The Afrotriumphalist commitment to life in freedom and dignity in transatlantic African literature

Abstract

The creation of a future of limitless possibilities is unthinkable without embracing the commitment to sacrifice. Commitment to both individual and group survival is at once the basis for transcendence and the most important index in determining the human worth of any given people. This article marshals evidence from transatlantic African literature to advance the contention that the African World Community still exists because of the commitment of African people to life in freedom and dignity even in the midst of unexampled adversity. Cast in this article as ‘the Afrotriumphalist idea’, the fidelity of African people to life is pervasive in African literature from either side of the Atlantic, categorised in this article as ‘transatlantic’ African literature. This corpus of works celebrates the necessity of struggle and rehearses the values that enabled African people to outlive the drama of death visited upon them through enslavement and colonisation and is, therefore, directly implicated in contemporary African efforts to promote a new wave of African excitement in African freedom. Against this backdrop, this article argues that there is adequate justification to imagine the inevitability of African victory over the challenges of neo-slavery in all areas of human endeavour.

South African Journal of African Languages 2012, 32(2): 195–206