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This paper explores the potential of South-South reading frameworks within postcolonial Atlantic literatures by examining the intellectual trajectories of João Cabral de Melo Neto and Léopold Sédar Senghor. Against the backdrop of postcolonial state-building in Africa and military dictatorship in Brazil, both figures crossed the Atlantic with the shared goal of strengthening cultural ties and fostering political solidarity between their nations. Their literary contributions not only engage with a common colonial history but also speculate on the intertwined destinies of Africa and South America.
Through an analysis of previously unexplored archives—such as Senghor’s speeches during his 1964 visit to Brazil and João Cabral de Melo Neto’s poetry from his tenure as ambassador in Dakar (1972–1979)—this study sheds light on their efforts to envision decolonial futures across the South Atlantic. By adopting a South-South reading perspective, this paper reveals key aspects of both writers’ poetic and political commitments to decolonial emancipation while also offering an alternative mapping of Atlantic literary circulation between the Lusophone and Francophone worlds.
Estefanía Bournot (PhD) is a Research Fellow at the Austrian Academy of Sciences, where she leads the project Forgotten Routes across the Atlantic (1960-1990). Her forthcoming monograph explores Pan-African encounters and cultural diplomacy as pivotal nodes in transatlantic exchanges between Brazil and West Africa, set against the backdrop of Cold War politics. Her research and teaching focus on contemporary cultural productions from the Global South and adopt a comparative lens to examine Lusophone, Francophone, and Hispanophone Atlantic cultures.
She is the author of Giros topográficos: (Re)Escrituras del espacio en la narrativa latinoamericana del S. XXI (Potsdam UP, 2022) and co-editor of the essays cluster on Geosemantics (ASAP/J) and the forthcoming collected volume World Literatures from Below (Bloomsbury). In 2024 she co-convened the international conference Decolonising the World Republic of Letters (Maison des Sciences de l’Homme, Paris) and the SUR Series on Latin American Artivism at the University of Bielefeld (Germany).
Moderated by: Mariano Siskind (Romance Languages and Literatures)
João Cabral de Melo Neto and Léopold Sédar Senghor, in Dakar 1972