The relevant task of forging Guinea-Bissau: the prose of Odete Semedo and Abdulai Sila

Abstract

The general aim of this thesis is to reflect on memory and the places of memory symbolically constructed in prose texts by Guinean writers Odete Semedo and Abdulai Sila. The aim is to discuss how texts are constructed by writers from a culture where orality is still very strong and present in all spheres of social life. It also seeks to reflect on how the concept of “places of memory”, originally developed in the field of History and later disseminated to Geography and Sociology, can be appropriated by literary studies as a theoretical operator in the discussion of memory narratives. This concept also allows us to think about the configurations of the physical places of memory staged in the literary texts of the selected Guinean writers and their meanings in the fictional space, as well as highlighting the narrative strategies used by Odete Semedo and Abdulai Sila to create texts that are constructed with an appeal to the modulations of orality and aspects of Guinea's historical past. The elements highlighted in the writers' works make it possible to assess the role of memory in the design of aesthetically politicized projects that bring literary features of Guineanness into play.