Construction of African Identity Through Poems: A Linguistic Exploration of Susan Akinkurolere’s My Black Brother and My Folks
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.53555/ssh.v3i10.312Keywords:
Culture, identity,, Yoruba, Africans, Poetry.Abstract
The concept of identity, especially in relation to black is not only a major preoccupation in African-American literature but also in typical African literature. Indeed, the concept has become issue of scholarly interest both in literature and linguistics. Despite this, it has been observed that an exploration a particular poet’s work based on identity, as portrayed in poems written at home
and abroad, has not received much attention. Consequently, this paper explores two poems from
an anthology of an emerging poet in Nigeria − Susan Akinkurolere, to emphasize and reiterate
soscio-cultural implications of identity construction from linguistic perspectives. It is therefore,
concluded that Africans are proud of their heritage, and they display identity and sense of
belongingness in their literature.
Downloads
References
Akinkurolere, S. O.(2017) A Journey in the Forest of Books. Akure: Bola Prints.
Akinkurolere, S. O. and Ariyo, K. S. (2015).‘Speech Act Features of Select Extracts in Chinua Achebe’s Arrow of God: Leadership Perspectives. Science Domain: British Journal of Education, Society and Behavioural Sciences(BJESBS). 9(2), 139-145.
Aur ́elie, H. (2014). The semantics of poetry: a distributional reading. Cambridge: University of Cambridge, ComputerLaboratory.
Faloye, Y.(2017) ‘Discursive features in the selected police-suspect interrogations in Ondo Metropolis, Nigeria’ A M.A.Seminar Paper of the Department of English Language, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria.
Leech,G. (1996). A linguistic guide to Englishpoetry. London: Longman Group Ltd.
Leech, G. H. and Short, M. H. (1981).Style in Fiction: A Linguistic Introduction to English Fictional Prose: Longman, London.
Mode,M.A. (2016).‘The ABC of Stylistics: a preliminary investigation’.International Journal of Humanities and Social Science Invention. 4(10):13-17.
Ojeniyi, G.K.(2016) ‘Religion and Cultural Values in African Traditional Societies: Focus on Yoruba Society of Western Nigeria’ Review in Social Sciences(RISS). 14(1):34-41.
