Rémi Armand Tchokothe How Can Literary Works Help Us to Understand the Politics of Migration?
Dr. Rémi Tchokothe is an Assistant Professor in African Studies at the University of Bayreuth. He has ongoing affiliations with Rhodes University (South Africa), the University of Sousse (Tunisia) and the Centre Universitaire de Mayotte. Tchokothe’s research interests include African urban youth languages, the production and reception of literature in African languages and the literature of the Comoros archipelago. An editor of several collected volumes, Tchokothe has published two monographs: Stylistic Features in Balisidya’s Short Stories (2010) and Transgression in Swahili Narrative Fiction and its Reception (2014).
Area of Research
Literature of the Comoros Archipelago, Migration and Multiple Identities, Literatures in African Languages, Intercultural Translation, African Urban Youth Languages, African Diaspora Studies, African Sociolinguistics, Critical African Studies
since 2019
Principal Investigator
University of Bayreuth (Universität Bayreuth) (more details)
Cluster of Excellence “Africa Multiple: Reconfiguring Africa"
since 2016
Visiting Research Associate
Rhodes University
African Language Studies Section & School of Languages and Literatures
since 2016
Professeur Associé
Université de Sousse
Département des Lettres et des Sciences Humaines
since 2015
Professeur Associé
Centre Universitaire de Mayotte
Département des Lettres et des Sciences Humaines
since 2013
Akademischer Rat auf Zeit
University of Bayreuth (Universität Bayreuth) (more details)
Chair of African Linguistics II
2018
Academic Teaching Excellence. Certificate of English as a Medium of Instruction (EMI)
University of Cambridge
Certificate of English as a Medium of Instruction (EMI)
2017
Certificate for Teaching in Higher Education
Free State of Bavaria, Germany
2008-2012
PhD
University of Bayreuth (Universität Bayreuth) (more details)
Bayreuth International Graduate School of African Studies
2002-2006
Master of Arts in African Linguistics, Literatures in African Languages and Development Sociology
University of Bayreuth (Universität Bayreuth) (more details)
1998-2001
Bachelor of Arts, Linguistics and English Literature
University of Buea
- South African Journal of African Languages
- Journal of African Cultural Studies
- Nordic Journal of African Studies
- Swahili Forum
- Association for the Study of African Literatures (APELA: association pour l’étude des littératures africaines)
- American Comparative Literature Association
- Litprom, "Literaturen der Welt"
- Mega-Chad Network
- Principal Investigator in the Cluster of Excellence: “Africa Multiple: Reconfiguring African Studies", German Research Council (DFG) (with 24 colleagues in African studies) (2019-2025)
University of Bayreuth (Universität Bayreuth)
Bayreuth, GermanyThe University of Bayreuth is a medium-sized campus university which is committed to the highest academic standards. As one of Germany’s youngest universities, it operates in an unbiased, self-confident spirit of academic freedom, scientific progress, and social responsibility. Top priorities are individual supervision, maintaining high academic standards, and creating programmes of study that take current research into account. The innovative collaboration between many of disciplines on the on the ‘Green Campus’ are key features of Bayreuth’s research culture. The University of Bayreuth is dedicated to interdisciplinary research. Its research facilities and infrastructure provide an ideal setting for scientific work. Focus areas – e.g. African studies, Polymer and Colloid Sciences, High Pressure and High Temperature Research, Ecology and the Environmental Sciences – combine the strengths of individual subject areas to address strategically chosen, cross-disciplinary research priorities. Foreign scholars rate Bayreuth as one of the most attractive universities in Germany, consistently placing it among the top institutions in the Humboldt Rankings.
Map
The island of Mayotte forms part of the Comoros archipelago in the Indian Ocean. While Mayotte is part of France and the EU, other islands of the archipelago like Grande Comore and Anjouan are not. In this video, REMI TCHOKOTHE analyzes the tensions that this situation has caused, focusing on how they have been expressed in literary works. Employing close readings of writings by Nassur Attoumani and Soeuf Elbadawi alongside critical geography and field observation, Tchokothe notes that, for these authors, historically established patterns of internal movement between the islands cannot constitute illegal migration. Noting how both authors employ the French language as a tool of resistance, Tchokothe highlights the vital, ongoing role that literature can play in the process of decolonization.
LT Video Publication DOI: https://doi.org/10.21036/LTPUB10756
"Balladur Visa" or "Visa of Death"? Questioning 'Migration' to Europe via the Comoros Archipelago
- Rémi Armand Tchokothe
- Journal of Identity & Migration Studies
- Published in 2018
«Sci-en-ti-fi-que-ment, c’est la France, la France qui a un mort entre les mains»: le référent spatial et la «migration» dans Autopsie d’un macchabée
- Rémi Armand Tchokothe
- French Studies in Southern Africa
- Published in 2018
L’Histoire est un éternel recommencement et presque toujours pour le pire
- Rémi Armand Tchokothe
- Études Littéraires Africaines
- Published in 2018
Les Littératures Francophones de l’Archipel des Comores
- Published in 2017
