For centuries, Afro-Hispanic characters have been confined to what José Piedra called “the dictates of the Old World”, where they were used as fictional mediators of a rhetorical unity project of literary whiteness. The 20th century saw significant growth in Afro-Hispanic literary productions, particularly with the Negritude and “negrismo” movements which influenced writers across the Spanish-speaking African diaspora. Building on the panoramic work of Richard Jackson, Laurent Prescott, and Marvin Lewis, which challenged the rhetorical system of literary whiteness in Hispanic America, interdisciplinary scholars such as Mayra Santos-Febres, Yair Cuenú Mosquera and Olga Lucía Martán among others, use literature as a cultural tool of knowing and understanding the Afro-Hispanic experience to deconstruct negative, inaccurate, and distorted perception of Afro-descendant in Hispanic America. For example, Afro-Colombian contributions to the political, socio-economic, and cultural landscape of the country have been silenced or devalued in national discourses.

The importance to understanding the full breadth of Hispanic literary expression has expanded the geographical scope of research from Afro-Latin America to the African continent. Scholars such as Mbaré N’gom, J. M. Lipski, Wilfrid Miampika, myself Alain Lawo-Sukam and few others are pioneering new ways of visibilizing African literature in Spanish, and addressing the institutional marginalization of this form of literature which is overlooked by university departments of Spanish Studies. African literature from former Spanish African territories suffers from invisibility derived in part from the dominance of Peninsular and Latin American studies in the departments of Spanish. Curricular bias perpetuated a dramatic error that concluded the Spanish Empire ended in 1898 with the loss of Cuba, Puerto Rico, Philippines, and Guam. While the fact is frequently ignored, the Spanish Empire not only extended to Latin America but also to Africa.

This panel seeks to explore methodological approaches to Afro-Hispanic and African Spanish literary studies. The panel brings together scholars working across different geographical regions (Africa and South America) and field of studies (Literature, History and Sociology) to discuss new methodological interventions. The panel will feature 3 presenters offering 13-15 minutes to allow time for introductions (5 minutes), transitions (2-5 minutes), and 15-20 minutes audience discussion. Presenters will be encouraged to be concise and precise, sharing concrete examples of methodological innovations from their own research.

Alain Lawo-Sukam paper establishes the history of Spanish literature produced by writers from former Spanish territories of Equatorial Guinea, Morocco and Western Sahara, in order to legitimize the existence of an African Spanish literary tradition, and develop a third axis of Spanish literature as a counter-frame to the institutional marginalization of African literature in Spanish which is currently dominated by Peninsular and Latin American literary studies. Using Afrocentricity as a decolonial framework, the paper problematizes and re-articulates the concept of Hispanism, with the inclusion of Spanish literary tradition from hispanophone African countries, that creates new frontiers to understand the realities of the evolving Hispanic world.

Pursuing the need to visibilize and legitimize the literary productions of Afro-Hispanic writers, Olga Lucía Martán paper presents an historiographical study of Afro-Hispanic thoughts and literature in Latin America. She critically examines the ways in which scholars have interpreted the history and existence of Afro-Hispanic literature over time. She further interrogates the consensus view that the development of Afro-Hispanic literature is divided in three periods [(16th-19th centuries), (1960s-1980s]) and (1980s-Present)]. She proposes a re-reading of Afro-Hispanic thoughts and literary history with the incorporation of the oral tradition and advocate for centering the perspectives of Afro-Hispanic writers rather than interpreting their work solely through European aesthetic traditions.

Yair Cuenu Mosquera’s paper examines how Afro-Colombian writers resist colonial power structures and create alternative knowledge systems that challenges the commonly assumption about black Colombians in urban settings as “foreign”, “transient inhabitants”, or “migrants in search of opportunity.” Yair Cuenu has coined and developed the concept of “Afrourbanite” as a counter-frame to the negation of black urban citizenship. This new sociological and literary approach to construct black Colombian identity responds to calls within the field to develop more theoretical frameworks that can address the historical marginalization of Afro-Colombian voices and citizenry.

The three presentations provide innovative approaches to the understanding of Afro-Hispanic and African Spanish literary traditions in order to have a greater visibility in the Hispanic literary canon. The presentations also serve as a call to integrate Afro-Hispanic and African Spanish (hi)stories and experiences in Spanish classroom instruction and curricula where they are marginalized.