ABSTRACT
This chapter considers China's cultural exports to Africa as an integral part of China's cultural soft power strategy, focusing in particular on the case of book donations from China to African libraries. It seeks to question whether China's export of its printed cultural material to the African continent can help to facilitate meaningful, two-way interaction or whether it is simply promoting the agenda of the Chinese government. The chapter aims to situate book donations within China's broader strategy of promoting its culture and language abroad and to assess whether the type of activity can generate meaningful cultural interaction. It also considers the phenomenon of book donations from China to African libraries as a direct means of distributing Chinese literature in Africa without going through a European intermediary. The chapter shows how the donations function as a means of controlling the nature of the cultural exchange and managing the type of books that are being made available to African audiences.
