The first offensive thing people say about
early African literature
is that it doesn’t exist, see my thread:
https://twitter.com/WendyLBelcher/status/1176515878894092289?s=20 …
The second offensive thing they say is that
it is all derivative.
#AfricanArchive
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When I told everyone involved to stop spreading this misinformation about Ethiopian literature, however inadvertently, they wouldn’t. They were just correcting an entry, they said. Why are you getting upset, they said? They couldn't care about the misinformation. 5/
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Unfortunately, people feel free to assert things about African literature in ways they wouldn’t about other bodies of literature they know nothing about. And then not to care about the consequences of such. So, here I am to explain the facts about this Ethiopian collection. 6/
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Stories about Mary first began in Jerusalem and then were told in Syria and other parts of the Levant. And then were told and written down in Europe. Pace this fact, people often say that these stories began in Europe, specifically in France. Typical Eurocentrism. 7/
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Stories continued to circulate, and one European collection of these Levant and European stories was translated into Arabic in Egypt in the 1200s. Perhaps thirty to forty of those stories were translated into Ge’ez (Ethiopic) in Ethiopia in the late 1300s. 8/
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In the centuries after, Ethiopians added hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of their own stories, with their own unique themes and inflections. It is a vast and vital body of African literature which most people know nothing about. 9/
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If you are interested in knowing more, you can read about one such extraordinary story, the Cannibal of Qemer, which includes our translation of it. 10/ https://muse.jhu.edu/article/729804
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So, please stop saying that early African literature is derivative. It isn’t. And please stop acting like ignorance, and refusing to stop and do some research, is any defense for spreading misinformation. It isn't.
#Africanarchive 11/11Show this thread
End of conversation
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I was really excited to follow you based on your earlier threads, but I'm appalled that now, instead of providing a correction to what the BL catalog says, you attacked a scholar asking for help understanding. And doubled down.
Thanks. Twitter will use this to make your timeline better. UndoUndo
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