John Guillory, Meet Kwasi Wiredu: A 1990s Guide to the Future English Department

Abstract

Abstract This article pairs the arguments of Cultural Capital with those of Ghanaian decolonial philosopher Kwasi Wiredu. Writing around the same time as Guillory, Wiredu proposes a distinctive mode of decolonization, one focused on concepts rather than syllabi or curricula. In Wiredu's argument, decolonization ought to be a genealogical project, disentangling African thought from colonial impositions. The goal is not simple opposition but the chance to enable located concepts’ and traditions’ mutual interrogation, so that a “decolonized” thinker is one who can make an informed choice as to what analytic lenses or worldviews can or should be defended. Even as literary studies continues to open up possible texts and traditions for study, the bottom has fallen out of a hiring market organized around periodizing categories and national literatures. Turning back to Wiredu and Guillory together might not only help us think more clearly about the politics of literary study but also construct a version of the field based on concepts rather than national-historical fields.