Mũkoma Wa Ngũgĩ

Mũkoma wa Ngũgĩ (born 1971) is a Kenyan American poet, author, and academic. He is associate professor of literatures in English at Cornell University and co-founder of the Safal-Cornell Kiswahili Prize for African Writing. His father is the author Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o. His family was deeply impacted by the British suppression of the Mau Mau revolution.

Early life and education

Mũkoma was born in 1971 in Evanston, Illinois, US, but raised in Kenya, before returning to the United States for his university education. He holds a BA in political science from Albright College and an MA in creative writing from Boston University. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin at Madison, where he specialized in how questions of authorized and unauthorized English, or standard and non-standard English, influenced literary aesthetics in Romantic Britain and Independence-Era Africa.

Career

He is an associate professor of English at Cornell University.

He is the author of several books, including ''Conversing with Africa: Politics of Change'' (2003, described by ''New Internationalist'' as "a wide-ranging investigation of Africa's dilemmas"), ''Hurling Words at Consciousness'' (poetry, Africa World Press, 2006) and ''Nairobi Heat'' (novel, 2009). His most recent book is ''The Rise of the African Novel: Politics of Language, Identity, and Ownership'' (2018).

His short story "How Kamau Wa Mwangi Escaped into Exile" was shortlisted for the Caine Prize in 2009 and is included in the anthology ''Work in Progress - And Other Stories (Caine Prize: Annual Prize for African Writing)'' (New Internationalist, 2009). His work was also shortlisted for the 2010 Penguin Prize for African Writing.

He has published poems in '' Tin House Magazine'', ''Chimurenga'', ''Brick'' magazine, ''Smartish Pace'', and ''Teeth in the Wind'', ''One Hundred Days'' ( Barque Press); ''New Black Writing'' (John Wiley and Sons); ''Réflexions sur le Génocide rwandais''/''Ten Years Later: Reflections on the Rwandan Genocide'' (L'Harmattan). Some of his poems have been archived on Badilisha Poetry X-Change.

Political opinions and activism

Mũkoma is a columnist for '' BBC Focus on Africa'' magazine and former co-editor of '' Pambazuka News''. In addition, he has published political essays and columns in the ''LA Times'', ''Radical History Review'', ''World Literature Today'', ''Mail and Guardian'', Zimbabwe’s ''Herald'', Kenya’s ''Daily Nation'', ''The EastAfrican'', '' Kwani?'' journal, and zmag.org among other publications.

Mũkoma stated that with Queen Elizabeth II's death, there needs to be a “dismantling” of the Commonwealth and a real reckoning with colonial abuses.

With two Cornell graduate students, Sriram Parasurama and Momodou Taal, who holds UK and Gambian citizenship, Mũkoma is a plaintiff in a lawsuit filed by the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee to block the enforcement of executive orders by President Donald Trump through deportation of foreign students and staff in higher education who were involved in pro-Palestinian protests.

Personal life

In March 2024, Mũkoma posted on Twitter that his father Ngũgĩ had physically abused his mother, now deceased. Ngũgĩ did not acknowledge the accusation and he and Mũkoma became estranged. When Ngũgĩ died in 2025, Mũkoma ultimately refused to visit him on his deathbed.

Books

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*''Killing Sahara'' – novel ( Kwela Books, 2013),
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References

External links

Author's website.
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at Mad Poetry
Profile
at Writers.net
Toward an Africa without Borders Organization

*Lunga Mkila, "The Enigma of Ethnic Violence: Mukoma wa Ngugi’s Novel ''Killing Sahara''"
/ref>, ''The Con'', 17 October 2013.

Webcast
at the Library of Congress, 12 March 2013

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ngugi, Mukoma
1971 births
Living people
Kenyan crime writers
Kenyan poets
Boston University College of Arts and Sciences alumni
Cornell University faculty
Kenyan novelists
Kenyan essayists
Albright College alumni
American crime fiction writers
University of Wisconsin–Madison alumni
21st-century short story writers