Narrating African Migration: Perspectives and Chronotopes in Narrative Strategies

This article adopts an illustrative approach to draw attention to the significance, scope and depth of a large range of African writers' migration narratives -exploring aspects ranging from the forces propelling these movements to ways in which they are experienced and the consequences of displacement and relocation.Literature in its affective dimension is equipped to mediate imaginative and empathetic access to the emotional consequences of displacement.Literary narratives have both informative and analytical dimensions and, by means of vivid evocation of complex situations, create contextualising representations that facilitate understanding of intertwined geographic and chronological factors, including political, social and cultural-familial influences on migrants' choices.Beyond a few 'big names,' African literature remains insufficiently appreciated.The article attempts to provide glimpses of some of these authors' aesthetic achievements.To provide its readers with something of a map to access the vast topic, selected scholarly commentaries are referenced, while the bibliography lists published English translations of texts written in other languages.