Afrofuturisms : Ecology, Humanity, and Francophone Cultural Expressions

Authors

Isaac Vincent Joslin

Files

Series

Research in International Studies, Africa Series

Description

An exploration of Francophone African literary imaginations and expressions through the lens of Afrofuturism

Generally attributed to the Western imagination, science fiction is a literary genre that has expressed projected technological progress since the Industrial Revolution. However, certain fantastical elements in African literary expressions lend themselves to science fiction interpretations, both utopian and dystopian. When the concept of science is divorced from its Western, rationalist, materialist, positivist underpinnings, science fiction represents a broad imaginative space that supersedes the limits of this world. Whether it be on the moon, under the sea, or elsewhere within the imaginative universe, Afrofuturist readings of select films, novels, short stories, plays, and poems reveal a similarly emancipatory African future that is firmly rooted in its own cultural mythologies, cosmologies, and philosophies.

Isaac Joslin identifies the contours and modalities of a speculative, futurist science fiction rooted in the sociocultural and geopolitical context of continental African imaginaries. Constructing an arc that begins with gender identity and cultural plurality as the bases for an inherently multicultural society, this project traces the essential role of language and narrativity in processing traumas that stem from the violence of colonial and neocolonial interventions in African societies.

Joslin then outlines the influential role of discursive media that construct divisions and create illusions about societal success, belonging, and exclusion, while also identifying alternative critical existential mythologies that promote commonality and social solidarity. The trajectory proceeds with a critical analysis of the role of education in affirming collective identity in the era of globalization; the book also assesses the market-driven violence that undermines efforts to instill and promote cultural and social autonomy.

Last, this work proposes an egalitarian and ecological ethos of communal engagement with and respect for the diversity of the human and natural worlds.

Copyright Statement

Afrofuturisms © 2023 by Ohio University Press is licensed under Creative Commons License CC BY-NC-ND. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Language

eng

ISBN

9780896805149

Publication Date

5-9-2023

Publisher

Ohio University Press

City

Athens

Keywords

Achille Mbembe, African literature, Algeria, Boualem Sansal, Cameroon, Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Cultural Studies, Djibril Diop Mambéty, Ecocriticism, Emmanuel Dongala, Fadika Kramo-Lanciné, Fatou Diome, Felwine Sarr, Francophone, Humanities, Jean-Marie Adiaffi, Jean-Pierre Bekolo, Ken Bugul, Kenya, Mali, Marie Ndiaye, Mauritania, Morocco, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Postcolonialism, Science Fiction, Senegal, Sony Labou Tansi, Valentin Mudimbe, Werewere Liking

Disciplines

Africana Studies | African Studies | Demography, Population, and Ecology | Film and Media Studies | French and Francophone Language and Literature | Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

Recommended Citation

Joslin, Isaac Vincent, "Afrofuturisms : Ecology, Humanity, and Francophone Cultural Expressions" (2023). Ohio University Press Open Access Books. 59.
https://ohioopen.library.ohio.edu/oupress/59