Guadeloupean writer Maryse Condé is adept at transnationalism. Not only does she have a firsthand knowledge of the Diaspora (she was married to a Guinean, lived in Guinea, the Ivory Coast, Ghana, Senegal, Great Britain, and taught for years in the US) but the characters in her novels travel the world as well. What becomes of the interactions within the Diaspora in Condé’s books? The Last of the African Kings examines the links between Africa, the place of origin, and its Diaspora of Guadeloupe and South Carolina. As the two leading personas, an African American wife belonging to the southern black elite and her Guadeloupean French husband descended from a Dahomayan king, get acquainted with each other’s milieu and confront their divergent opinions while they cross borders, the question of (African) lineage arises in poignant terms. In the Diaspora, who is genuinely African? How African are black Americans? Can French Antilleans be trusted with their blackness? Condé voices some of the preconceived ideas and stereotypical assertions entertained by both groups vis-à-vis each other. Dr. Alix Pierre examines the way the writer uses a couple of mixed African ancestry to discuss the loaded concepts of identity formation, race as a social construct, Diaspora, post traumatic slave syndrome and the relationship between Africa and the children of the African exile as they manifest themselves in contemporary black circles.
Location: ACE Lounge