Kwani Lit Fest, will take place next month. I read this interview of Binyavanga Wainaina on Pambazuka News (”the American students who come for the festival, for instance, are often disoriented when they arrive and they realize that they are not there to teach us how to write, but rather to learn”) and was struck by the following paragraph:
I am quite resentful of identity politics. The American notion of it has become “memeness.” What is this ? It’s me-me ness, narcissism and egocentrism if I understood well, disguised as empowerment. I recently read a short story about a Hawaiin-American girl working as a volunteer in Lamu who was offended when people there called her “China-girl.” She read this as racism, as a rejection of her cosmopolitan identity. Her pose as a victim, through this issue of identity really irritated me. In such cases, identity politics is a language that has permeated the system and ceased to be useful. It is strongly linked to the location of power. I have met many Kenyan students in the USA who tell me they don’t know who they are, but I just feel like telling them, “you are simply Kenyans living in the USA, what is so problematic about this?
I don’t adhere to the Rushdian notion of global citizen, because I have trouble seeing exactly what it means. Identity is the product of so many commitments, ideas, and natural circumstances.”
If you have not done so yet, you have to read Binyavanga Wainaina’s satire on How to write about Africa, it is a classic.
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