Marie-Claire Matip and Thérèse Kuoh-Moukoury as (In)Visible Pioneers: Early Works by Women Writers and the Struggle for Inclusion in Cameroon's National Educational Program

Cameroon's Marie-Claire Matip and Thérèse Kuoh-Moukoury published some of the very first works of Sub-Saharan African women's writing but their achievements are often invisible in their own country, due in part to the omission of these authors' texts from the country's educational program. Along with a brief history and analysis of Matip's novella Ngonda and Kuoh-Moukoury's Rencontres essentielles, this essay discusses the value of these texts today and seeks an understanding of their invisibility in Cameroon despite their indisputable contribution to the African literary canon. The essay also explains the challenges faced in implementing these works into the country's national education program along with some possible signs of and strategies for their eventual inclusion.