patricia Chogugudza (Zimbabwe)       
Ngomwa
    Ellen Mulenga Banda-Aaku (Zambia)       
They Came in the Morning
    Iheoma Obibi (Nigeria)       
The Battle of Words: Oratory as Women's Tool of Resistance to the Challenges of Polygamy in Contemporary Wolof Society
    Marame Gueye (Senegal)       

Part Four. Focusing on Survival: Women's Health Issues
Tell Me Why: Two Poems
    Ann Kithaka (Kenya)       
Surviving Me
    Janine Lewis (South Africa)       
The Struggle to End the Practice of Female Genital Mutilation
    Nawal El Saadawi (Egypt)       
Slow Poison
    Juliana Makuchi Nfah-Abbenyi (Cameroon)       
Just Keep Talking: Two Poems
    Cheshe Dow (Botswana)       
Tell Me a Lie
    Ann Kithaka (Kenya)       
Prayers and Meditation Heal Despair
    Pauline Dongala (Congo-Brazzaville)       

Part Five. Taking a Stand: Women as Activists against War, Environmental Degradation, and Social Conflict
"A Poem Written in the Ink of the Blood Shed in Rwanda" and "Poet's Note: On Writing Poetry: Resistance, Transcendence and Survival"
    Nathalie Etoké (Cameroon)       
Excerpt from Biography of Ash
    Khadija Marouazi (Morocco)       
Women's Responses to State Violence in the Niger Delta
    Sokari Ekine (Nigeria)       
Excerpt from Child Soldier: Fighting for My Life
    China Keitetsi (Uganda)           
Don't Get Mad, Get Elected! A Conversation with Activist Wangari Maathai (Kenya)
    Danielle Nierenberg and Mia MacDonald       

Part Six. Writing from a Different Place: Perspectives on Exile and Diaspora
Musings of an African Woman: Excerpts from a Memoir in Progress
    Kuukua Dzigbordi Yomekpe (Ghana)       
A Moroccan Woman in the G-local Village: Reflections on Islam, Identity, and Cultural Legacies
    Touria Khannous (Morocco)       
Knowing Your Place
    Diana Adesola Mafe (Nigeria)       
Letter to Clara
    Susan Akono (Cameroon)       

Part Seven. Standing at the Edge of Time: African Women's Visions of the Past, Present, and Future
Roundtable: "We Are Our Grandmothers Dreams": African Women Envision the Future
    Pauline Dongala (Congo), Marame Gueye (Senegal), Omotayo Jolaosho (Nigeria), Nimu Njoya (Nigeria), and Abena P.A. Busia (Ghana)   
Liberation
    Abena P.A. Busia (Ghana)       

Suggestions for Further Reading       
Contributors   

Editorial Reviews

Deeply personal and accessible. African Women Writing Resistance is a timely contribution, capturing a diverse range of responses to the struggles of African women today.”—Carole Boyce Davies, Cornell University

“African Women Writing Resistance: An Anthology of Contemporary Voices collects writing of thirty-six women from thirteen African countries, providing a metaphorical megaphone to those women and a clear, unflinching look at what it’s like to be female and oppressed in their respective countries. The picture thus drawn is anything but pretty, but contains the seedlings of hope and change.”—ForeWord

“Resistance, when effective, brings change. Reading African Women Writing Resistance will erase disinterest and ennui, and perhaps that is the first step toward supporting these writers’ admirable goals.”—ForeWord

From the Publisher