Galawdewos

The oldest-known biography of an African woman written by another African, this hagiography tells the story of an Ethiopian saint of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries who used her social position and saintly reputation to defend Ethiopian Orthodoxy against the encroachment of Roman Catholicism and European colonialism. This teaches well: the translation is quite accessible, and Walatta-Petros' actions and the framing thereof frequently defy twenty-first century undergraduates' expectations in a way that generates a lot of discussion about gender, race, and faith. It should be noted, however, that this translation (the only one of this text in English) is the subject of considerable debate. Some Ethiopians have critiqued the translation as colonialist and inaccurate; one of the translators has written a rebuttal to those critiques.… (mais)