Emmanuel Saboro’s scientific contributions

Drawing on an eclectic theoretical formulation, this paper explores how African writers reconfigure futurity by focusing on representations of masculinities, space and trauma using Adichie’s Purple Hibiscus. The central animating principle in this paper is that scholarship on gender relations within the last decade have shifted from placing the female at the centre of discourse to more diversified discussions – particularly to frame the experiences of the male as a site for a counter-discourse. Emerging debates, have largely focused on the heterogeneity of the masculine experience, de-affirming the oppressive patriarchal default of being and spatial markers that define maleness. There is also now a new surge of scholarly interests on the relevance of trauma in postcolonial contexts mainly focusing on trauma and related themes such as testimony, trauma and power, memory and survival. While these studies serve as critical interventions within the literature, the seemingly neglect of re-reading the interconnectedness between masculinities, spatiality and post-colonial traumas deprives us of a better appreciation of the critical utopias in African literary imagination.