P20 Literary approaches to the relationship between

colonization, christianity and civilization

Paper Review Sheet

Colonization, Christianity and Social Division in Ngugis's novel The River
Between

Author(s)

Mr Bruno Ribeiro Oliveira, 1988broliveira@gmail.com (Student, Universidade de Lisboa, Unregistered)

Short Abstract

Ngugi's novel The River Between is a source to understand how the missionary work caused division and
struggles among the Kikuyu people of Kenya. Ngugi recreates the scenario from the point of view of a
Kikuyu teacher that must deal with the two sides of the river, the western and the traditional.
Long Abstract

Released in 1965, the first novel published by the Kenyan writer Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o (1938-), The
River Between, is the story about a teacher called Waiyaki that must deal with the Kikuyu characteristics
of his traditional life, Western civilization features and Christian religion that sweeps through the
hinterlands of a Kenyan region. This situation causes a division among the Kikuyu population between
the traditionalists and the Christians. This novel is influenced from a real debate and clash that happened
in the Colony of Kenya between 1920 and 1930 when converted Kikuyu rejected the authority of
European missionaries that were trying to ban the tradition of circumcision performed by the Kikuyu
people. Thiong'o recreates this scenario and discuss the division this caused over individuals that walked
among institutions and ideas introduced by the colonial British rule, its missionaries and the cultural
values of the Kikuyu people. This book provide us a valuable source to understand how literature deals
with the history of missions and missionaries effects over the Kikuyu community in Kenya.

A eurocentric constat? An Approach to Mozambican Literature through

Academic Publications

Author(s)

Mrs Helena González Doval, hegondo@hotmail.com (Student, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela,

Unregistered)

Short Abstract

Through a database including publications about Mozambican literature from 1975 until 2017, this
communication aims to get closer to who and from where this literature is studied, as well as what optics
are adopted to identify (or not) a possible Eurocentric constant in Post-Colonial Studies.
Long Abstract

Through an extensive bibliographical compilation that includes studies that deal with Mozambican
literature from the year of the country's independence in 1975 until 2017, this communication aims to
get closer to who and from where this literature is studied, as well as what optics are adopted. A
database that includes the name of the author, the institution to which it belongs, the publishers or
institutions that publish them, a summary of the publication and five keywords will be used. With more
than 800 results from inside and outside the Lusophone world, this base is made up of academic studies
of platforms such as the World Cat, Academy, Research Gate, existing bibliographies, and catalog of
literary and academic journals.
The aim is to apply the results and conclusions to Joseph Nye's concepts of Cultural Diplomacy as well as
Itamar Even-Zohar's poly system theories so as to apply them to academic publications, taking into
account their consideration as legitimate knowledge, to study Mozambican literally system and the ways
it is presented and perceived inside and outside this African country.
The interest of the work is based on the condition of Mozambique as a former Portuguese colony, in
clarifying perspectives that from different geographic and institutional contexts work when talking about
Mozambican literature. Based on the information contained in the database, conclusions and statistics
will be made in order to identify (or not) a possible Eurocentric constant in Post-colonial Studies.

The reign of Ibrahim Njoya: between administrative and religious colonization.

 Author(s)

Mr Valentin Moulin, valentin.moulin@unilim.fr (PhD student, CeRes - Limoges (Semiotics Research

Center), Unregistered)

Short Abstract

In 1902, Europeans arrived in the Bamum kingdom. A problem arises for King Njoya: the legitimization of
his power ahead his people and the Europeans. He invents a writing, to which missionaries participates,
creating a place where royal, colonial and religious power mixes.
Long Abstract

After a civil war in 1896, King Njoya reigns alone on his people. After this event, and because he
discovers the importance of writing, he decides to invent his own. This presentation has for issues to
show how Njoya create the bamum writing and its importance in the colonization. Indeed, in 1902,
Europeans came in the kingdom and he must reign with them. I will discuss about the fact that the
colonisation, first by Germans, is also religious: the Basel Mission arrived and Njoya accepted them,
being friend with the pastor Göhring. He helps him on his writing and in 1910, the king finishes the final
phase. After that, he begins to write the history of his people. Translated and publish in 1953, analysis of
its book permit to understand how the king consider the « white », colonizer, and how he accepts the
colonization. Then, it's important to show how a beginning of a literature take place with the creation of
schools in which we can learn the writing and the creation of a printing house without the help of the
Europeans. It will then be time to conclude on the post-first world war: French colonization is more
present, in disagreement with the king. Njoya gradually loses his power, until he is exiled, the kingdom
abolished, and the writing forbidden. A bitter end that is found in his book, notably with the use of
"white", which allows us to understand the relationship between power, religion and colonization.

Mimicry, Resistance and Self-Affirmation in the African Novel

Author(s)

Dr Christopher Anyokwu, anyokwu_c@yahoo.com (Lecturer, University of Lagos, Unregistered)

Short Abstract

The story of the African as told by sundry agents of the West is almost always one of subjection and
subjugation. This study is a heuristic and hermeneutical excursus of two classic francophone novels
which explore the clash between the Western Centre and the African Margins.
Long Abstract

Topic: Mimicry, Resistance and Self-Affirmation in the African Novel

The story of the African as told by sundry agents of the West is almost always one of subjection and
subjugation. Thus profiled in the Western imaginary as a cretinized Other, the African hardly ever speaks
but merely babbles as in Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, a landmark modernist novel sired and
spawned by the ideology of empire and Western Christian proselytization of the subject races. African
literary history, however, posits a counter-canonical and counterfactual narrative, celebrating black
collective self-affirmation through a display of cultural sophistication, spiritual alertness and social
dignity. To vivify this, we shall undertake a heuristic and hermeneutical excursus of Camara Laye's The
Radiance of the King and Mongo Beti's Poor Christ of Bomba, two classic francophone novels which
explore the existential drama of the clash between the Western Centre and the African Margins.
Keywords: Black, race, Western, Empire, Africa, Novel.
Christopher Anyokwu, PhD
Associate Professor,
Department of English,
University of Lagos,
Nigeria.
e-mail: anyokwu_c@yahoo.com
Phone No: +2348035297582

Christianity, colonialism and racism: the use of machila by Missionaries of the

Methodist Episcopal Church in Mozambique (IME), 1890 to 1968.

Author(s)
Dr Simao Jaime, simaojaime@gmail.com (Investigador, Arquivo Historico de Mocambique, Unregistered)

Short Abstract

Starting from these assumptions I intend to contribute to the debate on racial relations based on the
analysis of some photographs of IME missionaries.
Long Abstract

Institutional racism and racial relations are the subject of research by several researchers. There are two
main positions that stand out among them: on one hand, those who seek to demonstrate the factual
existence of racism and the various forms it has been assuming over time, and on the other those who
deny the existence on the basis of several concepts of race. Among those who admit the existence of
racism, some attribute Christianity an appeasing role, particularly in Africa. Starting from these
assumptions I intend to contribute to the debate on racial relations based on the analysis of some
photographs of IME missionaries. These photographs report white missionaries carried by blacks in
machilas. Machila was a means of transport used in Africa, and Mozambique in particular, in the context
of Portuguese colonialism, by which white settlers were transported carried by blacks. If Christianity
appeased racism in Africa, what is the significance of the use of machila by IME missionaries in
Mozambique?