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A collection of essays about language and its constructive role in national culture, history, and identity, that advocates for linguistic decolonization.
'The language of literature', Ngũgĩ writes, 'cannot be discussed meaningfully outside the context of those social forces which have made it both an issue demanding our attention, and a problem calling for a resolution.' First published in 1986, Decolonising the Mind is one of Ngũgĩ's best-known and most-cited non-fiction publications, helping to cement him as a pre-eminent voice theorizing the 'language debate' in postcolonial studies.
Ngũgĩ wrote his first novels and plays in English but was determined, even before his detention without trial in 1978, to move to writing in Gikuyu. He describes the book as 'a summary of some of the issues in which I have been passionately involved for the last twenty years of my practice in fiction, theatre, criticism, and in teaching of literature...'. Split into four essays - 'The Language of African Literature', 'The Language of African Theatre', 'The Language of African Fiction', and 'The Quest for Relevance' - the book offers an anti-imperialist perspective on the destiny of Africa and the role of languages in combatting and perpetrating imperialism and neo-colonialism in African nations.
East Africa [Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Rwanda]: EAEP
'The language of literature', Ngũgĩ writes, 'cannot be discussed meaningfully outside the context of those social forces which have made it both an issue demanding our attention, and a problem calling for a resolution.' First published in 1986, Decolonising the Mind is one of Ngũgĩ's best-known and most-cited non-fiction publications, helping to cement him as a pre-eminent voice theorizing the 'language debate' in postcolonial studies.
Ngũgĩ wrote his first novels and plays in English but was determined, even before his detention without trial in 1978, to move to writing in Gikuyu. He describes the book as 'a summary of some of the issues in which I have been passionately involved for the last twenty years of my practice in fiction, theatre, criticism, and in teaching of literature...'. Split into four essays - 'The Language of African Literature', 'The Language of African Theatre', 'The Language of African Fiction', and 'The Quest for Relevance' - the book offers an anti-imperialist perspective on the destiny of Africa and the role of languages in combatting and perpetrating imperialism and neo-colonialism in African nations.
East Africa [Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Rwanda]: EAEP
Price: $29.99
Pages: 128
Publisher: Boydell & Brewer Inc.
Imprint: James Currey
Publication Date:
26 June 1986
Trim Size: 8.50 X 5.51 in
ISBN: 9780852555019
Format: Paperback
BISACs:
LITERARY CRITICISM / African, Literature: history and criticism, POLITICAL SCIENCE / Colonialism & Post-Colonialism, PHILOSOPHY / Political, Colonialism and imperialism, Politics and government
Many of the ideas are familiar from Ngugi's earlier critical books, and earlier lectures, elsewhere. But the material here has a new context and the ideas a new focus. This leading African writer presents the arguments for using African language and forms after successfully using an African language himself. -