Languages and Literatures in Africa?

Abstract

The study provides an overview of the diversity of African languages and the literature written in African languages. In the analysis, the author points to the biggest question mark in the life of African literatures, i.e. for decades, to whom, to which audience, for whom they are produced, whom they are intended to address. He concludes that (1) only an approximate picture of African languages and their numbers can be given, at best on the basis of estimates, even if the order of magnitude is clear, and (2) as far as the process of their becoming literary languages is concerned, it is not easy to trace, on the one hand, new literary experiments are still being produced using an African language not yet in use as a basic medium, but even when they reach local publication, they are mostly (at least for the time being) not found in European libraries and thus cannot be noted.