Naomi Nkealah
Biographic Data
| ID | 5646274 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Naomi Nkealah |
| GIVEN NAMES | Naomi |
| FAMILY NAME | Nkealah |
| SIGNATURE | NKEALAH N |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of the Witwatersrand |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-7953-9663 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 22 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 1 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 21 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2008 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar in Xitsonga: Translation, Transculturation and Transformation
Decolonizing feminist education: Teaching African feminism at a South African university
Contemporary feminist education is riddled with inequalities that place Western feminist theories and pedagogies at the centre of teaching and learning feminism, while African knowledges and pedagogies remain marginalized. This article draws on the experience of teaching African feminism at a South African university to offer some propositions on decolonizing feminist education. It suggests that the project of decolonizing feminist education at u…
Teaching Shakespeare: On Practising a Socially Responsive Literary Reading Pedagogy
In this article, I reflect on my journey of becoming a teacher of socially responsive literary reading as I found myself having to adjust to a new disciplinary affiliation in 2018. The challenges I experienced in teaching Shakespeare in an English education context in 2018–2020 prompted me to look into the possibility of decolonising my pedagogy for better service delivery to my students. Because I needed my students to like Shakespeare, to enjoy…
Literary reading as a socially responsive practice: Implications for literature pedagogy at higher education
As university teachers of literature, we tend to accept the rhetoric that students lack the capacity to interpret texts meaningfully, without questioning our own biases about the kinds of meaning we expect them to elicit from texts. Often, these are meanings that have little relevance to students' own social or professional lives. In this article, we report on a research project on literary reading at a South African university in which we set ou…
Introduction to Classics in the History of the African Humanities
This theme section brings together introductions to some of the seminal texts by African authors that have shaped the African humanities from at least the twelfth century throughout Africa and until today. The section starts from the admittedly somewhat contentious idea that Africa should be treated as a historical unity. We note that this is itself a context-specific way of regarding the continent and do not negate the incredible diversity hidde…
Molara Ogundipe-Leslie, Re-creating Ourselves: African Women & Critical Transformations , 1994
Sanctum: Poems of the Sacred , by Zena Velloo John
Literary reading as a web of relationships: Implications for pedagogy at a South African university
We teach English literature in South Africa, to third- or fourth-language English speakers. Increasingly dissatisfied with the effectiveness of our pedagogy under conditions of massification, we seek to agitate propositions about our students’ reading and what these propositions means for our pedagogy. Drawing on narrative theory we analyse our students’ written responses to a portfolio assessment designed to scaffold their reading of a setwork n…
Unravelling an assessment puzzle: Reflections on reconciling effective assessment and workload management in South African higher education
Assessment in higher education is a complex path to navigate, with unexpected twists and turns. Although many studies project the positive outcomes of assessment for learning, the outcomes do not always match the intention. Even when formative assessment is well-planned, the implementation may take such a toll, leaving a lecturer physically drained. A big puzzle with assessment in higher education is how to design formative assessment tasks that …
Gendered Violence and Human Rights in Black World Literature and Film
Challenging Precarious Work in Anglophone Cameroonian Women’s Literature: A Feminist Analysis of Anne Tanyi-Tang’s Visiting America and Imbolo Mbue’s Behold the Dreamers
Contemporary Anglophone Cameroonian women’s literature is concerned with the ways in which African immigrant women in the USA are compelled by the American economic system to take on nursing jobs in the absence of alternatives. The play Visiting America (2006) by Anne Tanyi-Tang and the novel Behold the Dreamers (2016) by Imbolo Mbue address this phenomenon by presenting women characters who are being coerced, literally and figuratively, to enter…
Rethinking Women’s Empowerment in Cameroon in the Drama of Anne Tanyi-Tang
The concept of women’s empowerment cannot be dissociated from that of women’s disempowerment since the two function as mutually reinforcing processes. This article argues that the drama of Anglophone Cameroonian playwright, Anne Tanyi-Tang, collapses the binary between empowerment and disempowerment, as opposed to dominant thinking which posits the two as mutually exclusive. Her plays project women characters who exhibit visible signs of self-emp…
Exploring the Dynamics of Time in Literary Texts
(2018). Exploring the Dynamics of Time in Literary Texts. Journal of Literary Studies: Vol. 34, Exploring the Dynamics of Time in Literary Texts, pp. 26-32
Understanding Sexual Violence through its Timing in Kagiso Lesego Molope’s This Book Betrays my Brother
In this article, I seek to understand why male sexual violence happens. I look specifically at the temporalities, and inevitably the spatialities, of a rape incident in the novel This Book Betrays my Brother by Kagiso Lesego Molope. In other words, I seek to answer the question: how does the timing of the rape enhance our understanding of why the rape happens and how the perpetrator conceives it? My feminist analysis combines theories of sexual v…
Reconciling Arabo-Islamic culture and feminist consciousness in North African women’s writing: Silence and voice in the short stories of Alifa Rifaat and Assia Djebar
This article sets out to explore the theme of silence and voice in selected short stories by two North African women writers, Alifa Rifaat and Assia Djebar. In their representations of women’s lives in Egypt and Algeria, respectively, both Rifaat and Djebar present different strategies employed by women to counter gender oppression. Although the female characters portrayed by both writers encounter diverse, and sometimes opposing, circumstances, …
Cameline Agency: A New Agenda for Social Transformation in South African Women’s Writing 2012–2014
What is new and progressive in writing in South Africa now, offering visions of the future? It is what I have termed cameline agency as I read a selection of South African women’s writing published between 2012 and 2014. Cameline agency is a model for women’s survival in post-apartheid South Africa that offers more functional methods of empowerment than snail-sense feminism does. It is a profound call for the transformation of the social landscap…
Anne Tanyi-Tang and Bole Butake: Two Anglophone Cameroonian Playwrights With Contrasting Visions of Women
Anne Tanyi-Tang and Bole Butake are two literary giants whose works have contributed immensely to the development of Anglophone Cameroonian drama. This article examines their plays from a feminist perspective, comparing their creative visions in terms of how they locate women in relation to survival politics and marriage. The article argues that, while Butakeâ€TMs plays project a vision of women that is both sexist and romanticised, Tanyi-Tangâ€T…
(West) African Feminisms and Their Challenges
This article highlights some challenges facing a set of African feminisms built on indigenous models. These feminisms are: Motherism – Catherine Acholonu; Womanism/Woman palavering – Chikwenye Okonjo Ogunyemi; Nego-feminism – Obioma Nnaemeka; Snail-sense feminism – Akachi Ezeigbo; Stiwanism – Molara Ogundipe-Leslie; African womanism – Mary Modupe Kolawole; and Femalism – Chioma Opara. The challenges under discussion have been grouped into two cat…
Women's Contribution to the Development of Anglophone Cameroonian Drama: The Plays of Anne Tanyi-Tang
This article explores the plays of Cameroonian female playwright Anne Tanyi-Tang, arguing that they make a significant contribution to anglo phone Cameroonian drama, particularly in the representation of women and articulation of female concerns. The plays analyzed in this article reveal that, although trapped in deeply patriarchal cultures, women draw on their inner strengths and female networks to create spaces for themselves—spaces through whi…
Self-fashioning through queer sex’: A case study of two student theatre performances
This article examines two plays performed by Dramatic Arts students of the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) during the 2010 Orientation Week (O-Week): Beyond Therapy by Christopher Durang and Vacant by Lareece Kelly. The plays were staged at the Wits Theatre, with sizeable audiences made up mainly of students. Both plays have queer sexuality as the central thrust of the narratives and yet they differ in the ways in which the protagonists af…
Interview with Bule Butake
(2009). Interview with Bule Butake. South African Theatre Journal: Vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 188-206
Reconciling Arabo-Islamic culture and feminist consciousness in North African women's writing: Silence and voice in the short stories of Alifa Rifaat and Assia Djebar
This article sets out to explore the theme of silence and voice in selected short stories by two North African women writers, Alifa Rifaat and Assia Djebar. In their representations of women’s lives in Egypt and Algeria, respectively, both Rifaat and Djebar present different strategies employed by women to counter gender oppression. Although the female characters portrayed by both writers encounter diverse, and sometimes opposing, circumstances, …
Anne Tanyi-Tang and Bole Butake: Two Anglophone Cameroonian Playwrights With Contrasting Visions of Women
Anne Tanyi-Tang and Bole Butake are two literary giants whose works have contributed immensely to the development of Anglophone Cameroonian drama. This article examines their plays from a feminist perspective, comparing their creative visions in terms of how they locate women in relation to survival politics and marriage. The article argues that, while Butakeâ€TMs plays project a vision of women that is both sexist and romanticised, Tanyi-Tangâ€T…
Reconciling Arabo-Islamic culture and feminist consciousness in North African women's writing: Silence and voice in the short stories of Alifa Rifaat and Assia Djebar
This article sets out to explore the theme of silence and voice in selected short stories by two North African women writers, Alifa Rifaat and Assia Djebar. In their representations of women’s lives in Egypt and Algeria, respectively, both Rifaat and Djebar present different strategies employed by women to counter gender oppression. Although the female characters portrayed by both writers encounter diverse, and sometimes opposing, circumstances, …
Interview with Bule Butake
(2009). Interview with Bule Butake. South African Theatre Journal: Vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 188-206
Self-fashioning through queer sex’: A case study of two student theatre performances
This article examines two plays performed by Dramatic Arts students of the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) during the 2010 Orientation Week (O-Week): Beyond Therapy by Christopher Durang and Vacant by Lareece Kelly. The plays were staged at the Wits Theatre, with sizeable audiences made up mainly of students. Both plays have queer sexuality as the central thrust of the narratives and yet they differ in the ways in which the protagonists af…
Women's Contribution to the Development of Anglophone Cameroonian Drama: The Plays of Anne Tanyi-Tang
This article explores the plays of Cameroonian female playwright Anne Tanyi-Tang, arguing that they make a significant contribution to anglo phone Cameroonian drama, particularly in the representation of women and articulation of female concerns. The plays analyzed in this article reveal that, although trapped in deeply patriarchal cultures, women draw on their inner strengths and female networks to create spaces for themselves—spaces through whi…
(West) African Feminisms and Their Challenges
This article highlights some challenges facing a set of African feminisms built on indigenous models. These feminisms are: Motherism – Catherine Acholonu; Womanism/Woman palavering – Chikwenye Okonjo Ogunyemi; Nego-feminism – Obioma Nnaemeka; Snail-sense feminism – Akachi Ezeigbo; Stiwanism – Molara Ogundipe-Leslie; African womanism – Mary Modupe Kolawole; and Femalism – Chioma Opara. The challenges under discussion have been grouped into two cat…
Cameline Agency: A New Agenda for Social Transformation in South African Women’s Writing 2012–2014
What is new and progressive in writing in South Africa now, offering visions of the future? It is what I have termed cameline agency as I read a selection of South African women’s writing published between 2012 and 2014. Cameline agency is a model for women’s survival in post-apartheid South Africa that offers more functional methods of empowerment than snail-sense feminism does. It is a profound call for the transformation of the social landscap…
Anne Tanyi-Tang and Bole Butake: Two Anglophone Cameroonian Playwrights With Contrasting Visions of Women
Anne Tanyi-Tang and Bole Butake are two literary giants whose works have contributed immensely to the development of Anglophone Cameroonian drama. This article examines their plays from a feminist perspective, comparing their creative visions in terms of how they locate women in relation to survival politics and marriage. The article argues that, while Butakeâ€TMs plays project a vision of women that is both sexist and romanticised, Tanyi-Tangâ€T…
Rethinking Women’s Empowerment in Cameroon in the Drama of Anne Tanyi-Tang
The concept of women’s empowerment cannot be dissociated from that of women’s disempowerment since the two function as mutually reinforcing processes. This article argues that the drama of Anglophone Cameroonian playwright, Anne Tanyi-Tang, collapses the binary between empowerment and disempowerment, as opposed to dominant thinking which posits the two as mutually exclusive. Her plays project women characters who exhibit visible signs of self-emp…
Exploring the Dynamics of Time in Literary Texts
(2018). Exploring the Dynamics of Time in Literary Texts. Journal of Literary Studies: Vol. 34, Exploring the Dynamics of Time in Literary Texts, pp. 26-32
Understanding Sexual Violence through its Timing in Kagiso Lesego Molope’s This Book Betrays my Brother
In this article, I seek to understand why male sexual violence happens. I look specifically at the temporalities, and inevitably the spatialities, of a rape incident in the novel This Book Betrays my Brother by Kagiso Lesego Molope. In other words, I seek to answer the question: how does the timing of the rape enhance our understanding of why the rape happens and how the perpetrator conceives it? My feminist analysis combines theories of sexual v…
Reconciling Arabo-Islamic culture and feminist consciousness in North African women’s writing: Silence and voice in the short stories of Alifa Rifaat and Assia Djebar
This article sets out to explore the theme of silence and voice in selected short stories by two North African women writers, Alifa Rifaat and Assia Djebar. In their representations of women’s lives in Egypt and Algeria, respectively, both Rifaat and Djebar present different strategies employed by women to counter gender oppression. Although the female characters portrayed by both writers encounter diverse, and sometimes opposing, circumstances, …
Challenging Precarious Work in Anglophone Cameroonian Women’s Literature: A Feminist Analysis of Anne Tanyi-Tang’s Visiting America and Imbolo Mbue’s Behold the Dreamers
Contemporary Anglophone Cameroonian women’s literature is concerned with the ways in which African immigrant women in the USA are compelled by the American economic system to take on nursing jobs in the absence of alternatives. The play Visiting America (2006) by Anne Tanyi-Tang and the novel Behold the Dreamers (2016) by Imbolo Mbue address this phenomenon by presenting women characters who are being coerced, literally and figuratively, to enter…
Gendered Violence and Human Rights in Black World Literature and Film
Unravelling an assessment puzzle: Reflections on reconciling effective assessment and workload management in South African higher education
Assessment in higher education is a complex path to navigate, with unexpected twists and turns. Although many studies project the positive outcomes of assessment for learning, the outcomes do not always match the intention. Even when formative assessment is well-planned, the implementation may take such a toll, leaving a lecturer physically drained. A big puzzle with assessment in higher education is how to design formative assessment tasks that …
Introduction to Classics in the History of the African Humanities
This theme section brings together introductions to some of the seminal texts by African authors that have shaped the African humanities from at least the twelfth century throughout Africa and until today. The section starts from the admittedly somewhat contentious idea that Africa should be treated as a historical unity. We note that this is itself a context-specific way of regarding the continent and do not negate the incredible diversity hidde…
Molara Ogundipe-Leslie, Re-creating Ourselves: African Women & Critical Transformations , 1994
Sanctum: Poems of the Sacred , by Zena Velloo John
Literary reading as a web of relationships: Implications for pedagogy at a South African university
We teach English literature in South Africa, to third- or fourth-language English speakers. Increasingly dissatisfied with the effectiveness of our pedagogy under conditions of massification, we seek to agitate propositions about our students’ reading and what these propositions means for our pedagogy. Drawing on narrative theory we analyse our students’ written responses to a portfolio assessment designed to scaffold their reading of a setwork n…
Teaching Shakespeare: On Practising a Socially Responsive Literary Reading Pedagogy
In this article, I reflect on my journey of becoming a teacher of socially responsive literary reading as I found myself having to adjust to a new disciplinary affiliation in 2018. The challenges I experienced in teaching Shakespeare in an English education context in 2018–2020 prompted me to look into the possibility of decolonising my pedagogy for better service delivery to my students. Because I needed my students to like Shakespeare, to enjoy…
Literary reading as a socially responsive practice: Implications for literature pedagogy at higher education
As university teachers of literature, we tend to accept the rhetoric that students lack the capacity to interpret texts meaningfully, without questioning our own biases about the kinds of meaning we expect them to elicit from texts. Often, these are meanings that have little relevance to students' own social or professional lives. In this article, we report on a research project on literary reading at a South African university in which we set ou…
Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar in Xitsonga: Translation, Transculturation and Transformation
Decolonizing feminist education: Teaching African feminism at a South African university
Contemporary feminist education is riddled with inequalities that place Western feminist theories and pedagogies at the centre of teaching and learning feminism, while African knowledges and pedagogies remain marginalized. This article draws on the experience of teaching African feminism at a South African university to offer some propositions on decolonizing feminist education. It suggests that the project of decolonizing feminist education at u…
Sociology (16 works) · Political science (12 works) · Gender Studies (11 works) · Art (10 works) · Literature (9 works) · History (8 works) · Law (8 works) · Psychology (8 works) · Aesthetics (4 works) · African history and culture studies (4 works)