Njeri Githire

she/her/hers

African American & African Studies

848 Social Sciences Building

267 19th Ave S
Minneapolis, MN 55455

Collegiate Affiliation

Associate Professor,

Educational Background & Specialties

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Educational Background

PhD: Comparative Literature & Women's Studies, The Pennsylvania State University, 2004
Doctoral Studies: Francophone African Literatures, Centre International d’Etudes Francophones (CIEF)/Université de Paris IV-Sorbonne, 1999
D.E.A (Diplôme d’études Approfondies): Francophone African Literatures, Université de Paris XII - Val de Marne, 1999
Maítrise Langues: Stylistics & Translation, Université de Paris III - Sorbonne Nouvelle, 1997
Licence Langues: Foreign Languages & Literatures (English, French, Portuguese), Université de Nantes, 1993

African Popular Cultures
African Cinema
Postcolonial Theory & Criticism; Gender Studies & Feminist Theory; Francophone Studies
Immigration, Migration & Transnational Networks in Africa/the Diaspora
African Diaspora Studies
African Literarature
Food, (Non)-Eating, and Related Topics in African Literature,

Publications

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Githire, Njeri. "Eating Bodies: Edwidge Danticat's The Farming of Bones." Research in African Literatures 53 (4) (2023): 141-159.
Githire, Njeri. "Looking Back, Reeling Forward: Wanuri Kahiu's Rafiki." Black Camera 14 (1) (2022): 8-33.
Githire, Njeri. "Writing Back to Hugo: Intertextuality in the Works of Raphaël Confiant and Gisèle Pineau." International Journal of Francophone Studies 25 (1-2) (2022): 9-35.
Githire, Njeri. "Reign of the Hyenas: The Dark Satire of Djibril Diop Mambéty." Crosscuts (September, 2019).
Cannibal Writes: Eating Others in Caribbean and Indian Ocean Women's Writings. University of Illinois Press, Githire, Njeri, 2014.
Githire, Njeri. "The Empire Bites Back: Food Politics and the Making of a Nation in Andrea Levy’s Works." Callaloo 33.3 (2010): 857-873.
Githire, Njeri. "The Female Pioneer in Monique Agénor’s L’Aïeule de l’isle Bourbon." The French Review 84.3 (2010): 36.48.
Githire, Njeri. "New Visions, New Voices: Emerging Perspectives in East African Fiction." Transition 102 (2009): 182-8.
Githire, Njeri. "The Semiotics of (Not)-Eating: Fasting, Anorexia, & Hunger Strike in Ananda Devi’s Le voile de Draupadi." Nottingham French Studies 48.1 (spring, 2009): 82-93.
Githire, Njeri. "Horizons Adrift: Women in Exile, at Home and Abroad in Gisí¨le Pineau’s Works.." Research in African Literatures 36.1 (Spring, 2005): 74-90.
Githire, Njeri, C. Makward. "Gisèle Pineau: Causerie á Penn State." Women in French Studies 9 (2001): 220-23.

Activities

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Consuming Texts: Reading, Eating & Not-Eating in the African Cultural Landscape: Book project. 2013 - 2022
Islands in the Midst: Ecology and Nature in Crisis in Francophone Women’s Writing: Book Project. 2022-

Courses

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AFRO 1023W: Introduction to African World Literature
AFRO 1904: Caribbean Literature and the Search for Identity: A Survey
AFRO 3006: Impact of African Migrations in the Atlantic World
AFRO 3009: History of Women in Africa
AFRO 3131: Contemporary Issues in Africa
AFRO 3578: Contemporary Sub-Saharan Popular Art Forms
AFRO 3592W: Introduction to Black Women Writers in the United States
AFRO 3601W: African Literature
AFRO 3625W/5625: Women Writers of Africa & the African Diaspora
AFRO 3654: African Cinema
AFRO 4301: The African Novel
GLOS 5900: Immigrant Dreams & Contemporary African Diasporic Literatures
AFRO 5910: Feast or Famine: The Politics of Food in Literary and Cultural Contexts
AFRO 8590: Contemporary Literary & Cultural Studies
AFRO 8802: Africa and the Rise of the East
HSEM 2001H: Fragile Subjects: Portraits of Childhood in African World Literature