Postcolonial hauntologies : African women's discourses of the female body /
Ayo A. Coly.
- Lincoln : University of Nebraska Press, (c)2019.
- 1 online resource.
- Expanding frontiers: interdisciplinary approaches to studies of women, gender, and sexuality .
Machine generated contents note: List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction 1. The African Female Body: From Colonial Inscription to Postcolonial Conscription 2. Haunted Silences: African Feminist Criticism and the Specter of Sarah Baartman 3. Spectral Female Sexualities: The Politics of Sexual Pleasure in Women's Literatures 4. Subversive and Pedagogical Hauntologies: The Unclothed Female Body in Visual and Performance Arts 5. Laying Specters to Rest? On Bringing Sarah Baartman Home Conclusion Notes References Index.
Includes bibliographies and index.
Cover; Title Page; Copyright Page; Contents; List of Illustrations; Acknowledgments; Introduction; 1. The African Female Body; 2. Haunted Silences; 3. Spectral Female Sexualities; 4. Subversive and Pedagogical Hauntologies; 5. Laying Specters to Rest?; Conclusion; Notes; References; Index
"Postcolonial Hauntologies is an interdisciplinary and comparative analysis of critical, literary, visual, and performance texts by women from different parts of Africa. While contemporary critical thought and feminist theory have largely integrated the sexual female body into their disciplines, colonial representations of African women's sexuality "haunt" contemporary postcolonial African scholarship which, by maintaining a culture of avoidance about women's sexuality, generates a discursive conscription that ultimately holds the female body hostage. Ayo A. Coly employs the concept of "hauntology" and "ghostly matters" to formulate an explicative framework in which to examine postcolonial silences surrounding the African female body as well as a theoretical framework for discerning the elusive and cautious presences of female sexuality in the texts of African women. In illuminating the pervasive silence about the sexual female body in postcolonial African scholarship, Postcolonial Hauntologies challenges hostile responses to critical and artistic voices that suggest the African female body represents sacred ideological-discursive ground on which one treads carefully, if at all. Coly demonstrates how "ghosts" from the colonial past are countered by discursive engagements with explicit representations of women's sexuality and bodies that emphasize African women's power and autonomy."-- "Postcolonial Hauntologies is an interdisciplinary analysis of critical, literary, visual, and performance texts by women from different parts of Africa. Ayo A. Coly employs the concept of "hauntology" to examine postcolonial silences surrounding the African female body as well as female sexuality in the art of African women"--
9781496214898
Body image in women--Africa. Postcolonialism--Africa. Women--Africa. Imagery (Psychology)