| dc.description.abstract | This article assesses the evolving Kiswahili poetry aesthetics and argues that the art
is an African prodigy. It evaluates the arguments of both the conservatives and the
liberals in the debate and asserts that the identities which the two camps tend to
front are tenuous considering that they straddle the general and the specific. Based
on the constructionist theory, the article analyses the standpoints of the conservatives
and the liberals in the debate and contends that they reveal three subsets
of identities: the Swahili, the Africans and the universal. The article unearths the
various methods that have been employed to ascribe Kiswahili poetry to such
identities and argues that they mainly derive from some generalised and unstable
postulations – facets such as historical epochs, orality and literacy, geography,
language, literature, social class, religion and gender. By referring to the same
facets, while also taking into account Kiswahili’s poetry medium of dissemination, its
authors and consumers, functionality, aesthetics and locality, the article asserts that
the art is after all an African genius. | en_US |
