What differentiates literature from world literature? How do western conceptions of literary works categorize or diminish contributions from those outside the West? In today’s age of connectivity, migration, and growing diasporas, is there really a need for this distinction? Was there ever?

While constructing DisPlace: The Poetry of Nduka Otiono, author Nduka and editor Peter Midgley wrestled with these questions among other conventions of global literature. Confronting concepts like the decolonization of knowledge and conflicting cultural approaches to spirituality, Nduka and Peter hoped DisPlace could complicate theories of language, world citizenship, and modern poetry.

In this second episode, Nduka describes how his Nigerian roots and background in oral poetry shape the narratives and sequence of his writing. He also grapples with the complexity of choosing between a colonial and indigenous language and balancing multiple cultural contexts in his poetry. Peter explains his wariness of terms like “world literature,” “global south,” and “third world country,” and the importance of overturning long-held notions of what defines the literary canon.

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