Engaging with Africa: a study of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie s Americanah

Abstract

This work aims to analyze Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie s novel Americanah, one of the representatives of the third generation of Nigerian writers. The novel reaches prominence not only for presenting numerous themes and perspectives but also for combating stereotypes, or 'single stories', in Adichie s words, as it amplifies the possibilities of stories about Africa and Diasporic Nigerians. This dissertation uses Mikhail Bakhtin s concepts to demonstrate how intertextuality, dialogism, Otherness and multivocality can be observed in Adichie's text, especially in the space of irony. To explore irony as a stylistic and sociocultural aspect of the novel, this dissertation finds theoretical and methodological support in the works of Linda Hutcheon and Claire Colebrook. In this sense, this dissertation cuts through the Postcolonial Literature stamp in order to think of Adichie s polyphonic novel as an invitation to a different form of engagement with Africa. Texts by Frantz Fanon, Edward W. Said, Homi Bhabha, Aimé Césaire, Abdul Jan Mohamed, Achille Mbembé, Ngũgĩ Wa Thiong'o, Jemie Chinweizu, Onwuchekwa Jemie, Ihechukwu Madubuike, Olatunji Ogunyemi and Chinua Achebe contribute to elaborate the themes addressed by Adichie in the novel