Andrew Ate Agera
Department of English and Literary Studies,
College of Education,
Katsina-Ala, Benue State, Nigeria.
e-mail: [email protected]
Elizabeth Hembadoon Kankwe
GNS Department,
Akperan Orshi Polytechnic,
Yandev, Benue State.
e-mail: [email protected]
Abstract
African literature is a representation of the crisis within the African society, which had never been assessed properly by the world earlier. The spread of imperialism in Africa has created areas of political influence and domination, which naturally produced a far-reaching influence in the growth of African literature. One of the greatest contributors to this growth is Chinua Achebe who has captured the encounter between the colonizer Westerner and the colonized African from various perspectives. This paper analyzes his novel, A Man of the People which centres on the aftermath of colonization when the newly independent nation is still struggling to come to terms with its newly acquired “freedom”. The newly created independent society is characterized by hybridity, which is the defining function of the relations between the characters. The paper delves into the nature and function of hybridizarion in an effort to render meaningfully the African encounter with historical change and cultural crisis that ensued in the wake of independence.
Keywords: Hybridization, Imperialism, Multiculturalism.
