African Literature and Us Empire: Postcolonial Optimism in Nigerian and South African Writing

Postcolonialism has been linked to post-nationalism, but African postcolonial and diasporic literatures reveal ongoing dreams of national becoming. Hallemeier's study challenges chronologies that depict a growing disillusionment with the postcolonial nation and national development. Nigerian and South African writings in African Literature and US Empire examine why visions of national exceptionalism persist despite decades of disillusionment with national governments.

Format: Hardback
Length: 208 pages
Publication date: 31 May 2024
Publisher: Edinburgh University Press

Postcolonialism has long been associated with post-nationalism, but the persistence of nation-oriented literatures from within the African postcolony and its diasporas reveals how dreams of national becoming endure. In this fascinating new study, Hallemeier brings together African literary studies, affect studies, and US empire studies to challenge chronologies that chart a growing disillusionment with the postcolonial nation and national development across the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The Nigerian and South African writings in African Literature and US Empire, while often attuned to the trans- and extra-national, repeatedly scrutinize why visions of national exceptionalism, signified by a 'pan-African Nigeria and 'new South Africa, remain stubbornly affecting, despite decades of disillusionment with national governments beholden to a neocolonial global order. In these fictions, optimistic forms of nationalism cannot be reduced to easily critiqued state-sanctioned discourses of renewal and development. They are also circulated through experiences of embodied need, quotidian aspiration, and transnational, pan-African relationship.

Weight: 466g
Dimension: 162 x 241 x 18 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781399516167