Joanna Boampong

The critical discourse on African Literatures has mainly been constructed with reference to Francophone, Anglophone, and to a lesser extent, Lusophone writings. Notwithstanding the common background of colonization and post-independence socio-economic, political and cultural patterns of development it shares with its counterparts, Hispanophone writings are virtually unacknowledged. This project employs the ideological framework of African feminist theory to study the writings of Sefi Atta, Fatou Diome and Guillermina Mekuy. By studying together the works of these budding female writers from the Anglophone, Francophone and Hispanophone African literary traditions respectively, I seek to do two things: engage Hispanophone perspectives in the critical discourse on African literatures and, establish and explore a dialogic relationship among Anglophone, Francophone and Hispanophone literary traditions. Ultimately, I underscore the composite perspectives that, studied together, they bring to bear on topical issues relating to women’s agency and sexuality, marriage and polygamy, motherhood and family.