This book is response to the recent surge of formidable voices that consistently demean and attempt to reverse the gains of pan-Africanism. Besides questioning its relevance, these voices supplant essential tenets of pan-Africanism – Blackness, the narrative of Return, sanctity of the ancestral homeland, exposition of evils of colonialism and African Literature – with new postulations. These new suppositions deny race, accentuate onward migration and diminish the ancestral homeland to any ordinary city to globetrot. These voices liken any reminiscence of colonial evils to Afro-pessimism, pronounce African Literature dead on arrival and proceed to ‘substitute’ pan-Africanism through studies, which neglect pioneer and contemporary literary works, cultural productions, folklore, conversations on social media (blogs, Facebook, WhatsApp) and questionnaires to gauge their influence among Black peoples themselves. This study adopts a design that interrogates literary works, data from questionnaires and social media to determine the relevance and influence of pan-Africanism and the new paradigm.

This book is response to the recent surge of formidable voices that consistently demean and attempt to reverse the gains of pan-Africanism. Besides questioning its relevance, these voices supplant essential tenets of pan-Africanism – Blackness, the narrative of Return, sanctity of the ancestral homeland, exposition of evils of colonialism and African Literature – with new postulations. These new suppositions deny race, accentuate onward migration and diminish the ancestral homeland to any ordinary city to globetrot. These voices liken any reminiscence of colonial evils to Afro-pessimism, pronounce African Literature dead on arrival and proceed to ‘substitute’ pan-Africanism through studies, which neglect pioneer and contemporary literary works, cultural productions, folklore, conversations on social media (blogs, Facebook, WhatsApp) and questionnaires to gauge their influence among Black peoples themselves. This study adopts a design that interrogates literary works, data from questionnaires and social media to determine the relevance and influence of pan-Africanism and the new paradigm.

"This book is response to the recent surge of formidable voices that consistently demean and attempt to reverse the gains of pan-Africanism. Besides questioning its relevance, these voices supplant essential tenets of pan-Africanism - Blackness, the narrative of Return, sanctity of the ancestral homeland, exposition of evils of colonialism and African Literature - with new postulations. These new suppositions deny race, accentuate onward migration, and diminish the ancestral homeland to any ordinary city to globetrot. These voices liken any reminiscence of colonial evils to Afro-pessimism, pronounce African Literature dead on arrival and proceed to 'substitute' pan-Africanism through studies, which neglect pioneer and contemporary literary works, cultural productions, folklore, conversations on social media (blogs, Facebook, Whatapp) and questionnaires to gauge their influence among Black people themselves. This study adopts a design that interrogates literary works, data from questionnaires and social media to determine the relevance and influence of pan-Africanism and the new paradigm"--

This study proposes that – rather than trying to discern the normative value of Afropolitanism as an identificatory concept, politics, ethics or aesthetics – Afropolitanism may be best approached as a distinct historical and cultural moment, that is, a certain historical constellation that allows us to glimpse the shifting and multiple silhouettes which Africa, as signifier, as real and imagined locus, embodies in the globalized, yet predominantly Western, cultural landscape of the 21st century. As such, Making Black History looks at contemporary fictions of the African or Black Diaspora that have been written and received in the moment of Afropolitanism. Discursively, this moment is very much part of a diasporic conversation that takes place in the US and is thus informed by various negotiations of blackness, race, class, and cultural identity. Yet rather than interpreting Afropolitan literatures (merely) as a rejection of racial solidarity, as some commentators have, they should be read as ambivalent responses to post-racial discourses dominating the first decade of the 21st century, particularly in the US, which oscillate between moments of intense hope and acute disappointment. Please read our interview with Dominique Haensell here: https://blog.degruyter.com/de-gruyters-10th-open-access-book-anniversary-dominique-haensell-and-her-winning-title-making-black-history/

A dissemination of the figure of the 'Afropolitan' from a critical literary angle. It attempts to explore a field of study which lacks a comprehensive literary approach to ways of being Afropolitan in the 21st century.

Throughout Africa, artists use hip-hop both to describe their lives and to create shared spaces for uncensored social commentary, feminist challenges to patriarchy, and resistance against state institutions, while at the same time engaging with the global hip-hop community. In Hip-Hop in Africa, Msia Kibona Clark examines some of Africa’s biggest hip-hop scenes and shows how hip-hop helps us understand specifically African narratives of social, political, and economic realities. Clark looks at the use of hip-hop in protest, both as a means of articulating social problems and as a tool for mobilizing listeners around those problems. She also details the spread of hip-hop culture in Africa following its emergence in the United States, assessing the impact of urbanization and demographics on the spread of hip-hop culture. Hip-Hop in Africa is a tribute to a genre and its artists as well as a timely examination that pushes the study of music and diaspora in critical new directions. Accessibly written by one of the foremost experts on African hip-hop, this book will easily find its place in the classroom.

At thirty-nine, Deola Bello, a Nigerian expatriate in London, is dissatisfied with being single and working overseas. Deola works as a financial reviewer for an international charity, and when her job takes her back to Nigeria in time for her father’s five-year memorial service, she finds herself turning her scrutiny inward. In Nigeria, Deola encounters changes in her family and in the urban landscape of her home, and new acquaintances who offer unexpected possibilities. Deola’s journey is as much about evading others’ expectations to get to the heart of her frustration as it is about exposing the differences between foreign images of Africa and the realities of contemporary Nigerian life. Deola’s urgent, incisive voice captivates and guides us through the intricate layers and vivid scenes of a life lived across continents. With Sefi Atta’s characteristic boldness and vision, A Bit of Difference limns the complexities of our contemporary world. This is a novel not to be missed.