De Harlem à Yaoundé: du panafricanisme au discours critique en Afrique francophone

Authors

Sélom Komlan Gbanou, University of Calgary

Abstract

The birth of the Negro Renaissance movement in Harlem (USA), at the beginning of the 1920s, had a remarkable impact on the destiny of the black peoples of Africa, especially in their fight for independence. Having experienced slavery and segregation, the AfroAmerican intellectuals fought continuously in the quest for dignity and freedom. In so doing, their actions and ideas inspired their African counterparts to devise ways and means in their anticolonial fight. This impact, in addition to other factors, inherently led to the 1956 and 1959 Congresses held in Paris and Rome respectively. The purpose of these meetings was to rethink the political and sociocultural future of Africans based on a new social consciousness. However, more than half a century after those meetings, the question still remains whether Africa benefited from the American heritage, and whether the critical and literary discourse, specifically the francophone discourse, enabled it to achieve its autonomy and ambitions.

Recommended Citation

Gbanou, Sélom Komlan (2019) "De Harlem à Yaoundé: du panafricanisme au discours critique en Afrique francophone," Présence Francophone: Revue internationale de langue et de littérature: Vol. 93: No. 1, Article 10.
Available at: https://crossworks.holycross.edu/pf/vol93/iss1/10