Type
Text
Type
Dissertation
Advisor
Pérez Melgosa, Adrián | Vernon, Kathleen M | Charnon-Deutsch, Lou. | Flesler, Daniela | Sampedro Vizcaya, Benita.
Date
2017-08-01
Keywords
Hispanic Americans | Afro-Hispanic studies | Hispanic Studies | Migration studies | Post-colonial studies
Department
Department of Hispanic Languages and Literature.
Language
en_US
Source
This work is sponsored by the Stony Brook University Graduate School in compliance with the requirements for completion of degree
Identifier
http://hdl.handle.net/11401/78347
Publisher
The Graduate School, Stony Brook University: Stony Brook, NY.
Format
application/pdf
Abstract
This dissertation explores the ideological and physical movements from Africa to Europe and vice-versa during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. I compare different perspectives on displacement and cultural transit between Africa and Europe, focusing on Spain and Italy, as they represent crucial points in the conceptualization of contemporary crossings to Europe. The hybrid cultural productions authored by those who cross the borders to and from Europe are of paramount importance because, as I argue, they provide an entry point into a powerful social cultural imaginary constructed during the colonial period that continues to be present and operate today. Chapter One focuses on Afran and Kikoko’s artistic production. I argue that European countries tend to ignore the originality of the migrant subjects’ African cultural practices and I show how these artists reaffirm their African traditions from a modern perspective. The second and third chapters deal more specifically with representations of African migration to Europe through the literary and theatrical works of the Guinean writers Recaredo Silebo Boturu, Donato Ndongo Bidyogo and Maximiliano Nkogo Esono, placing them in dialogue with the works of the Moroccan poet Abderrahman El Fathi and the Ethiopian film-maker Dagmawi Yimer. I argue that these cultural production invert the distorted images of the migrant subject, propose new concepts of borders, and destabilize European countries’ concepts of national purity. Chapter four focuses on the fang woman (an ethnicity of Equatorial Guinea) through the literary production of Trifona Melibea Obono Ntutumu. I highlight how the European imaginary about the African woman is determined by western contamination, and show how she claims independence from any gendered spaces. In the last chapter, I adopt a visual studies approach to analyze present-day constructions about the migratory movements from Europe to Africa in the twentieth century. I demonstrate how colonial symbolism operates and how Africa was depicted as a migratory haven for European nations seeking an alternative to their economic crisis. Implementing a multidisciplinary perspective this dissertation studies cultural manifestations, emphasizing how African cultural productions deconstruct Western ideologies of modernity and superiority and renegotiate the colonial legacy in an era of globalization and capitalism. | 216 pages
Recommended Citation
Licata, Stefania, "Tránsitos entre África y Europa: Proyectos culturales e imaginarios postcoloniales" (2017). Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions). 3841.
https://commons.library.stonybrook.edu/stony-brook-theses-and-dissertations-collection/3841