African community has
been subjected to migration, thanks to flourishing slave trade, since the
historic ages. During their forced migration, the Diaspora community maintained
its age-old tradition of oral storytelling in their new homes across the
foreign lands. The themes of the stories naturally revolved around their native
land, abandoned homes and indigenous cultures. This tradition kept itself alive
in spite of unbelievable adversities.
At a later stage, this
culture exhibited itself in form of slave narratives. This genre of literature
became exceptionally popular across the society dominated by whites. In fact,
these slave narratives were the first batch of literature that was ever
published by the African Diaspora authors. The range
of literature provided firsthand accounts of life under slavery and exposed the
brutality and vulnerability that slaves used to face in the hands of so-called
civilized society.
However, the range of
literature also exhibits the indomitable dignity that at least some of the men
and women of black community possessed even in that unbelievably oppressive situation.
It is this sense of dignity that enabled those folks to scribe their life’s
experiences in words for the future generations to know. In course of time,
life changed somewhat for better for these people living in foreign lands. Gradually,
the Diaspora community had to wage incessant struggle to gain freedom and
equality in their adopted countries. As such, the age of conflict for this
people to gain recognition and respect continued for long, stretching across
centuries.
This entire period of
struggle actually facilitated the growth and maturity of the Diaspora
literature of Africa. The genre of literature obviously reflects the changing
social norms and the shifting cultural and political realities with the advent
of the new age. Interestingly, the fraternity of authors did not lose its
inherent bonding with the unique cultural heritage that was inherited from
Africa by sheer birthright.
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