Literatures in African Languages

Download or read book Literatures in African Languages written by B. W. Andrzejewski and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1985-11-21 with total page 678 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although African literatures in English and French are widely known outside Africa, those in the African languages themselves have not received comparable attention. In this book a number have been selected for survey by fourteen specialist writers, providing the reader with an introduction to this very wide field and a body of reference material which includes extensive bibliographies and biographical information on African authors. Theoretical issues such as genre divisions are discussed in the essays and the historical, social and political forces at work in the creation and reception of African literature are examined. Literature is treated as an art whose medium is language, so that both the oral and written forms are encompassed. This book will be of value not only to readers concerned with the cultures of Africa but to all those with an interest in the literary phenomena of the world in general.