‘Anthropological mutilation’ and the reordering of Cameroonian literature

Auteurs

  • Cilas Kemedjio University of Rochester, Rochester, United States

DOI :

https://doi.org/10.4314/tvl.v53i1.6

Mots-clés :

Cameroonian literature, Francophone literature, national literary tradition

Résumé

I argue in this article that the postcolonial existential wound, otherwise referred to by Eboussi Boulaga as the anthropological mutilation, represents the intertextual nexus that bridges the generational gap in Francophone Cameroonian literature. The tragic malaise, rooted in absurdity and the dire state of the postcolonial condition, echoes anxieties expressed by earlier generations of Cameroonian writers in the 1950s about engaged literature. The article is therefore an exercise in detecting commonalities and discontinuities that weave a shared national literary tradition. Among the commonalities, the presence of jazz, the writing of the anticolonial struggle stand out while innovations are to be found in the epidemic manifestation of madness and the disintegration of the basic social fabric visible in the form of incest.

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Biographie de l'auteur

Cilas Kemedjio, University of Rochester, Rochester, United States

Cilas Kemedjio is Frederick Douglass Professor of French and Francophone Studies and Director of the Frederick Douglass Institute for African and African-American Studies at the University of Rochester, NY, USA.

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Publiée

2016-04-01

Comment citer

Kemedjio, C. (2016). ‘Anthropological mutilation’ and the reordering of Cameroonian literature. Tydskrif Vir Letterkunde, 53(1), 86–108. https://doi.org/10.4314/tvl.v53i1.6

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Research articles