Juju Fission

Women, especially leaders, holding tête-à-têtes with men to address political impasses have been recognized as shrewd, double headed, or witchlike distinctions that link them with juju or extraordinary, survivalist powers. Juju Fission: Women’s Alternative Fictions from the Sahara, the Kalahari, and the Oases In-Between is a theoretical and analytical book on African women writers that focuses on seven representative novels from different parts of Africa: Bessie Head’s Maru (South Africa/Botswana); Nawal El Saadawi’s Woman at Point Zero (Egypt); Ama Ata Aidoo’s Our Sister Killjoy; or Reflections from a Black-Eyed Squint and Changes (Ghana); Assia Djebar’s A Sister to Scheherazade (Algeria); Calixthe Beyala’s The Sun Hath Looked Upon Me (Cameroon); and Yvonne Vera’s Nehanda (Zimbabwe). In her analysis, Chikwenye Okonjo Ogunyemi demonstrates how women are viewed and how they operate in critical times. Ogunyemi explains how the heritage is passed on, in spite of dire situations emanating from colonialism, postcolonialism, ethnicism, sexism, and grinding poverty. An important contribution to many fields, Juju Fission is excellent background material for courses on African studies, women’s studies, African Diaspora studies, black studies, global studies, and general literature studies.