In 2002, at the annual Zimbabwe International Book Fair, twelve literary books by African women were included for the first time in the category of "Africa's 100 Best Books of the Twentieth Century." This was an important but belated affirmation of women writers on the continent and a first step toward establishing a recognized canon of African women's literature.
"The Twelve Best Books by African Women" is a collection of critical essays on eleven works of fiction and one play. The titles by African women that were included in the list of "Africa's 100 Best Books of the Twentieth Century" are: Anowa, Ama Ata Aidoo (1970); A Question of Power, Bessie Head (1974); Woman at Point Zero, Nawal El Saadawi (1975); The Beggars' Strike, Aminata Sow Fall (1979); Burger's Daughter, Nadine Gordimer (1979); The Joys of Motherhood, Buchi Emesheta (1979); So Long a Letter, Mariama Ba (1980); Fantasia: An Algerian Cavalcade, Assia Djebar (1983); Nervous Conditions, Tsitsi Dangarembga (1988); Living, Loving and Lying Awake at Night, Sindiwe Magona (1991); Butterfly Burning, Yvonne Vera (1998); Riwan ou le chemin de sable, Ken Bugul (1999).
This collection of original essays recognizes the gesture of inclusion as an important shift in consciousness and creates a fresh awareness of the literary works by African women writers. Each essay offers a penetrating analysis of individual texts and opens up a fresh perspective that allows scholars and students alike to explore new dimensions of these writers' work.

Gender in Modernism, conceived as a sequel to the now-classic volume The Gender of Modernism, selects the best from the fifteen years of feminist literary and modernist scholarship that has appeared since the original's publication. Its fresh and diverse texts examine new themes and reflect today's broader, more inclusive understanding of modernism. The collection's modernist works have been grouped into twenty-one thematic sections, with theoretical introductions to the primary texts provided by the scholars who have taken the lead in pushing both modernism and gender in new directions. The selections enhance our understanding of the complex intersections of gender with a large array of social identifications, including global location, ideas of race, passing, the queering of sexualities, medicine, and experiences of trauma and war. It sees continental modernism in a different light, and moves on to colonial and postcolonial sites. less-studied genres of modernism, including writers on the left, suffragists, authors of manifestos, mediums, authors dismissed as sentimental, artists, dancers, dramatists, and filmmakers. Gender in Modernism will quickly move from resource to springboard, furthering modernist study well into the twenty-first century. Contributors include Tuzyline Jita Allan, Ann Ardis, Nancy Berke, Julia Briggs, Pamela L. Caughie, Mary Chapman, Suzanne Clark, Patrick Collier, Diane F. Gillespie, Barbara Green, Leslie Kathleen Hankins, Suzette A. Henke, Katherine Kelly, Colleen Lamos, Bette London, Janet Lyon, Jayne Marek, Sonita Sarker, Carol Shloss, Susan Squier, Claire Tylee, and Gay Wachman.