‘Counter Discourse’ reworks the cultural heritage of black literary aesthetic using the prose and drama fictions of Anglophone, Lusophone, and Francophone writers from Africa and the African Diaspora.

Counter Discourse Writing in African Literature

From the African Library of Critical Writing

Available from African Books Collective

Editors Smith and Ce in compilation of these studies stress the point that literature in Africa can hardly be discussed outside of history and environment, and the apparent disconnection among African groups and their Diaspora can be traced to the disparate historical conflicts from within and outside the continent.

The chapters are placed in three interactive phases of critical discussions involving rejoinders from the past, reassessment of the present, and a widening futurity of cultural and contemporary modernity.

In general the foci of counter discourse are more appropriately inclusive of works whose purpose aims at giving voice to the previously silenced or voiceless, and letting the newly voiced surprisingly go against expected voicing in a revolutionary way.

Thus the act of reworking the canon from the western centre to an afro centric vision would mean the end to the distortions in the perception of history and culture and the allowing of all contraindications in the process of visionary rearmament.

For Africa, thrown in the margin of voluble and visible world expressions, there subsists a deep pool of creativity and power in literary subversion, resulting in the configuration of platforms for a new language in literature.

It is the expectation of the editors that this series of African Library of Critical Writing testifies to a bolder trend in criticism embracing more uncharted currents in critical literary engagement.

It purposes to be consistent with the collegiate vision of its sponsors to reconstruct African literature in a way that departs from old discordant attitudes, thereby crystallising into multi dimensional appreciation of the cultural heritage of African writing.

Available from African Books Collective