The dynamics of subversion and resistance in Ahmadou Kouroma's novels

For many years since the foundation of Negritude by Senghor, Cesaire, and Damas, Francophone West African novelists have tried their best to emulate French authors by adjusting African culture and language to the French. The appearance of Ahmadou Kourouma on the African literary scene in 1968 brought a dramatic shift in the relations between French and African languages in general and particularly between French and Malinke language. Kourouma no longer seeks to copy his predecessors but rather to inscribe Malinke in postcolonial literature as a supplement to French.;The burlesque and carnival are the means that Kourouma uses to ridicule power and authority.;Based on literary and postcolonial theories by Bakhtin, Ashcroft, Zabus, Bhabha, and Gramsci a set of arguments was designed to appraise Kourouma's novels both as fiction and historical narratives dealing with events that shaped Malinke (African) lives from colonial conquest to independence and beyond.;In the light of these theories, Kourouma's style proceeds from abrogation to appropriation in order to establish Malinke as a supplement to French. Such a move results from the quasi impossibility for French to erase Malinke after years of colonial domination. Thus, the cohabitation of French and Malinke in Kourouma's novels becomes evidence that strengthens Bhabha's claim for a third literary space. The quest for literary identity that Kourouma's novels underpin is resolved because postcolonial African literature must reflect current linguistic changes.;The intent of this dissertation is to present an argument for the position that Kourouma's novels offer two levels of subversion that develops through form and content. First, Kourouma gets rid of some of the rules governing the French language. Then, he denounces postcolonial African regimes that threaten people's freedom. His assault on French finds a counterpart in the attack on colonial and postcolonial powers. The artificial corruption of French by the Malinke language corresponds to an intentional denial of dictatorial regimes' tight hold on their people's destiny.;Finally, History is no longer viewed as a superstructure but as a combination of individual testimonies on events that affect people differently. For Kourouma, official History is always questionable.