Postcolonial literature is one of the most politically urgent fields in literary studies — and one of the most contested. Teaching it well means engaging with difficult history, complex theory, and literature that is often explicitly political. Here's a framework.
Key Texts and Theories
The theoretical foundation: Frantz Fanon's The Wretched of the Earth (1961) — essential for understanding colonial psychology and anti-colonial resistance. Edward Said's Orientalism (1978) — how Western representations of the East constructed power. The literary canon: Chinua Achebe — Things Fall Apart (1958). The colonial novel from the colonized perspective. Ngugi wa Thiong'o — A Grain of Wheat (1967). Kenyan independence and its moral costs. Jean Rhys — Wide Sargasso Sea (1966). Jane Eyre rewritten from the perspective of Bertha Mason. The contemporary: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie — Half of a Yellow Sun. Teju Cole — Open City. Postcolonial identity in the global city.
Map the colonial and postcolonial literary world on Genesis of Literary.