African-language Literatures ─ Perspectives on IsiZulu Fiction and Popular Black Television Series

In "African-Language Literatures, " Innocentia Jabulisile Mhlambi charts new directions in the study of African-language literatures generally, and isiZulu fiction in particular. She proposes that African popular arts and culture models be considered as a logical solution to the debates and challenges informing discourses about expressive forms in African languages. Mhlambi shows how this approach brings into relationship the oral and written forms, the local and the international, the elitist and popular genres, and she places the resultant emerging, eclectic culture into its socio-historical context. She uses this theoretical approach to explore what matters or what is of interest to the people, irrespective of social hierarchies and predispositions. It is the author's contention that the African-language literary tradition displays diversity, complexity, and fluidity.

Innocentia Jabulisile Mhlambi is a senior lecturer and Head of Department in the Department of African Languages at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.