American International Journal of Humanities and Social Science (AIJHSS)

This paper examines the visibility of the discourse of Pan-Africanism in Kenya’s children’s literature through the Lion’s series of biographies, whose original aim was to reclaim the historical voices in Kenya for young readers. Within this body of writing, there is a diversification of the history narrated by inclusion of African personalities who have played different roles in their own countries. This paper picks this strand of the biographies and argues that making such stories available for children is an important occurrence in the history of African children’s literature because such biographies help children to understand the makers of African history. Specifically, the paper examines the biography of Kwame Nkrumah, by looking at styles superimposed in the text and the traits accorded to the character, which are useful in showing young readers the role Nkrumah played in pioneering the discourse of African unity. The paper concludes that like adult literature, contemporary children’s literature is an important literary strand through which socio-political ideologies can be understood.