Description
This is a major project that will confirm Wendy Griswold's status as one of the premier sociologists of literature working today. It is singular in the way it systematizes and enriches our understanding of the context in which literature is produced and how context shapes the content of the work. That Griswold does this for Africa is even more remarkable... That Nigeria is the most populous African country with one of the most lively literary cultures makes the book even more significant for our understanding of intellectual production in cultural peripheries. This topic is likely to become increasingly important as we become more aware of the impact of globalization processes on national cultures. -- Michele Lamont, Princeton University
About the Author
Wendy Griswold is joint Professor of Sociology and English and Comparative Literature at Northwestern University. She is the author of Renaissance Revivals: City Comedy and Revenge Tragedy in the London Theatre, 1576-1980 and Cultures and Societies in a Changing World as well as coeditor of Literature and Social Practice and Places within, places beyond: the question of Norwegian regionalism in literature.
Reviews
Winner of the 2002 Best Book Award "By using extensive interviews with publishers, booksellers, and readers, along with surveys and her own insights into the novels, Griswold offers on of the few truly comprehensive views of the world of literature in Africa. It is also a wonderfully optimistic book that suggests the vitality of the written word in contemporary Nigerian life."--Choice "Griswold wears her learning lightly, using footnotes to show broader debates, keeping her text uncluttered... Bearing Witness provides a useful counterbalance to much detached, contemporary literary criticism; it demonstrates the needs for novels to be examined by scholars from a variety of disciplines."--James Gibbs, World Literature Today "It is rare to find an American scholar so committed to and successful in melding the approaches of the social sciences and the humanities as Griswold does."--Vera Zolberg, American Journal of Sociology "To those readers who have explicit memories of Nigeria, whether good or not so good: Please read Wendy Griswold's Bearing Witness. And likewise to those who have never been to Nigeria: please read Grisworld's book. In other words, for anyone with an interest in historical political, cultural, and literary development in Nigeria (and Africa in general), Bearing Witness is a very good book."--Glen Bush, African Studies Review
Awards
Winner of American Sociological Association Culture Section Distinguished Book Award 2002.
Book Information
ISBN 9780691058290
Author Wendy Griswold
Format Paperback
Page Count 376
Imprint Princeton University Press
Publisher Princeton University Press
Weight(grams) 539g