Academic literature on the topic 'East African poetry (English)'

Thesis (PhD)--Stellenbosch University, 2013.<br>ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This dissertation explores selected Indian narratives that emerge in South Africa and East Africa between 1960 and 2010, focusing on representations of migrations from the late 19th century, with the entrenchment of mercantile capitalism, to the early 21st century entry of immigrants into the metropolises of Europe, the US and Canada as part of the post-1960s upsurge in global migrations. The (post-)colonial and imperial sites that these narratives straddle re-echo Vijay Mishra‘s reading of Indian diasporic narratives as two autonomous archives designated by the terms, "old" and "new" diasporas. The study underscores the role of memory both in quests for legitimation and in making sense of Indian marginality in diasporic sites across the continent and in the global north, drawing together South Asia, Africa and the global north as continuous fields of analysis. Categorising the narratives from the two locations in their order of emergence, I explore how Ansuyah R. Singh‘s Behold the Earth Mourns (1960) and Bahadur Tejani‘s Day After Tomorrow (1971), as the first novels in English to be published by a South African and an East African writer of Indian descent, respectively, grapple with questions of citizenship and legitimation. I categorise subsequent narratives from South Africa into those that emerge during apartheid, namely, Ahmed Essop‘s The Hajji and Other Stories (1978), Agnes Sam‘s Jesus is Indian and Other Stories (1989) and K. Goonam‘s Coolie Doctor: An Autobiography by Dr Goonam (1991); and in the post-apartheid period, including here Imraan Coovadia‘s The Wedding (2001) and Aziz Hassim‘s The Lotus People (2002) and Ronnie Govender‘s Song of the Atman (2006). I explore how narratives under the former category represent tensions between apartheid state – that aimed to reveal and entrench internal divisions within its borders as part of its technology of rule – and the resultant anti-apartheid nationalism that coheres around a unifying ―black‖ identity, drawing attention to how the texts complicate both apartheid and anti-apartheid strategies by simultaneously suggesting and bridging differences or divisions. Post-apartheid narratives, in contrast to the homogenisation of "blackness", celebrate ethnic self-assertion, foregrounding cultural authentication in response to the post-apartheid "rainbow-nation" project. Similarly, I explore subsequent East African narratives under two categories. In the first category I include Peter Nazareth‘s In a Brown Mantle (1972) and M.G. Vassanji‘s The Gunny Sack (1989) as two novels that imagine Asians‘ colonial experience and their entry into the post-independence dispensation, focusing on how this transition complicates notions of home and national belonging. In the second category, I explore Jameela Siddiqi‘s The Feast of the Nine Virgins (1995), Yasmin Alibhai-Brown‘s No Place Like Home (1996) and Shailja Patel‘s Migritude (2010) as post-1990 narratives that grapple with political backlashes that engender migrations and relocations of Asian subjects from East Africa to imperial metropolises. As part of the recognition of the totalising and oppressive capacities of culture, the three authors, writing from both within and without Indianness, invite the diaspora to take stock of its role in the fermentation of political backlashes against its presence in East Africa.<br>AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie studie fokus op geselekteerde narratiewe deur skrywers van Indiër-oorsprong wat tussen 1960 en 2010 in Suid-Afrika en Oos-Afrika ontstaan om uitbeeldings van migrerings en verskuiwings vanaf die einde van die 19e eeu, ná die vestiging van handelskapitalisme, immigrasie in die vroeë 21e eeu na die groot stede van Europa, die VS en Kanada, te ondersoek, met die oog op navorsing na die toename in globale migrasies. Die (post-)koloniale en imperial liggings wat in hierdie narratiewe oorvleuel, beam Vijay Mishra se lesing van diasporiese Indiese narratiewe as twee outonome argiewe wat deur die terme "ou" en "nuwe" diasporas aangedui word. Hierdie proefskrif bestudeer die manier waarop herinneringe benut word, nie alleen in die soeke na legitimisering en burgerskap nie, maar ook om tot 'n beter begrip te kom van die omstandighede wat Asiërs na die imperiale wêreldstede loods. Ek kategoriseer die twee narratiewe volgens die twee lokale en in die volgorde waarin hulle verskyn het en bestudeer Ansuyah R Singh se Behold the Earth Mourns (1960) en Bahadur Tejani se Day After Tomorrow (1971) as die eerste roman wat deur 'n Suid-Afrikaanse en 'n Oos-Afrikaanse skrywe van Indiese herkoms in Engels gepubliseer is, en die wyse waarop hulle onderskeidelik die kwessies van burgerskap en legitimisasie benader. In daaropvolgende verhale van Suid-Afrika, onderskei ek tussen narratiewe at hul onstaan in die apartheidsjare gehad het, naamlik The Hajji and Other Stories deur Ahmed Essop, Jesus is Indian and Other Stories (1989) deur Agnes Sam en Coolie Doctor: An Autobiography by Dr. Goonam deur K. Goonam; uit die post-apartheid era kom The Wedding (2001) deur Imraan Covadia en The Lotus People (2002) deur Aziz Hassim, asook Song of the Atman (2006) deur Ronnie Govender. Ek kyk hoe die verhale in die eerste kategorie spanning beskryf tussen die apartheidstaat — en die gevolglike anti-apartheidnasionalisme in 'n eenheidskeppende "swart" identiteit — om die aandag te vestig op die wyse waarop die tekste sowel apartheid- as anti-apartheid strategieë kompliseer deur tegelykertyd versoeningsmoontlikhede en verdeelheid uit te beeld. Post-apartheid verhale, daarenteen, loof eerder etniese selfbemagtiging met die klem op kulturele outentisiteit in reaksie op die post-apartheid bevordering van 'n "reënboognasie", as om 'n homogene "swartheid" voor te staan. Op dieselfde manier bestudeer ek die daaropvolgende Oos-Afrikaanse verhale onder twee kategorieë. In die eerste kategorie sluit ek In an Brown Mantle (1972) deur Peter Nazareth en The Gunny Sack (1989) deur M.G. Vassanjiin, as twee romans wat Asiërs se koloniale geskiedenis en hul toetrede tot die post-onafhanklikheid bedeling uitbeeld (verbeeld) (imagine), met die klem op die wyse waarop hierdie oorgang begrippe van samehorigheid kompliseer. In die tweede kategorie kyk ek na The Feast of the Nine Virgins (1995) deur Jameela Siddiqi, No Place Like Home (1996) deur Yasmin Alibhai en Migritude (2010) deur Shaila Patel as voorbeelde van post-1990 verhale wat probleme met die politieke teenreaksies en verskuiwings van Asiër-onderdane vanuit Oos-Afrika na wêreldstede aanspreek. As deel van die erkenning van die totaliserende en onderdrukkende kapasiteit van kultuur, vra die drie skrywers – as Indiërs en as wêreldburgers – die diaspora om sy rol in die opstook van politieke teenreaksie teen sy teenwoordigheid in Oos-Afrika onder oënskou te neem.

Narratives are the product of a basic human tendency to make sense of real or imagined experiences. The research question posed in the dissertation is: how is narrativity encoded in East African English? Can the narrativity model in the dissertation distinguish between registers that prototypically focus on narration versus registers that do not primarily focus on narration? The narrativity model consists of four main groups of features, namely Agency, Causation, Contextualisation and Evaluation. These groups are representative of the fundamental structure of narratives: things happen to people at a specific time and place. Agency concerns the people who either instigate or are affected by the events. The things that happen can be denoted by Causation when they are the result of cause and effect in the world. Contextualisation refers to the grounding of events in time and space. Lastly, Evaluation concerns the reactions and attitudes people have towards the events. Eighteen linguistic features such as third person pronouns (part of the Agency group) and past tense verbs (part of the Contextualisation group) were analysed as micro-level indicators of narrativity. The corpus-based investigation analysed the linguistic features used to encode narrativity across 22 spoken and written registers of the East African component of the International Corpus of English (ICE-EA) using WordSmith Tools 4.0. The raw scores for each feature were standardised across all registers to enable comparisons between features, as well as between registers. The results indicate that narrativity is a gradient phenomenon that occurs across a variety of East African English spoken and written registers. After the initial analyses were done, the narrativity model was revised to include only 11 core narrativity features. These features are past tense verbs, third person pronouns, proper nouns for persons, activity verbs, time and place adverbials, perfect aspect, emotional stance verb feel, first person pronouns, evaluative adjectives and non-finite causative clauses. ICE-EA registers that focus on narration as a MEANS to make sense of experiences (the objective or END) are Fiction, Social letters, Oral narratives, Face-to-face conversation and Legal cross-examination. In other words, the core narrativity features are the MEANS and the END is to make sense of experiences and facilitate understanding using narration. Twelve registers have an intermediate focus on narrativity. Narration is a secondary or simultaneous objective in these registers alongside primary objectives such as scientific exposition, persuasiveness, information presentation or interpersonal interaction. There are five registers with low scores for the core narrativity features: Student writing, Business letters, Popular writing, Academic writing and Instructional writing. These registers do not primarily focus on narration and have other primary and even secondary objectives such as scientific exposition and persuasiveness. The narrativity model sheds light on the way narrativity is encoded using linguistic features and gives insight into East African English register variation<br>Thesis (M.A. (English))--North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2011

Includes bibliographical references.<br>Edward Said's notice of 'orientalism' is explored with reference to a cross-section of Byron's narrative verse, taken chronologically. Particular focus is placed on two textual loci, namely, the concepts of 'culture' and 'identity'. These concepts form the basis of a close reading of both the texts themselves, and the manner in which Byron's personal and textual personas shape the narrative and are in turn influenced by their social context. An additional theme of exile is considered, and forms the bridge between a historical analysis of the verse, and current political reality as it is depicted in JM Coetzee's recent novel, Disgrace.

<p>This corpus study discusses the subjunctive construction in mandative sentences in East</p><p>African and Indian English. Data taken from the East African ICE-EA corpus and the Indian</p><p>Kolhapur corpus are compared to previous studies about American English and British</p><p>English, mainly by Hundt (1998) and Johansson & Norheim (1988). Subjunctive, indicative</p><p>and modal periphrastic constructions are identified and examined.</p><p>The conclusion of this study is that the subjunctive construction in mandative sentences is</p><p>more common in Indian and East African English than in British English.</p>

Bibliography: p. 362-393.<br>In this thesis, the discussion of South African English poetry is undertaken in terms of critical questions to which the body of work, to date, has not been subjected. In the nineteen-seventies and -eighties, several anthologies of South African English poetry were published which, despite their differing foci, attested to the strength, innovation, and international stature of the work. Their editors made claims which emphasised both the importance of Sowetan poetry and the emancipation of white poetry, particularly in the last three decades, from the legacy of a stultifying colonial past. This thesis sets out to examine the validity of these critical evaluations. The impetus for such an examination is threefold. Firstly, in comparison with a world literature, South African English poetry has had little impact on the kinds of aesthetic questions which have led to the radical work of international figures like Milosz, Walcott, Neruda. Secondly, South African English poetry tends to be bifurcated by critical analysis, both locally and internationally, into the work of black poets and the work of white poets. Despite the realities of social history which have indeed dichotomised the human experience of South Africa in racial terms, this dichotomy does not seem the most fertile assumption from which to approach the achievement of a nation's poetry. Thirdly, as a poet himself, the writer of this thesis embarked upon the scholarly analysis of a poetic ancestry to which his own work looked ,in vain for location. The re-examination of the roots and value of South African English poetry begins in the thesis with the dilemmas posed by a legacy of romanticism in its displaced relation to a British colony. From this point the discussion argues that this legacy is visible in the unsatisfactory work of liberal poets in the nineteen-seventies and eighties, and argues that such choices cannot be nourishing to a South African cultural originality. Turning to the work most forcefully emphasised as culturally original - i.e. the work of the Soweto poets in the nineteen-seventies and after - the thesis explores this poetry's claims to stylistic and conceptual innovation. The poetry of the late eighties is then examined in relation to its desire to support, and even to drive, anti-apartheid philosophy and practice. The conclusions of the final chapter, presaged throughout the entire argument, suggest that earlier critical estimations of South African English poetry ignore crucial aspects of what has usually been meant by a fully achieved poetic tradition and that such neglect amounts to the betrayal of the very meaning of the term "poem".

Many of these poems, although written in English, are inspired by Sepedi idioms and proverbs. Some invoke township and village life, others the observations and questions that come from writing poetry and experiences of travelling to different countries to read my poems. Others dwell on the political transformation in South Africa, or its absence, and on my own spiritual transformation.

<p>This quantitative corpus study discusses and compares the distribution of the inflected genitive (’s- or zero-genitive) with that of the of-construction in East African, Indian, American and British English using data collected from the ICE-EA, ICE-IND, Frown and FLOB corpora. This study also discusses the semantic categories of the inflected genitive in the varieties mentioned.</p><p>The first conclusion of the study is that the distribution of tokens according to semantic categories is similar in all varieties examined. Furthermore, it is concluded for the modifier classes that animateness-biased classes are more common with the inflected genitive, while inanimateness-biased classes are more common with the of-construction; this distribution is similar in all varieties.</p>

This thesis presents for the first time a critical reading edition of all known poems by N. H. Brettell. It makes no claim to being definitive, nor does it attempt to establish a final text. It represents merely the best thinking of the editor. Brettell printed and circulated his poetry primarily in hand-made illustrated volumes in a process reminiscent of the scribal publication of the seventeenth century. Only 137 of his 206 extant poems were commercially published during his lifetime. In this study all known printed versions of Brettell's poetry whether in privately printed or commercially published form were examined. All variant readings were recorded and are shown. Wherever possible the relationships between texts are also noted. The poems in this edition are ordered in each case according to the version in the latest datable privately produced collection. The commentary and critical introduction were compiled with the general reader in mind. No previous familiarity with southern African fauna and flora is assumed: animals, birds and insects are described and their scientific names supplied. Expressions current in ordinary British or South African English and present in non-specialist dictionaries are not glossed, but archaic and dialectal forms felt to require explication are briefly explained. So too are less familiar South African dialectal expressions which have been assimilated into the South African English lexicon. Intertextual, Christian and mythological references, both African and Western, are annotated in an attempt to make such references accessible to readers who may not share Brettell's cultural background. The intention is to close the changing distance between the text and the audience. An essay discussing the merits, potential and limitations of electronic scholarly editing is included as part of the textual introduction. A CD-Rom containing Brettell's watercolour illustrations in his privately produced collections and audio-clips of him reading his poetry accompanies this thesis.

In both my English and IsiXhosa poetry, my themes are love, politics, and the social issues of rural communities, and include my own life experiences, both good and bad. My poems are mainly short narrative accounts of township life. Although they do have a broad educational purpose, they do not preach to the reader. In IsiXhosa, my poetic forms are influenced by the works of J J R Jolobe, W N Mbovane, P T Mtuze, and my English poems by Pablo Neruda, Mafika Pascal Gwala, Garcia Lorca and others.<br>Intliziyo yona izimele gxebe ifihlakele Iyimfihlo, kumagumbi omphefumlo. Iyafunxa, ifukame kulo magumbi amxinwa. Iingcango, mba! Zivaliwe! Maxa wambi zide zixel’ isisila senkukhu, sona sibonwa mhla ligquthayo. Vul’ amehlo ubaz’ iindlebe uchul’ ukunyathela. Yiza ndikubambe ngesandla, sivul’ iingcango! Masivul’ iingcango zentliziyo yam, sikrobe ngaphakathi! Masithi ntla‐ntla kumagumb’ amathathu kuphela! Masithi ntla‐ntla, kwelepolitiki yakwaXhosa, Kaloku nam ndingumXhosa! Masithi ntla‐ntla kwelifukame, i.z.i.x.i.n.g.a.x.i n.o.b.u.n.c.w.a.n.e. b.o.t.h.a.n.d.o, kaloku nam ndinemithamb’ ebalek’ igaz’ eliqhumayo! Ucango lokugqibela lukungenisa kwigumbi elinezidl’ umzi, Kaloku nam ndizalwa kulo mzi wakwaXhoooooosa!<br>This thesis is presented in two parts: English and isiXhosa.