Introduction. African Literature in African Languages: Orality and the Burden of Modernity

Sixty years have passed since that historic Makerere University conference in which indigenous African language literatures were conspicuously cast aside for those written in English or French. In the intervening years, discursive approaches such as postcolonialism, postmodernism, and world literature (Damrosch; Prendergast) have compounded the debate and stretched the binary/dichotomy between African (oral) literatures in indigenous languages and ‘modern’ African literatures in European languages or languages of the colonizers. Given the renewed interest in this abiding question of the language of African literatures in the context of decoloniality and the promotion of prizes to recognize and encourage writing in African languages and to kindle translation from, between, and into African languages, exemplified by the Safal-Cornell Kiswahili Prize for African Literature (see https://kiswahiliprize.cornell.edu), it is pertinent to return to Wali’s submission and ask: What is the state of African literatures in African languages today?

For an appreciation of the dimensions of cultural production in indigenous languages, Jeff Opland takes a magisterial view of South Africa’s Xhosa language literature. Unarguably the doyen in that field, Opland offers what could well be described as a condensed history of Xhosa written literatures, identifying writers such as Samuel Edward Krune Mqhayi, Nontsizi Mgqwetho, and David Manisi, in addition to tracing the earliest Xhosa writings to as far back as the early 1800s. Opland’s article is significant in highlighting the tremendous work he and others have done not only in transcribing many of the oral texts, but in translating them for appreciation and study by a much wider audience.

In Chike Okoye and Juliet Ifunanya Okeyika’s article, ‘“A People’s Firewood Cooks for Them”: The Contextual Prosody of Igbo Mask Poetry and Mbem Poetics’, one critical aspect of the revered Igbo mask theatre, the mbem (poetic chants) performed by the masks, forms the basis of inquiry. Setting aside the dynamism of the theatre, Okoye and Okeyika examine the artistic value of the Igbo chants, laden with proverbs and dense imagery. Perhaps, more importantly, the authors advance what they call ‘Mbem Poetics’, a theoretical construct that aims to provide a more encompassing framework for understanding Igbo mask chants and poems, focusing on prosody as the key to unveiling the indigenous knowledge system embedded in the performances. In many ways, Okoye and Okeyika’s article echoes the theoretical reflections of Emenanjo (‘From Third World to First’, ‘The Modernisation of the Igbo Language’, ‘Written Literature in the Major Nigerian Languages’) and of Obiechina (Nchetaka: The Story, Memory and Continuity of Igbo Culture). Particularly applicable is Obiechina’s poignant observation that ‘the Igbo of today are linked to the Igbo of by-gone ages … not only at the surface level of everyday communications, but at the deeper, symbolical level of myths, tales and fables, of values and patterns of meaning and signification’ (25).

To be clear, the discussion of knowledge production through poetic language systems is not to suggest a simple utilitarian quality to the indigenous language presence in performance. The theoretical offering provides a lens through which the unique features, themes, and techniques employed in Igbo poetry and oral performances can be analysed and appreciated. Artistry emerging as the intermingling of individual talent and communal aesthetics still shines brightly over whatever norms and ethos of the community are gleaned from the performances. This is what makes Marame Gueye’s discussion of the bàkku, a form of the panegyric among the Wolof of Senegal, specifically performed during traditional wrestling matches (the làmb) particularly fascinating. Wolof traditional wrestling lies in the domain of men, and performing the bàkku, the wrestler’s self-praise delivered with wit and rhetorical sophistication, adds to the masculine mystique of the entire tradition. Gueye notes that, while contemporary wrestling remains popular, even as it has taken more and more Western capitalist undertones there is less of the accompanying bàkku performance as younger wrestlers pay perfunctory homage to that tradition.

In a culture where griots still command the highest social space in oral traditional performances, Gueye’s focus on the bàkku tradition is important. But even more so is the analytical move she makes on that genre by arguing that part of bàkku’s panegyric elements are actually borrowings from two other oral genres performed by women – the taasu and the xaxar. While both genres feature women in self-praise either in the context of family celebrations or in rivalry with co-wives, Gueye’s work shows the resilience of the African performance text in the face of changing economies and gender stratification.

This volume features two different articles on written Bini poetry. Among the numerous languages spoken in Nigeria, Yoruba, Hausa, and Igbo have received more attention than the rest, basically because they also command the greatest number of speakers in the national population. Despite the multiplicity of dialects in those three languages, they have also managed to develop standard forms for writing in them so that speakers of the various dialects can read and write in a common vernacular. Although other languages such as Efik, Ibibio, Tiv, Edo, Idoma, Fulfulde, Igala, and Kanuri have evidence of written traditions, unfortunately they have not garnered as much attention as the ‘Big Three’. It was partially in recognition of that reality that we gave the spots to the two Bini articles. Kola Eke and Edafe Mukoro’s ‘Pictures of Materialism in the Benin Ecological Worldview: Eco-Critical Poems of Osemwengie Ero’ draws attention to the poems of the contemporary poet, Osemwengie Ero, who writes in the Edo language. Ero’s formal education in linguistics and Edo language and his social standing as a titled man in Benin certainly colour his poetry, with his rich representation of the flora and fauna of the ancient kingdom captured in the formal poetic structures possibly nurtured by his own advanced studies at the university.

In their analysis, Eke and Mukoro examine the ways that Ero’s poetry draws attention to the Benin worldview concerning the sacredness of the environment and, by implication, the responsibility of the Benin people to preserve that world. There are elements of Bini spiritual values that are alluded to but, again, the authors are careful to direct our attention to one of the pressing concerns of our time – global warming and the imperatives on humans to help heal the earth. Since they are working from an Edo text, the authors further validate that worldview by seeking the interpretation of certain lines and ideas in the poems from knowledgeable members of Bini society. The point that comes through is the capacity of Ero’s Bini poetic expressions to successfully capture the beauty of the Bini world using the sensibility of the culture within that linguistic milieu.

Similarly, Uyilawa Usuanlele’s article on another Bini artist, Ikponmwosa Osemwegie, represents an effort to bring the Bini epic tradition as written by Osemwegie to a wider audience through translation. Osemwegie was a pioneering writer in the Edo language in the 1950s, when the British colonial administration did not have the development of Nigerian indigenous languages as one of its priorities. Indeed, even after independence, as we mentioned earlier, Edo was not in the top tier of languages receiving significant support for development as far as its written tradition was concerned. Therefore, Osemwegie’s choice to write in Edo and share his research into Benin history, culture, and tradition made him a folk hero in Edo land for those interested in seeing their culture and history represented in writing.

Usuanlele’s article is an original and significant contribution to the historiography and development of Edo literature with Osemwegie’s Ọrọ epic constituting the high point of indigenous literary craft. Granted, the history and visual arts of the Edo have enjoyed sustained scholarly attention for nearly a century. However, there has not been much research and analytical work on Bini/Edo literary traditions. The article demonstrates how Osemwegie and his contemporaries inaugurated a thriving tradition of creative writing in the Edo/Bini language. In this regard, the essay broadens and deepens our knowledge and appreciation of the literature beyond references available in studies by historians, anthropologists, and ethnographers.

The detailed historical background in the article reveals fresh insights on the various factors that impeded the development of the Edo indigenous language and its literature during the era of British colonial rule. The heroic efforts made by the Edo elite to surmount these hurdles offer valuable lessons for researchers working on other areas of Africa. The section of the article that chronicles Osemwegie’s writings and creative engagement illustrates his genius. The final section of the article examines the themes and techniques in the Ọrọ epic. Although the text of the epic is not provided, the synoptic analysis enables us to see how the epic contributes to the debate on the genre of African epic. The analysis draws attention to the cultural and historical context that engendered the story, particularly the Benin-Idah war of the seventeenth century.

The scholarly merit of the article also rests on the discussion around the translation of the Ọrọ epic. The intellectual collaboration between the composer/writer (Osemwegie), the work of the distinguished American anthropologist and scholar on Benin, Professor Joseph Nevadomsky, and his wife, Rebecca Agheyisi, as well as other custodians of Edo folklore and language underscores an important aspect of the epic form. This process involves multiple creative voices, and they add to the thematic and aesthetic quality of the work. This creative enterprise alludes to the matter of oral epic narratology discussed extensively by Isidore Okpewho in his study of J.P. Clark’s The Ozidi Saga. In Usuanlele’s article, therefore, we not only learn about the pioneering work of this Bini artist and historian, we also learn about the development of written Edo, Professor Nevadomsky’s extensive work with Osemwegie, and Usuanlele’s fateful role now as the executor and finisher of the collaborative translation work that Osemwegie and Nevadomsky had started, as both are now deceased.

Ida Hadjivayanis contribution to this collection titled ‘The Swahili Mtapta: Exploring Translation in Abdulrazak Gurnah’s Paradise’, emerges out of her translation of the Nobel laureate’s novel in English, Paradise, into Kiwahili, with emphasis on its treatment of the very act and process of translation. As Hadjivayanis writes, the novel is set in a region that, for centuries, had vast trading networks that extended from continental East Africa to the Arabian Peninsula, India, Persia, China, Indonesia, and the Mediterranean. Trade was vital in creating relationships through multilingual connections and networks that were distinctively Swahili. In Paradise, Gurnah writes about a society where Kiswahili, a language that has absorbed vocabulary from across the Indian Ocean and beyond, is established as the lingua franca in the region. Various languages that are spoken rely on Kiswahili to cut across the area’s diverse linguistic, religious, and political communities. In this article, Hadjivayanis explores how Gurnah grapples with that language conundrum by empowering the Swahili voice in colonial East Africa through the mediating force of translation. Hadjivayanis’ article emphasizes the important role that translation plays in shaping the trajectories and relationships that exist among the characters in the novel, while offering a glimpse into her own translation of Peponi, the first translation of Paradise into an African language.

That we have not really received the expected robust submissions indeed raises some questions about the state of African literatures in African languages today. Although one may suggest some reasons for the lean harvest, it is fair to say that, without a detailed, data-driven, quantitative analysis, such reasons may be at best speculative. Nevertheless, is it possible that the few submissions received for this special issue reflect the overall parlous state of African literature in African languages? How popular is African literature in African languages? What is the demographic of writers who subscribe to the idea of writing in indigenous languages? How many entries are received annually for the few awards for writing in indigenous African languages such as the Safal-Cornell Kiswahili Prize for African Literature?

The answers to these questions may shed light on the state of African literatures in African languages today. Notwithstanding the answers, contemporary African writers at home and in the diasporas have increasingly demonstrated consciousness about the growing decolonial practices in intellectual and cultural production. Recognizing the three main streams of literary production – orality and oral tradition, writing in indigenous African languages, and writing in European languages – young African writers have boldly staked their claims to the ‘globalectic’ (wa Thiong’o 2012) or ‘world-ness’ of their scribal practices within world literature. This partly explains their resistance to the use of glossaries for local words or terms used in their writing, unlike the practice by the literary forebears. The integrity of the new hybrid expressive forms goes beyond the idea of ‘New Englishes’ to the insistence by the new generation of African writers that international readers of their works tackle unfamiliar words by searching out their meanings online. The corollary of this new cultural independence or confidence is in the creation of special dictionaries for some of the neologisms, slangs, or pidgin. A good example of the point being made here is the establishment of the Naija lingo (or the Nigerian pidgin) dictionary online. These new expressive forms are often hybrids or glocal in nature – as it were, combining local and European languages – especially in the urban centres. Indeed, as Thaddeus Menang notes,

For his part, Achebe rationalizes that

It would appear then that many contemporary African writers have had to balance both Ngũgĩ’s and Achebe’s approaches to the language question by producing a hybrid. The idea of hybridization has culminated in the use of such terms for African cultural identities as ‘Afropolitanism’ and ‘Afropeanism’, the latter, coined by David Byrne and Marie Daulne of Zap Mama in 1991, being applied by Sabyl Ghoussoub to evoke ‘a zone of fusion and blurring, plural identities, diverse visions of constantly evolving, self-questioning Afropean identity’ (‘Afropean: Plural Identities’ n.p.). But more conceptually stated, in Hicham Gourgem’s words, ‘the two concepts informed by anglophone and francophone African experience respectively – “Afropolitan” and “Afropean” – construct cultural dialogue through an over-reliance on a dualized Western-African relation’ (‘Beyond Afropolitanism’). The indigenous-Western duality is implicated in much of the identity politics that we witness in the writings of contemporary African writers, some of whom live in the diaspora and embrace the new identities as Afropolitans or New Age citizens who depend on the new technologies of communication for literary production. Hence, as Thaddeus Menang rightly notes,

Although the articles collected in this volume do not explore the implications of AI for our field of focus, they productively refocus attention on matters arising in the field. Particularly noteworthy, as we have tried to demonstrate, is the fact that concern for the sustenance of Africa’s rich oral and literary heritage in indigenous and non-African languages is still strong. This is evident in the coverage of articles in this volume – ranging from the minority literature of the Bini people, through the rich oral traditions of the Igbo mask theatre, the mbem (poetic chants), to Nobel Laureate Gurnah’s Swahili-defined novel set in a region that stretched from continental East Africa to the Arabian Peninsula, Asia and Europe, to Jeff Opland’s authoritative recounting of South Africa’s Xhosa language literature. It should be noted that, while we grapple with the importance of promoting African literatures in African languages, the lesson of the success with Afrikaans needs to be highlighted. As Sean Jacobs, the founder and editor of Africa is a Country points out in his review of Mahmood Mamdani’s work, ‘it is no exaggeration to say that Afrikaans represents the most successful decolonizing initiative on the African continent’ and ‘no postcolonial government elsewhere on the continent had elevated indigenous languages to languages of science or humanities, beyond what he [Mamdani] described as “folkloric”’ (‘When the war is over’ n.p.).

Finally, besides the articles, this volume also features a Literary Supplement comprising poems by Chinua Ezenwa-Ohaeto, Amaka Blossom Chime, Blessing Ezinne Okah, Alexander Opicho, Stephen Oladele Solanke, Aisha Umar, and a short story by Felicia Moh. The Literary Supplement is followed by Featured Articles by Ukachi Wachuku and Chijioke Onah, and Reviews by Kufre Usanga and Iniobong I. Uko.

Special appreciation goes to G.G. Darah and Wangui wa Goro for the invaluable support towards putting this issue together.