NEW TRENDS IN ANGLOPHONE CAMEROONIAN POETRY-THE ROLE OF GUERRILLA POETS

Abstract

Guided by the Marxist critical theory and the concept of socialist realism, the assumption of this paper rests on the hypothesis that recent Anglophone Cameroonian poets like Gahlia Gwangwa’a, Emmanuel Fru Doh, John Ngong Kum Ngong, Bate Besong, Nol Alembong and Mathew Takwihave written very revolutionary and radical poetry with the sole intention of effecting a change in the society.Consequently, this paper preoccupies itself with the various critical poetic voices that emerged in the early 1990s and the later part of 2000 which were  

concerned with the process of effecting change; that is, they were change-oriented. This poetry unlike early poetry is a subversive weapon intended basically to rebuild the fragmented socio-political structures of the Cameroonian society caused by dictatorship, bad governance, alienation and estrangement. Finally, this paper also underscores the role played by guerrilla poetry in addressing some of these psycho- socio-political ills that alienate and estrange the people from their leaders and their society. 

Key words: Alienation, estrangement and guerrilla poetry