New Daughters of Africa

by Margaret Busby

  Dọlapọ had been sent out of the room twice for introducing herself as Lapo and Olap. Finally she had come up with Dolly.

  “Take a seat, Dolly,” her mentor said. “Now we’ve given you a name, let’s talk about your hair.”

  Dọlapọ loved the afro now hidden under her weave, loved its untameable, uncombable sprawl, loved the extra inches it added to her height, loved the mushroom silhouette of her head in photos, loved hair that grew up instead of down, gravity-defying, extra-terrestrial hair.

  “That’s fine if you want to work in advertising or publishing, or media, or fashion, or maybe even engineering, but certainly not banking,” Daisy said.

  “My friends like it.”

  “White friends or black?”

  “Does it really matter?”

  “White or black?”

  “Mostly white.”

  “They think its funky, edgy and cool, don’t they?”

  “What’s wrong with that.”

  “Never elegant, chic, glamorous; these are the adjectives we use for women in banking. These are the adjectives for success. As a black woman, let me be honest, when you walked into this room, what I saw was unprofessional, unkempt and unserious.”

  She had been paired with Daisy by Diversity Unlimited, a recruitment firm that helped companies fill up their ethnic minority quota. Daisy had worked for seven years in an investment bank. Daisy carried a red leather bag with slim, curved handles, discreet, silver, letters spelling out PRADA under the zip. Daisy wore structured dresses, thin black heels, milky pearls, minimal lipstick, dramatic eye shadow and cascading hair that swept below her shoulders. Daisy’s hair cost a thousand pounds.

  Dọlapọ’s more modest purchase came in a black cardboard box, edged with gold curlicue. The hair lay lustrous on a bed of crepe, folded into itself like a small, sleek creature, a sable or a mink. Her aunt had gone with her to the salon, leafing through magazines as they wove Dọlapọ’s afro into lines and then stitched the human hair to hers, tight-running stitches that made her eyes water. She skyped her parents in Nigeria once she got home.

  “Ọpẹ o,” her mother sang, her face large and happy on the screen. “Thank God you’ve finally gotten rid of that bush. Darling, come and see your eldest daughter.” The tablet was passed to Dọlapọ’s father.

  “Dọla dearest, you look beautiful. You always look beautiful. Afro, weave-on, whatever. I’m so proud of you.” He was the more emotional of the two, prone to bursts of affirmation, fed by his unvaried diet of American motivational books. You are what you eat, what you say, what you think, mantras he repeated like sutras.

  “Thanks, Dad. I’m going to go to bed now. This weave is giving me a headache.”

  “Beauty is pain,” her mother said in the background.

  That first night, with her new hair tucked under a net, she dreamt she was on a cart, her legs dangling over the platform and trailing above short grass. Her tongue lay in her mouth like a pebble, smooth and dry. The cart swayed through the hot field, the wooden wheels creaking and rumbling on the axle, twenty noisy revolutions per minute. An ant crawled up her leg. Her calf was slim, thinner than she had ever wanted to be, almost wasted. She flicked the insect away. A bracelet of red, plastic beads stirred on her wrist. It was not her body she realised as she crossed from dream into her cold bedroom in Hampstead.

  All through her lectures that day, the field rose before her like a sentimental painting, a bourgeois imagining of rural life: green grass, blue sky, wooden cart. The professor spoke of economic structures in medieval Europe, of peasant families and agricultural networks.

  “You look so different,” her friend Priscilla said, as they walked to the tube.

  “Different how?”

  “Just different. I liked your afro.”

  “It’s under here somewhere.”

  “But how does it work? Whose hair is it?”

  “Does it matter? I need to look this way to work in a bank.”

  Priscilla did not ask what she meant. Priscilla, with her corn-coloured, lank hair would never need to know what Dọlapọ meant. Instead Priscilla asked:

  “Who studies history and goes off to work in a bank?”

  “I’m not you. I can’t just become the director of Daddy’s luxury tea company.”

  Priscilla’s blue eyes widened. “That’s so unnecessary, Dollop. It’s not like your parents aren’t rich.”

  “I’m calling myself Dolly now,” she said, as the barriers clattered open.

  Dọlapọ had read somewhere that cheese gave strange dreams. That second night, she exchanged her bedtime snack of Brie and two crackers for carrot and hummus. She dreamt she was on the back of the cart again, fresh vegetables and fruit crowding around her. It had rained and the field had turned to mud.

  “Sunita,” someone said.

  She looked back and saw two bullocks, their horns rising like pale crescents, sharp tipped and dangerous. They were pulling the cart, their shoulder blades rolling with each step.

  “My name is Dọlapọ Owolabi,” she said when she woke up. “My name is Dọlapọ Owolabi,” she muttered as she rode on the tube, the ground beneath her a black mudslide. In the windows, she saw the marble eyes of a bullock.

  The third night, she was afraid to sleep. Her first interview was tomorrow and she couldn’t sleep. Daisy had called her that evening to ask what she thought of the falling oil prices. Dọlapọ had not heard.

  “I’ve told you. You have to be going over the financial pages. Have you done your hair?”

  “Yes. I was wondering, do you know where it comes from? Is it Brazil?”

  “Well, it’s called Brazilian hair but it’s mostly from India. The women sell it to make money for their families. I read something about getting the hair from temples as well but I don’t know if I believe that. Anyway, focus, Dolly, and tell me the difference between a stock and a bond.”

  When she got off the phone, she stared at the high Victorian ceiling of her bedroom. The house was hollow without her parents and two brothers. They were safely asleep in Nigeria. Who could she call? Her English friends wouldn’t get it, her Nigerian cousins would tell her to get a grip. Get a grip, Dọlapọ, she said to herself.

  This time Dọlapọ dreamt she was in a cool, dark room. She put her hands on the walls, pitted mud walls that her fingers slid into. There was an earthen bowl in front of her. She drank from it and tasted buffalo milk, fat and creamy, freshly squeezed from an udder that morning.

  “Sunita, stop dawdling. Hurry so you won’t be late for school.”

  She stepped into the sunlight, into a lane with other huts with brown walls and grey thatched roofs, thatch made from woven grass reeds and coconut leaves. There were other children emerging in blue and white uniforms.

  “Sunita, where’s your hair?” a little boy with dirty knees asked. She ran her hand over her scalp and felt the stubble of new growth bristling against her palm.

  “Baldie,” he chanted behind her as they walked to school. “Baldie, Baldie.”

  She waited until the huts were out of sight and then she flung her bag to the ground.

  “Your mother is a baldie!”

  She launched herself at her tormentor and they fell to the ground.

  Dọlapọ woke with her legs still thrashing. She went to her dressing-table and brushed out Sunita’s hair. She could still feel herself rolling in the Indian dirt, kicking and spitting and scratching. She hoped she won. Nobody messed with Sunita and nobody messed with her. She flicked her weave over her shoulder, glamorous for one last time and then she found a razor and began to slit the stitches that bound her and Sunita together.

  Six hours later, Dọlapọ walked into a room in Canary Wharf, in a structured dress, thin black heels, a single strand of pearls and her hair combed out to its tallest and widest, a globe of an afro, space for Europe, Africa and Asia on her head.

  “Hello, good morning. I’m Dọlapọ Owolabi.”

  “Morning, I’m Mike
Jones. Is there a name you prefer to be called by?”

  “Just Dọlapọ is fine.”

  “Please take a seat, Dọlapọ, and tell us why you want to work in banking.”

  Acknowledgements

  Back in 1989, I met a young editor called Candida Lacey, from feminist publishers Pandora Press, who had just brought out An Anthology of British Women Writers (edited by Dale Spender and Janet Todd). We talked of the need to rectify the absence of black women from the literary canon, and I agreed to take on the world single-handedly with her commissioning me to compile Daughters of Africa: An International Anthology of Words and Writings by Women of African Descent from the Ancient Egyptian to the Present. Then I became a sort of literary stalker. Pandora transitioned to HarperCollins, and I followed; I was right behind Candida when she moved on to Jonathan Cape, where Daughters of Africa was eventually published in 1992. Twenty-five years later, with the original long out of print, and Candida now publisher of Myriad Editions, along came the notion of a completely new edition.

  Thank you, Elise Dillsworth, for kickstarting the idea, and thank you again, Candida, for running with it with so enthusiastically. Your hands-on commitment to New Daughters of Africa demonstrates everything one could wish for in a publisher. And gratitude aplenty for the dedication of the Myriad-New Internationalist team—seen and unseen—including Corinne Pearlman, Kelsi Farrington, Dawn Sackett, Emma Dowson, Anna Burtt, Charley Chapman, Linda McQueen . . .

  Brilliant backup from the US came in the person of Stephanie Steiker, whose efforts resulted in the welcome partnership with Amistad.

  I owe more than I can ever express to my siblings—George and Eileen—who have been by my side from day one, ready to help whenever and however necessary, including with translations. Other family members around the world continue to be loyal cheerleaders and keep me going in various ways—Allyson, Phyllis, Moira, Natalie, Ibrahim, Jamil, Kathryn . . .

  Innumerable friends (which category embraces contributors too—you know who you are) and colleagues gave time, encouragement, practical help, and occasionally much-needed chocolate. To mention just a few: Pauline Melville; Burt Caesar; Joan Harris; Christopher MacLehose; Irene Staunton; Sylvester Onwordi, son of the late Buchi Emecheta; Eve Lacey; Miranda Pyne; Ike Anya; Nicola Cross; Nuruddin Farah; Lorna Goodison; Mandla Langa; the late Ernest Hecht; Bibi Bakare-Yusuf; Polly Pattullo; Pedro Perez Sarduy; Vanessa La Rose; Martina Attille; Rick Jones; Ishmahil Blagrove; Rob Watson; Nicholas Laughlin; Val Wilmer; Suzanne Roden; Richard Hoare . . .

  How fortunate I am to have Luke Daniels in my life, providing sustenance, sharing the good times and keeping me on my toes. There is no one I’d rather go dancing with!

  Which brings me to music, without which I can’t function, so the soundtrack of NDOA features Aaron, Abbey, Abdullah, Ahmad, Al, Albert, Alberta, Alexander, Ali, Alice, Alicia, Alick, Althea, Amadou, Amakye, Andra, Andy, Angela, Angelique, Anita, Ann, Anne-Marie, Antonio, Archie, Aretha, Art, Arthur, Asa, Aston, Astor, Ayanna, Baaba, Baba, Babs, Barbara, Barry, Bébé, Bebo, Ben, Benny, Beres, Bessie, Betty, Bettye, Beverley, Beyoncé, Bheki, Bi, Bill, Billie, Billy, Bob, Bobby, Bonga, Booker, Brandi, Brenda, Brian, Brook, Bruno, Bud, Buddy, Burt, Byron, Caetano, Cal, Cannonball, Carl, Carla, Carlos, Carmen, Carole, Cassandra, Cece, Cecil, CeeLo, Celia, Celina, Cesaria, Chaka, Chano, Charles, Charlie, Cheikh, Chet, Chick, Chucho, Chuck, Cissy, Clarence, Cleo, Cleveland, Cliff, Clifford, Coleman, Corinne, Count, Cuba, Curtis, Daddy, Dakota, Damian, Dave, David, Dawn, Dee Dee, Della, Denise, Denyse, Derrick, Desmond, Des’ree, Dexter, Diana, Diane, Dianne, Dick, Dinah, Dionne, Dizzy, Dobet, Dolly, Don, Donna, Donnie, Donny, Dorothy, Duke, Eartha, Ed, Eddie, Eddy, Edwin, Elizabeth, Ella, Ennio, Eric, Erma, Ernestine, Ernie, Erroll, Erykah, Esperanza, Esther, E.T., Etta, Fats, Fela, Femi, Filomena, Fontella, Francis, Frank, Freda, Freddie, Freddy, Fundi, Gary, Gato, Gene, Geoffrey, George, Gil, Gladys, Gloria, Grace, Gregory, Guy, Gwen, Habib, Hank, Harold, Harry, Hazel, Heather, Helen, Herbie, Hope, Horace, Hugh, Inez, Irene, Irma, Isaac, Ivie, Jackie, Jamelia, James, Janet, Jean, Jeff, Jeffrey, Jennifer, Jevetta, Jill, Jim, Jimi, Jimmy, JJ, Joan, Joe, John, Johnnie, Johnny, Jon, Joni, Joseph, Josephine, Joyce, Kadija, Kai, Kaissa, Keith, Ken, Kenny, Ketty, Khadja, Kirk, Kitch, Lauryn, Lee, Lena, Lenny, Leona, Les, Lester, Letta, Linda, Lionel, Lisa, Lizz, Lonnie, Lorez, Lorraine, Lou, Louis, Lucky, Lukie, Luther, Lynn, Ma, Machel, McCoy, Macy, Mahalia, Manu, Marcel, Marcia, Marcus, Maria, Mariah, Mariam, Mariza, Mark, Marlena, Martha, Martinho, Marvin, Mary, Mary Lou, Mavis, Max, Maxine, Maya, Melba, Melissa, Mercedes, Me’shell, Miatta, Michael, Michel, Mildred, Miles, Millie, Milt, Milton, Minnie, Miriam, Mitty, Monica, Monty, Moses, Mwenda, Nana, Nancy, Nat, Natalie, Nawal, Nene, Neneh, Nico, Nikki, Nina, Nneka, Noel, Nona, Norah, Norma, Oleta, Oliver, Omar, Omara, Ornette, Oscar, Otis, Oumou, Owen, Paco, Papa, Pat, Patrice, Patsy, Patti, Paul, Paulinho, Peabo, Peaches, Pearl, Peggy, Percy, Pharoah, Pharrell, Phineas, Phoebe, Phyllis, PP, Prince, Queen, Quincy, Rachelle, Randy, Ray, Rebecca, Red, Regina, Richie, Rita, Roberta, Rokia, Roland, Ronald, Rose, Roy, Ruben, Ruby, Ruth, Ry, Sade, Salena, Salif, Sam, Samantha, Sambou, Sammy, Sarah, Sathima, Sergio, Seydu, Shadow, Sheila, Shirley, Shontelle, Sibongile, Sipho, Slim, Smokey, Solomon, Sona, Sonny, Souad, Sparrow, Stanley, Stephanie, Stevie, Susana, Susheela, Syreeta, Tadd, Taj, Tammi, Tania, Teddy, Thad, Thelma, Thelonious, Thomas, Tina, TK, Tommy, Toni, Tony, Toots, Toumani, Touré, Tracy, Tunde, Tyrone, Virginia, Vusi, Walter, Wasis, Wayne, Wes, Whitney, Wilson, Winston, Wyclef, Wynton, Yemi, Yolanda, Youssou, Yvonne, Yusuf, Zoe, ZZ . . . (stop me when I run out of space, because I won’t run out of names), ABBA . . .

  Copyrights and Permissions

  Most of the work in New Daughters of Africa has been written especially and appears here for the first time; in all of these cases copyright for individual works remains with the author. Copyright for the introduction and this compilation is held by Margaret Busby. For work that has been previously published, the editor and publisher have made every effort to trace the copyright holder and would like to thank those listed below for permission to reproduce the material here. We would be pleased to hear from copyright holders we have not been able to contact and to print due acknowledgement in the next edition.

  YASSMIN ABDEL-MAGIED: “Eulogy for My Career” is an edited version of a speech given at the Melbourne Writers Festival event of the same name on 26 August 2018. SADE ADENIRAN: “The Day I Died” was first published in Ake Review 2017. CHIMAMANDA NGOZI ADICHIE: Extract from We Should All Be Feminists first published by Fourth Estate, 2014, reprinted by permission of the author, copyright © Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 2014. PATIENCE AGBABI: “The Doll’s House”, first published in The Forward Book of Poetry 2014, Forward Worldwide in association with Faber, 2013, copyright © Patience Agbabi 2013, used by permission of the author. AGNÈS AGBOTON: “1” and “30” first published in Modern Poetry in Translation, No. 2, 2016. ANDAIYE: “Audre, There’s Rosemary, That’s For Remembrance (For Audre Lorde)” first appeared in the CAFRA newsletter in 1992. YOLANDA ARROYO PIZARRO: “Midwives (fragment)” was previously published in Negras, stories, Ed. Boreales, 2015. AMMA ASANTE: “The Power of Defining Yourself” was adapted from a TEDx Brixton talk given in December 2014. MILDRED K. BARYA: “Black Stone” was first published in Per Contra Journal, 2012, Issue 26: http://percontra.net. SIMI BEDFORD: Extract from Yoruba Girl Dancing, copyright © Simi Bedford 1991, reproduced by permission of Sheil Land Associates Ltd. LINDA BELLOS: “Age” first appeared in IC3: The Penguin Book of New Black Writing in Britain, edited by Courttia Newland and Kadija Sesay, Penguin, 2001, copyright © Linda Bellos. AMA BINEY: “Creating the New Man in Africa” was first published by Speaking Truth to Power, The Steve Biko Transformative Education Project Online Newsletter, Vol. 1, Issue 2, April 2017. MALIKA BOOKER: “The Conversation—Ruth and Naomi” was published in Poetry Wales in 2016. CANDICE CARTY-WILLIAMS: “Body Hair: Conversations and Conflict” first appeared in “Hot Fuzz”, Refinery 29’s series on body hair. PANASHE CHIGUMADZI: Extract from These Bones W
ill Rise Again, Indigo Press, 2018, copyright © Panashe Chigumadzi 2018. GABRIELLE CIVIL: Reprinted from Swallow the Fish, published February 2017, with permission from Civil Coping Mechanisms Press. MAXINE BENEBA CLARKE: “Hurricane Season” was first broadcast on BBC4 in 2017, then published in print in The Big Issue, Australia, 2017. CAROLYN COOPER: “Finding Romance Online in 2018” was first published in The Gleaner, Sunday, January 7, 2018. META DAVIS CUMBERBATCH: “A Child of Nature (Negro of the Caribbean)”, reprinted by permission of Dr Peter D. Maynard. PATRICIA CUMPER: “Just So Much a Body Can Take” was produced in 1998 by Crucial Films; it was produced by Paulette Randall, directed by Avril E. Russell and starred Claire Benedict. STELLA DADZIE: “Roots” first appeared in TEMBA TUPU! Africana Women’s Poetic Self-Portrait, Africa World Press, 2008, copyright © Stella Abasa Dadzie. NANA-AMA DANQUAH: “Saying Goodbye to Mary Danquah”, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o quoted from a private conversation with the author. EDWIDGE DANTICAT: “Dawn After the Tempests” first published in the New York Times. Copyright © 2017 by Edwidge Danticat, reprinted by permission of Edwidge Danticat and Aragi Inc. YVONNE DENIS ROSARIO: “the roach and the rat at the library”, first published in Capa Prieto, Isla Negra, 2009. Reprinted with permission of the author. CAMILLE T. DUNGY: “From Dirt” first published in Emergence Magazine, No. 2, copyright © Camille T. Dungy. RENI EDDO-LODGE: “Women, Down Your Tools!” first appeared in The Telegraph, 6 October 2014. EVE L. EWING: “The Device” first appeared in her book Electric Arches, Haymarket Books, 2017. DEISE FARIA NUNES: “The person in the boat” first published in Carte Blanche—the Norwegian National Company of Contemporary Dance’s magazine for the performance “We Are Here Together”, 2016. VANGILE GANTSHO: “smallgirl” and “Mama I am burning” previously published in red cotton, impepho press, 2018. ROXANE GAY: “There Is No ‘E’ In Zombi Which Means There Can Be No You Or We” previously published in Guernica, October 1, 2010. DANIELLE LEGROS GEORGES: “Poem for the Poorest Country in the Western Hemisphere”, “Lingua Franca with Flora” and “A Stateless Poem” from The Dear Remote Nearness of You, Barrow Street Press, 2016. “Songs for Women” and “musing” from Maroon, Curbstone Press, 2001. All reprinted with permission of the author. PATRICIA GLINTON-MEICHOLAS: “Remembering, Re-membering”, “Slavery Redux” and “Woman Unconquerable” first published in Patricia Glinton-Meicholas, Chasing Light: A Collection of Poems, Proverse Hong Kong, November 2013, copyright © Proverse Hong Kong, June 2012, November 2013, by kind permission of Proverse Hong Kong. WANGUI WA GORO: “Looking down from Mount Kenya” first published in Pambazuka News, February 5, 2009. RACHEL ELIZA GRIFFITHS: “Chosen Family” was published in The Progressive, October/November 2018. “Seeing the Body” was published in Virginia Quarterly Review, Volume 94, Number 3, Fall 2018. CARMEN HARRIS: “Hello . . . Goodbye” is an extract from Sh*t Happens, Magic Follows (Allow It!) published by O-Books, 2015. ZAKIA HENDERSON-BROWN: “unarmed” was previously published in No, Dear under the title “breaking: dash cam footage”; “A Man Walks into a Bar” was previously published in North American Review; “I Was Getting Out of Your Way” was previously published in The Adroit Journal; “ex-slave with long memory” was previously published in Washington Square Review. NAOMI JACKSON: Extract from The Star Side of Bird Hill, Penguin Press, NY, 2015. MARGO JEFFERSON: “My Monster”—New Daughters of Africa, copyright © Margo Jefferson, used by permission of The Wylie Agency. ETHEL IRENE KABWATO: “Women’s Day” first published in Sunflowers In Your Eyes by Cinnamon Press 2010. DONIKA KELLY: “Sanctuary” has also been published in PoetryNow; “Where We End Up” first published in Foglifter, Vol. 2.2, 2017; “Brood” first published in Sewanee Review, vol. CXXV, no. 4, Fall 2017. ROSAMOND S. KING: “for Isatou for Haddy for Adama for Elle”, Untitled [“each clump of grass or stone”] and Untitled [“scrub dark and soiled areas”] were published in Rock | Salt | Stone, Nightboat Books, 2017, and are reprinted with permission of the publisher; Untitled [“I do not want to be a monster”] was first published in the Cortland Review. LAURI KUBUITSILE: “The Colours of Love” first published in In the Spirit of McPhineas Lata and Other Stories, Hands-On Books, 2012. ANDREA LEVY: Copyright © 2004 Andrea Levy, extract from Small Island, first published in Great Britain in 2004 by Headline Review. ROS MARTIN: “Being Rendered Visible in The Georgian House Museum, Bristol” is published online as one of a series of short stories commissioned by the University of Bristol AHRC literary archaeology project 2016, www.bristol.ac.uk/arts/research/literary-archaeology, a collaboration with Bristol Writers group Our Stories Make Waves, www.bristol.ac.uk/media-library/sites/arts/research/documents/being-rendered-visible-ros-martin.pdf. It is also a short online film directed and published by Martin, www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Axam3sgLdc, as one of a trilogy of films comprising the transatlantic digital memorial, Daughters of Igbo Woman, produced by Martin for an artist digital installation in the Georgian House Museum. MAAZA MENGISTE: “This Is What the Journey Does”, copyright © 2018 Maaza Mengiste, originally published in The Displaced © 2018 Harry N. Abrams, Inc. ARTHENIA BATES MILLICAN: “The Autobiography of an Idea”, courtesy of Richard (Rick) Jones and The AJBM Literary Foundation; first published in African American Review, Vol. 27, Issue 1, Spring 1993. SISONKE MSIMANG: “Black Girl in America” is an extract from Always Another Country: A memoir of exile and home. Jonathan Ball, South Africa, 2017. BLESSING MUSARIRI: “Signs That You Were Here”, “A Poem I Wrote Standing Up—Indictment”, “On Platform 3”, “She, on the way to Monk’s Hill” copyright © Blessing Musariri 2010, first published on Poetry International, 2011. JULIANA MAKUCHI NFAH-ABBENYI: Extract from “Home is where you mend the roof”, originally published in 27 Views of Raleigh: The City of Oaks in Prose & Poetry by Eno Publishers, Hillsborough, NC, 2013, pp. 64–75. JENNIFER NANSUBUGA MAKUMBI: “She is our Stupid” was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in December 2018 under the title “My Sister Biira”. Originally published in The Displaced © 2018 Harry N. Abrams, Inc. MARIE NDIAYE: Extract from Three Strong Women, copyright © Editions Gallimard, Paris, 2009. English translation copyright © 2012 by John Fletcher. WANJIKU WA NGŨGĨ: “Hundred Acres of Marshland” first appeared in Auburn Avenue, www.theauburnavenue.com. ELIZABETH NUNEZ: Extract from Not for Everyday Use, Akashic Books, 2014. SELINA NWULU: “Half-Written Love Letter” was a commissioned poem for the In Place project, a collaboration between Brunel University, Beyond Borders, Sound and the Arts Council; “The Audacity of Our Skin” is a version of a commissioned piece by Counterpoints Arts, originally entitled “Who Are We”, as part of a festival with Tate Exchange. NANA OFORIATTA AYIM: “Abele”, copyright © Nana Oforiatta-Ayim, 2019, The God Child, Bloomsbury Publishing. CHINELO OKPARANTA: “Trump in the Classroom” is part of a lecture that the author gave on February 15, 2017, at the African Writer’s Festival at Brown University. MAKENA ONJERIKA: “The Man Watching Our House” previously appeared in a different form on the Storymoja website and won the Storymoja Short Story Contest in November 2013. YVONNE ADHIAMBO OWUOR: A version of the story “These Fragments” was published in the anthology All the Good Things Around Us, ed. Ivor Agyeman-Duah, Abe Books, 2016. LOUISA ADJOA PARKER: “Black histories aren’t all urban: tales from the West Country” was commissioned by Henna Zamurd-Butt and first published on mediadiversified.org, a platform celebrating the work of writers of colour. DJAIMILIA PEREIRA DE ALMEIDA: Extract from That Hair, copyright © Djaimilia Pereira de Almeida and Teorama, 2015; English-language translation © Eric M.B. Becker, 2018. HANNAH AZIEB POOL: “Nairobi” first appeared in Fashion Cities Africa, Intellect Books, 2016. CLAUDIA RANKINE: “Making Room” from Citizen, copyright © 2014 by Claudia Rankine; reprinted with the permission of Graywolf Press, Minneapolis, Minnesota, www.graywolfpress.org. SAPPHIRE: Extract from Push, Alfred A. Knopf, 1996. Reprinted with permission of the author. TAIYE SELASI: Extract from The Sex Lives of African Girls, copyright © Taiye Selasi, 2012, used by permission of the Wylie Agency UK Ltd. DOROTHEA SMARTT: “Poem Beginning With A Line From Claudia Rankine” first appeared in
Chicago Review. CELIA SORHAINDO: “Creation” first published in Moko Magazine, 2015 as “Giving Birth”; “In The Air” was first published in Interviewing The Caribbean, 2018. ATTILLAH SPRINGER: “Castle in the Sand” was first published in the Trinidad Guardian, May 2013. VALERIE JOAN TAGWIRA: “Mainini Grace’s Promise” first published in Women Writing Zimbabwe, edited by Irene Staunton, Weaver Press, Zimbabwe, 2008. JENNIFER TEEGE: Reprinted from My Grandfather Would Have Shot Me: A Black Woman Discovers Her Family’s Nazi Past by Jennifer Teege and Nikola Sellmair, translated into English by Carolin Sommer. Originally published under the title Amon: Mein Grossvater hätte mich erschossen. Copyright © 2013, 2015 by Rowohlt Verlag GmbH, Reinbek bei Hamburg. Copyright © 2013, 2015 by Jennifer Teege and Nikola Sellmair. Translation copyright © 2015 by Carolin Sommer. First published in North America in 2015 by The Experiment, LLC. Reprinted with permission of The Experiment, LLC. The translation of this work was supported by a grant from the Goethe-Institut, which is funded by the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs. YVONNE VERA: Extract from The Stone Virgins, pp. 47–52 (Weaver Press, Harare, 2002; Farrar, Straus and Giroux Inc, New York, 2003); reprinted with the kind permission of Weaver Press and Farrar, Straus and Giroux. KIT DE WAAL: Copyright © Kit de Waal, 2016, extract from My Name Is Leon, Penguin, 2017. REBECCA WALKER: Extract from Adé: A Love Story by Rebecca Walker, Houghton Mifflin/Little A, 2013. JESMYN WARD: Extract from Sing, Unburied, Sing, Bloomsbury Publishing 2018; reprinted with permission of the publisher. CHARLOTTE WILLIAMS: Extract from Sugar and Slate, 2002, courtesy of Planet Books, www.planetmagazine.org.uk. MAKHOSAZANA XABA: “Tongues of their mothers” first published in the book of the same name, UKZN Press, 2008, copyright © Makhosazana Xaba.