Course description

This twelve-week course introduces African Anglophone Studies as an interdisciplinary field. It examines how English interacts with African languages, histories, institutions, literary traditions, media and everyday life. The course does not treat “Africa” as a single culture. Each unit requires learners to identify the location, period, speakers, genre and power relations involved in the material studied.

Learning outcomes

By the end of the course, students should be able to:

  • locate an English-language text or practice within a specific African context;
  • distinguish description, interpretation and evaluation in academic discussion;
  • analyse how language choice constructs identity, authority or belonging;
  • compare two sources without erasing their historical and regional differences;
  • write a documented argument and present it orally in clear academic English;
  • cite sources and explain the rights attached to materials reused in a project.

Weekly sequence

  1. Naming the field. What do “Anglophone”, “African” and “studies” include or exclude?
  2. Maps, regions and histories. Building contextual timelines instead of memorising isolated dates.
  3. English and multilingual repertoires. Code choice, translation and audience.
  4. Oral forms and performance. Storytelling, speech, proverb, song and the limits of transcription.
  5. Colonial and postcolonial institutions. Education, administration and the circulation of English.
  6. Fiction and narrative voice. Narrator, focalisation, time and address.
  7. Poetry and public language. Image, rhythm, memory and protest.
  8. Drama and performance. Space, audience, gesture and multilingual staging.
  9. Media and popular culture. Radio, film, digital platforms and urban expression.
  10. Gender, generation and social position. Who speaks, for whom and under which constraints?
  11. Research methods. Question, corpus, field notes, ethics and citation.
  12. Student colloquium. Presenting a small documented project and responding to questions.

Learning activities

Each week combines one short contextual briefing, one primary source, one analytical task and one oral interaction. A “context card” records place, date, producer, intended audience, language(s), medium and source rights. A “language notebook” records five expressions used to compare, qualify evidence or acknowledge uncertainty.

Assessment plan

  • Context cards — 15%: three concise source profiles.
  • Close reading — 20%: analysis of a selected passage or media extract.
  • Comparative seminar — 20%: six-minute presentation plus questions.
  • Research proposal — 15%: question, corpus, method, ethics and preliminary bibliography.
  • Final project — 30%: documented essay, podcast with transcript, or digital exhibition with commentary.

Principles for selecting readings

The teacher should balance regions, periods, genders, genres and publication contexts. A text should not be used merely because it is available online: verify the edition, author, source, licence and pedagogical purpose. Copyrighted works may be discussed and cited within lawful limits, but the platform must not reproduce an entire protected work without permission.

Adaptation options

For a first-year class, shorten the theoretical readings and increase guided vocabulary. For advanced students, add historiography, theory and independent corpus building. For bilingual classes, permit notes in French while requiring the final analytical claim and evidence in English.