• Chris Abani and the Politics of Ambivalence

    Author(s):
    Matthew Omelsky (see profile)
    Date:
    2011
    Group(s):
    LLC African since 1990, TC Postcolonial Studies
    Subject(s):
    African literature, Fiction, Postcolonialism, Literature, English-speaking countries, Twentieth century
    Item Type:
    Article
    Tag(s):
    Contemporary global fiction, Postcolonial novels, 20th-century anglophone literature
    Permanent URL:
    http://dx.doi.org/10.17613/w6na-ma50
    Abstract:
    In his 2004 novel GraceLand, Chris Abani unsettles notions of youth “empowerment,” or “resistance,” creating a restless oscillation between cynicism and idealism. On the one hand, pervasive violence and restricting norms seem to debilitate the novel’s characters, leaving little room to negoti- ate the constraints of their bleak lives in the slums of Lagos. On the other, there is a certain euphoric optimism that pervades the novel—particularly among youth—which is undergirded primarily by idealized non-African spaces. The persistent fluctuation between suffocating violence and utopian thoughts of the “outside” renders the politics of GraceLand fundamen- tally ambiguous. In lieu of a rigidly determinate portrayal, Abani deploys ambivalence as a discursive vehicle with which to expand the contours of how we come to think and imagine African youth resistance—pressing us to consider the inherent contradictions, complicities and contingencies that perhaps accompany any ascription of agency.
    Metadata:
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    Published as:
    Journal article     Show details
    Publisher:
    Indiana University Press
    Pub. Date:
    Winter 2011
    Journal:
    Research In African Literatures
    Volume:
    42
    Issue:
    4
    Page Range:
    84 - 96
    Status:
    Published
    Last Updated:
    4 years ago
    License:
    All Rights Reserved
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