SOURCE: Kimenyi, Alexandre. “The ‘Popularity’ of Négritude.” Journal of Ethnic Studies 9, no. 1 (spring 1981): 69-74.

In the following essay, Kimenyi defines the characteristics of Negritude, moving on to expound on the reasons for its rise and popularity.

Books, conferences and hundreds of essays, supportive and critical, have been devoted to Négritude. The question which has never been discussed is why Négritude became so popular. Négritude as a literary movement denouncing oppression, political domination, economic exploitation and intellectual and cultural alienation was indeed predictable. Literature, or any other type of art, is not independent of the spatio-temporal factors in which the writer lives. Whether he is committed or not, the political, economic and social conditions witnessed by the author will be reflected in the work.

Since Africans have been subjected to all forms of humiliation, were not responsible for their own destiny, had been forced to...