Defense of Nature: Ecological readings of African and Caribbean Postcolonial Writings

Ecology is one of the oldest topics of postcolonial literatures. It emerges behind critics of European colonization in Africa or denunciations of slavery consequences in Caribbean areas. Most postcolonial novels make us understand that slavery and colonization are not only phenomena of domination but also movements of destruction of worlds in all their compositions. This course offers to read some famous novels of African (Camara Laye, Ahmadou Kourouma) and Caribbean (Jacques Roumain, Maryse Condé) postcolonial writers since the end of World War II with an original ecological point of view. We will study some important poetics aspects sharing with environment in postcolonial era (relations with geography, earth, naturals phenomena like drought or and relationships with the other part of the world like landscapes and animals, etc.) and some political engagements and discourses of writers for the defense of the Nature which also includes languages and cultures.

Required texts:
Jacques ROUMAIN, Gouverneurs de la rosée, Zulma (2013), ISBN: ‎ 978-2-84-304663-6
Maryse CONDÉ, Moi, Hugo le terrible, Larousse (2020 [1991]), ISBN: 978-2-03-593892-3
Camara LAYE, L’enfant noir, Presses Pocket (2007 [1954]), ISBN: 978-2-26-617894-5
Ahmadou KOUROUMA, Les Soleils des indépendances, Seuil (1970), ISBN: 978-2-02-025921-7