Vers une nouvelle colonisation : le roman du dictateur francophone subsaharien et caribéen

This study proposes to examine the representation of neo-colonialist governments in black Francophone novels. The dissertation examines the modes and means by which several post-independences writers depict, portray, represent and, to some extent, codify within their texts the tactics of neo-colonial governmental leaders. Most compellingly, the authorial voices here invoked avail themselves, though here in literary terms, of methods and strategies notably reminiscent of their former masters. These post independence writers depict leaders who are brutal and contemptuous of those they govern, motivated by a need for power and supremacy over their subjects, and in their quest to dominate the people, they embrace many of the same tactics, strategies, and attitudes of former colonial masters. Ultimately, then, historical reality gives way to a series of textual counterparts, each of which, in turn, brings us back, literarily, to the era of socio-political denigration that occasioned them. The authors chosen for our study come from francophone Sub-Saharan African and Caribbean countries with intensive dictatorships. Writers included come from Guyana (Damas), Haiti (Victor, Chauvet), Cameroon (Nganang, Beti), Congo (Tansi) and Senegal (Diop). Despite their different locales and time periods, all the writers included depict leaders whose unsavory behavior is modeled on the tyrannical practices prevalent in the colonial regime they replaced. Like their colonial counterparts, these neocolonialist dictators use physical force to control and silence opposition, and actively promote social divisiveness so as to maintain their own privilege and power. Because it is a type of governance based on the colonial model of brutality and repression, it leads to an endless cycle of violence and suffering. These writers seem to be offering a unified message: until formerly colonized francophone leaders liberate themselves from colonial practices and influence, independence will be an ever-elusive quest.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph. D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Romance languages and literature (MU)

Grantor dc:publisher

University of Missouri--Columbia

Year dc:date.issued

2020

Author dc:creator

• Domle, Falone

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Muratore, Mary Jo

Statement dc:rights

• OpenAccess.

Language dc:language.iso

eng, fre, English, French

DOI

https://doi.org/10.32469/10355/79480

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:mospace.umsystem.edu:10355/79480