Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature
Ngugi wa Thiong'o
His farewell to English as a language of fiction.
In these essays the novelist argues that language was colonialism's most effective weapon, carrying the culture and worldview that guns alone could not impose. Choosing to write his fiction in Gikuyu rather than English, Ngugi frames the abandonment of European languages as necessary to reconnect African literature with the people it claims to serve. He draws directly on his own detention without trial.
Its legacy. It became a central, much-debated text of postcolonial and language politics worldwide.
- Author
- Ngugi wa Thiong'o
- First published
- 1986
- Genre
- Literary criticism
- Theme
- Liberation and the Decolonized Mind
More from Liberation and the Decolonized Mind
- The Wretched of the Earth — Frantz Fanon
The psychiatrist of the Algerian revolution anatomizes colonial violence.
- Neo-Colonialism: The Last Stage of Imperialism — Kwame Nkrumah
Independence on paper, control in practice.
- Return to the Source — Amilcar Cabral
Culture as a weapon of the liberation struggle.
- I Write What I Like — Steve Biko
The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.