Full Description
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
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
