Researcher: Margarida Vale de Gato (RG3)
Project Designation: ECO-Africa – Aesthetics of Extinction: Environmental Collapse and African Literatures in Portuguese
Funding entity: Reference of Application to FCT R&D Projects Call (submitted March 15, 2024): 1450e0c2-5122-456d-8998-0d6e6488ef2b
Principal Researcher: Ana Mafalda Leite
Research Unit: CeSA (Centre of African and Development Studies)
Partners: Centro de Pesquisa Kaliban (Universidade Estadual de Campinas); Research unit Africomultiple (U of Beyreuth); Cátedra Agostinho da Silva (U of Brasília); CREPAL (Université Sorbonne Nouvelle); Universidade Católica de Moçambique
Funding: waiting results
Overall Description: Using and expanding the critical framework of ecocriticism, which is still largely centred in Europe and the US, The ECO-Africa Project proposes to reconfigure the ways of reading and critically analysing African Literatures in Portuguese. It is possible to observe a set of themes that this literature records, particularly: the rise in sea and ocean levels, oil spills, the exploitation and destruction of maritime life and habitats, uncontrolled extractivism and the exploitation of minerals and raw materials,deforestation, the destruction of native fauna and, consequently, forced human displacement. The project stems from the Centre of African and Development Studies (CeSA in ISCTE), and has partnered with several institutions, including ULICES (multilateral protocol signed March 14, 2024) for support on theoretical key texts in English, as well as research on their application to African literatures. Major outputs foreseen are publication of one e-book and one book of essays: 1) African Literature and Environmentalism. (e-book, a translated anthology of canonical texts) 2) African Literature in Portuguese and the aesthetics of extinction (critical studies by the team and invited specialists).