This Ain’t Paris Sweetie: Exploring West African and French Identity in the Southern United States | CU Experts

This autoethnography explores West African and French identity in the Southern United States. Seven short poems trace back a journey from West Africa and France to the American South and flesh out the contours of a transient and suspended self. A brown immigrant woman, my text reconstructs the embodied experience of racism and sexism in a small conservative community. Poetic prose helps to capture the elusive nature of a narrative, best expressed through fragmentary impressions. These bits written in half-dream state bring to life the folding and unfolding of identity/ies in a foreign land. They also offer a political and cultural reflection on racism, sexism, and immigration. Finally, because they open many windows to other narratives, they shed light on intertextuality in autoethnographic practice, through what I call the “Russian Dolls” metaphor.

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