We cordially invite you to the next session of the Africa Colloquium.

Prof. Dr. James Yékú (University of Kansas/HU Berlin):
Cancelling Adichie: African Literature and the Algorithmic Politics of Social Media Outrage


Abstract

Social media commentary discourses on African literature reveal how algorithmic politics have played a major role in the recent spate of literary controversies and cancel culture campaigns involving writers such as Chimamanda Adichie. A full understanding of how African literature takes shape in a digital era requires a critical scrutiny of the role algorithms play in creating and maintaining a culture of outrage online. This is the focus of this talk in which I also explain how an algorithmic age of personality connects to and extends a pre-digital culture of literary disputes in anticolonial and pan-African magazines such as Transition and Présence Africaine. I will argue that African literary criticism does not sufficiently interrogate the design and algorithmic politics of social media and blogging, despite their prominence as tools of digital storytelling and cultural production on the continent. I address this issue through a focus on literary controversies and cancel culture discourses on prizes, literary festivals, and digital literary magazines in African literature.