From Third-Generation Nigerian Literature in English to the Twenty-First Century.

The late Harry Garuba and Biodun Jeyifo are considered to be the most outspoken critics against the generational model of writing the history of Nigerian literature. These academics raised objections against the national-generational framework on the premises that it is ambiguous, unstable, temporally reductive, and uses a rudimentary age-grading system to explain away a complex literary history in which different writers are constantly churning out works of different genres and stylistic compositions at different times regardless of the generation to which they have been constricted. Drawing from their highly antagonistic outlooks, this article further criticizes the disadvantageous character of the generational model adopted in Nigerian literary history by critically examining how twenty-first-century literary developments disrupt historiographically constructed generations in Nigerian literature. The article also subtly proposes that a fourth generation be instituted or the generational model be altogether scrapped. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]