Okyeame

This magazine was founded in 1961 by The Writers Workshop, with literary organ Okyeame as key in this development. Thought of after the post-independence era in Ghana, which saw the rapid rise of a new generation of thinkers, writers and poets. Inspired by the then Ghanaian Prime Minister, Kwame Nkrumah, the publication sought to explore the experiences of Africa from a new intellectual framework.

The publication took its name from a traditional Ghanaian figure, the "spokesperson" or "linguist" responsible for channelling communication between a leader and his people. Okyeame sought to give voice to Nkrumah's dream of a new African identity. Articles called for a Ghanaian poetry whose content and form was based on oral tradition, drum poetry. These ran alongside traditional oral works translated by leading contemporary poets such as founding editor Kofi Awoonor, and texts were interspersed with icons and Adinkra symbols. Like its namesake Okyeame, was not simply a mouthpiece. It was also an "interpreter" and an "ambassador in foreign courts". It provided a platform for a new generation of writers to experiment with a versatile, hybrid Pan-African linguistics that combined African oral influences with African American literary devices; rural with urban imagery; phonetic innovations with lyricism and wordplay; and dirge rhythms with jazz free-play. Okyeame magazine era is recalled by some scholars such as a time when its writers functioned like Nkrumah's foot soldiers in the cultural field.

This article uses text from chimurengalibrary.co.za under the GFDL