The university has created a new academic department devoted to the study of the African Diaspora, the movement of Africans and their descendants to places throughout the world, particularly the descendants of black Africans who were enslaved and brought to the western hemisphere.
In this first installment of an audio portrait series that explores the African Diaspora, Dr. Jennifer Wilks, an associate professor of English and African and African American Studies, discusses a 1939 poem by Aimé Césaire that reflects on the conditions of people of African descent under colonialism. Césaire was an early proponent of recognizing and celebrating blackness and the African cultural heritage of those in the diaspora throughout the world. He is considered to be one of the greatest poets of the French language and in all of literature.
Read the transcript of the interview (PDF).
