Academic and author of ‘Against Wildlife Republics: Conservation and Imperialist Expansion in Africa’ Aby Sène, believes pan-Africanism should not be presented in an alienating way: ‘To me, before any theory or ideology, pan-Africanism is first and foremost an instinct, an intense love for global Blackness that includes love towards all Africans across the globe, including the poor and working-class African, the agrarian African, the queer African, the incarcerated African, and so on.’
First Draft is our interview column, featuring authors and other prominent figures on books, reading, and writing.
Our questions are italicized.
What books or kinds of books did you read growing up?
I grew up in several Francophone West African countries and attended French schools in Senegal, where I was born, then Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso. And so, the literary works that I was mostly exposed to was from Francophone Africa, and from the post-independence period. The books I read were the classics set in the post-independence period from authors such as Maraima Ba, Aminata Sow Fall, Amadou Hampate Ba, Camara Laye and Ahmadou Kourouma. Because I attended French schools for most my childhood, we also read the classic French literature from Molière, Victor Hugo and Candide Voltaire...