Corresponding with the city: Self‐help literature in urban West Africa

Abstract

Contemporary West African self‐help literature is preoccupied with the theme of marriage. The reader’s correct choice of marriage partner and subsequent happiness in the home are fundamental concerns of the genre. This article asks about the extent to which locally published self‐help literature – and popular literature more generally – is inseparable from urbanization in West Africa. Do these pamphlets arise as a direct consequence of urbanization in the late 20th century? What kind of “self” is produced to be “helped” in this literature? In addressing these questions, the article situates locally published self‐help literature in relation to recent theorizations of urbanization and popular culture in Africa, and in relation to the fierce current debate about the usefulness of “modernity” as a term to describe postcolonial urban cultures. Popular misogyny is also addressed, and the controlling role played by God in West African discussions of marriage and relationships. The article suggests that the authors of self‐help pamphlets in West Africa can be regarded as “urban correspondents”, corresponding with the city as its writers, its products and its cultural echoes.