An Immigrant as a Blogger in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Americanah

Abstract

Abstract: The preliminary part of this article outlines the changes that immigrants face in today's era of global mobility and how these changes correlate with the aesthetics of migratory fiction. Then I discuss the identity of a Nigerian immigrant, Ifemelu, in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Americanah and the reasons that led to her dissatisfaction with identitarian politics in the United States and prompted her to start a blog about racism. The article concentrates on the monetization of race through Ifemelu's blog posts and the movement from politicizing race to its capitalization. I assess the grounds for her shift from political blogging in the United States to writing a historical and cultural blog after returning to Nigeria. Her blogging in America became a way of capitalizing on race while in Nigeria, suggesting that cultural and historical blogging is a way to build a new, collective, decolonized identity. Decolonization as an act of refusal must be turned into the act of assertion, an act of refoundation.