Writing In-Between Lecture Series
Florida Atlantic University
Department of Languages Linguistics and Comparative Literature -Italian Program
and
Department of English
present
Monday September 19 at 7:00 PM
PA101
Kossi Komla-Ebri
Abstract
Culture and Literature as Instruments of Communication and Identity.
Kossi A. KOMLA-EBRI
Kossi A. KOMLA-EBRI
Can literature, and in particular migration literature, lead to knowledge
and liberation?
Knowledge assumes a self-meeting and more generally, a meeting with
others -the other different from himself- object or subject of knowledge.
This encounter requires a place, a space, an agora, a square.
Literature, and migration literature especially, allows us to create this
virtual meeting place.
Moreover, knowledge understood as the acquisition of education and
learning, requires awareness, understanding and openness of the self. This
consequently necessitates the creation of a virtual place where other
people can be accommodated.
For the migrant writer the choice to write in the host country’s language,
in our case Italian, arises from the need to communicate, to be known; no
one better than himself, can open a window onto the customs and
traditions of his homeland.
We write in Italian to Italians (and not only to them).
As jugglers at the court of opulence, we joust with the language of
Dante, Manzoni, Calvino and Moravia using dexterity, humor, subtlety
and sometimes irreverence.
and liberation?
Knowledge assumes a self-meeting and more generally, a meeting with
others -the other different from himself- object or subject of knowledge.
This encounter requires a place, a space, an agora, a square.
Literature, and migration literature especially, allows us to create this
virtual meeting place.
Moreover, knowledge understood as the acquisition of education and
learning, requires awareness, understanding and openness of the self. This
consequently necessitates the creation of a virtual place where other
people can be accommodated.
For the migrant writer the choice to write in the host country’s language,
in our case Italian, arises from the need to communicate, to be known; no
one better than himself, can open a window onto the customs and
traditions of his homeland.
We write in Italian to Italians (and not only to them).
As jugglers at the court of opulence, we joust with the language of
Dante, Manzoni, Calvino and Moravia using dexterity, humor, subtlety
and sometimes irreverence.
