The Executive Council of the African Literature Association stands in support of the Zimbabwean writer and activist, Tsitsi Dangarembga. In 2019, Dangarembga was one of the ALA keynote speakers at the annual conference in Columbus, Ohio and we value her contribution to our association. On September 29, 2022, Tsitsi Dangarembga was convicted of “promoting public violence” after participating in a peaceful protest in Harare calling for reforms. The ALA supports her decision to appeal this verdict and expresses its unequivocal support for her freedom of expression as a writer and activist in her home country. Dangarembga is the author of Nervous Conditions (1988) for which she won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize in Africa, The Book of Not (2006), and This Mournable Body (2020) that was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. In 2021, she was honored by the PEN International Award for Freedom of Expression.
