African literature refers to the literature of and for the African peoples.As George Joseph notes on the first page of his chapter on African literature in Understanding Contemporary Africa,while the European perception of literature generally refers to written letters,the African concept includes oral literature.

As George Joseph continues,while European views of literature often stressed a separation of art and content,African awareness is inclusive.

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Tejumola Olaniyan and Ato Quayson

Part 1: Backgrounds

1 Africa and Writing

  Main Ricard (2004)

2 Sub-Saharan Africa's Literary History in a Nutshell

  Albert S.Gerard (1993)

3 Politics, Culture, and Literary Form

  Bernth Lindfors (1979)

4 African Literature in Portuguese

  Russell G.Hamilton (2004)

5 North African Writing

  Anissa Talahite (1997)

6 A Continent and its Literatures in French

  Jonathan Ngate (i 988)

7 African Literature and the Colonial Factor

  Simon Gikandi (2004)

8 African Literature: Myth or Reality?

  V.Y.Mudimbe (1985)

Part 2 Orality,Literacy,and the Interface

Part 3 Writer,Writing,and Function

Part 4 Creativity in/and Adversarial Contexts

Part 5 On Nativism and the Quest for Indigenous Aesthetics:Negritude and Traditionalism

Part 6 The Language of African Literature

Part 7 On Genres

Part 8 Therrizing the Criticism of African Literature

Part 9 Marxism

Part 10 Feminism

Part 11 Structuralism,Poststructuralism,Postcolonialism,and Postmodernism

Part 12 Ecocritcism

Part 13 Queer,Postcolonial