As Kenyan scholar and novelist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o reminds us in Writing Against Neocolonialism, African writers who emerged after World War II experienced three defining eras: anti-colonial struggle, independence and neocolonialism.
Political independence spread across Africa during the twentieth century, yet the cultural and linguistic legacy of colonialism remains deeply embedded. One of its most enduring manifestations is language.
Across Africa, millions of children are educated primarily in English or French while Indigenous languages are increasingly marginalized. Many young Africans therefore grow up unable to communicate fluently with elders, access oral traditions or participate fully in the cultural inheritance of their communities. This raises an urgent question: Whose language tells Africa’s stories?
Language is more than a tool of communication. It carries memory, identity, historical truths and ways of understanding the world. When a language disappears, systems of knowledge disappear with it. Preserving African languages must therefore be understood as a cultural responsibility—and an act of resistance against neocolonialism.
For whom does the writer in a neocolonial state write?
For the African writer, the choice of language is never neutral; it often determines the audience before the first word is written. Writers may choose silence, align with the status quo or resist—sometimes at the risk of censorship, imprisonment or exile.
The deeper question is whether writers portray society as fixed or capable of transformation. To write from the perspective of people as agents of social, political and cultural change is to expose the forces that sustain inequality and domination.
The need to speak our mothers’ tongue
In 2022, I met my 107-year-old great-grandmother during a homecoming visit to Cameroon. As a member of the Bamileke tribe, my ability to speak our dialect allowed me to converse with her directly. She recorded a prayer for me in our native language—a recording that remains one of the most treasured memories on my phone.
Language made that moment possible. Yet millions of African children may never share a similar experience with their grandparents or great-grandparents. As Indigenous languages disappear from homes, schools and public life, children lose access to stories, wisdom and traditions passed from one generation to the next.
Living in the International Decade of Indigenous Languages
The United Nations designated 2022–2032 as the International Decade of Indigenous Languages to respond to the growing number of languages at risk and mobilize preservation efforts. If African languages are to survive, they must exist in classrooms, books and educational programs where children can actively read, write and create knowledge in their own languages.
Africa is home to extraordinary linguistic diversity, with an estimated 1,500–2,000 languages spoken across the continent. When a child writes a story in Bamileke, Kiswahili, Yoruba or another African language, that child preserves cultural heritage and community identity. The child also participates in a form of authorship that challenges the lingering hierarchies of colonial language systems.
For every African who cannot write or speak the language of their ancestors, a vital part of identity and culture becomes harder to reach. Our work is to ensure the next generation has the tools—and the confidence—to keep those languages alive.
