1. The Education Ministry in Retrospect: A Figural View of Armah’s Osiris Rising and Awoonor’s This Earth My Brother

    Japhet Mokani

    English Department, S.D.A College of Education, Asokore-Koforidua, Ghana.

    Abstract: Re-membering Africa is a sure way to guaranteeing Africa’s own complete renaissance from its long existence in the whirlpools of stagnation after independence. The portrayal of the Ministry of Education in Armah’s Osiris Rising (1995) and Awoonor’s This Earth My Brother (1971) casts a slur on the image of the Ministry in a figural view. In spite of the wide gulf existing between these two novels in respect of their historical settings, they are very much alike in their portrayal of Ghana’s education then and in prognosis. A Ghanaian proverb states: “a crab does not give birth to a bird”, thus, the image of the Education Ministry in all of its branches and institutions across the country today presents no less educational topsy-turvy than those depicted in these two texts. In a comparative study of the two texts, this study employs Erich Auerbach’s theory of figura (1938) to demonstrate the scathing portraiture of the Education Ministry during the colonial and post-colonial era of independence.  The Ministry’s institutions and workers in the colonial and early post-colonial times foreshadow the declension and stagnation of the education system of post-independence Ghana, and proportionally index the nation’s porous economy.

    Keywords: Figura, Symbol, Re-membering, Retrospect, Stagnation.

    Pages: 1 – 12 | Full PDF Paper

  2. Reasserting Relevance: Literature in a COVID-Changed World

    Paul Almonte

    Prince Mohammad Bin Fahd University
    LCC International University

    Pages: 13 – 21 | Full PDF Paper