African literature differs from one society to another within a single state of multiple ethnicities and religions, just as it differs from one state to another. Popular literature initially appeared, and it was oral and in local dialects, followed by written literatures in the languages of some African peoples, such as Swahili in the East and Hausa in the West. What has reached us from oral literatures revolves, in its entirety, around superstitions and myths that mix truth and imagination.

After that, African literature was influenced by Arabic literature, which arrived with the Islamic conquests in the eighth century AD, as well as European literature during the Christian occupation in the nineteenth century AD. This resulted in Arab-African literature and European-African literature, in addition to literature written in modern local languages.

However, Arab critics, and even African ones, did not pay attention to Arab-African literature. As for European-African literature, it receives the attention of cultural centers and the support of political institutions in Europe, in order to consolidate European culture in Africa.