Friday, May 29, 2015

Dissertation Camp Introduction

In spite of all the enormous challenges of daily living, is the thriving, astoundingly creative artistic-imaginative landscape of Africa today. African literature, I repeat, is doing well. --Tejumola Olaniyan June 3, 2014

I am ending the 8th year of my PhD program in English Literary Studies. My research interests are postcolonial theory, African literatures in English, and 20th- and 21st-century literatures.

I am working on a dissertation that examines how whiteness is used in a range of postcolonial African literatures. I examine literatures from the late colonial period to contemporary post-apartheid literature in South Africa and look at how whiteness is used in representations of African identity and subjecthood.

My summer writing goal is to complete chapter 3 of my dissertation, revise chapters 1-3, and write the introduction and conclusion.