Definitions Flashcards
Meaning of canonial counter-discourse?
- destabilizes the power and knowledge of imperialism
It is a method to refuse classical past and postcolonial present the empire is trying to preserve
Rewriting classics
Writing Back paradigm
Three acts of liberation:
Canonial counter discourse
Oppositional use of language
Oppositional use of language
Appropriation
Ability to de- / reconstruct in line with postcolonial experience
Heterogeneity
Diverse in character and content
No single focus possible
Postcolonialism
All cultures affected by imperial process from point of colonization until the present day
Creole languages
Mixture of different languages
Used in communities
Acquired by children as native language
A stable language
Creole continuum
Speakers of creolen and standard english choose between registers that best fit the meaning or situation they are trying to convey
Pidgens
Contact languages without native speakers
Exist in addition to mother tongues
Limited in communitive range
Used for buisness/ trade reasons
Otherness
Social or psychological ways in which one group exclused or marginalizes another group
Ambivalence
Ambigous way in which colonizer and colonized regard themselves
Mixed sense of blessing or curse
Mix of inferior and enviable
Heterodiegenic narration
Narrator who is not a character in the story but hovers above it and knows everything about it
Double colonisation of women
Colonised twice through oppression of colonialism and through patriarchy
Colonial writing
Defined as literature written during time of colonization
Usually from point of view of colonizers
National writing
Sense of national identity to resist impact of colonialism
People past geographical borders share a identity
Hybridity
Cross between two races or cultures
Existing social processes mix to create new
Positive/resistive form of cultural translation
Colonial
Political condition of dependency
Control of cultural reproduction
Reflects norms and forms of the controlling culture
Mimicry
Ambivalent relationship between colonizer and colonized
Colonized produces blurred copy of colonizer
Habits, values etc.
Never far from mockery
Cartography
Process of cartography reinforces colonization
Naming/ renaming act of control and superiosity
Terra nullis
Abrogation
Denial of the priviledge of English
Refusal of the imperial culture
Regusal of its aestethic/ correct usage of language
Appropriation
The process of remoulding a language
Language is used as a tool to express differing cultural experiences
Result of imperial control through language
Alienation in linguistic and social fields
Gap between land and language
Settler colonialism
Replacement of indigenous
With settler economics, society, language and politics
Designed to secure local markets and merchandise
Diaspora
Voluntary of forced movement of people from their homeland to a new region
Revisionist historiography
Reviewing revising history and view of colonial history provided by the imperial centre
Anglophone Literatures
literatures in English
Man Booker Prize
prestigious British literary Prize
- represents the internationalization of English writing
- includes all former British colonies
Commonwealth of Nations
founded 1931, lose grouping, 53 nations
characteristics of Colonialism
Occupation
conducted trade
exploitation of human and natural ressources
missionaries (Christian religion)
‘work force’
Europeans needed workforce to do labour, and basically imported slaves mainly from Africa to do labor
Brief history of British Empire
- journey of exploration: England leading sea power
- founding of British Colonies Americe (East India Company, Hudson Bay company); slave trade
- loss of American colony, settlement in Australia
- 19th Century: height of Empire, Queen Victoria Empress of India
- long process of decolonisation, withdrawal after WW2
- Postwar immigration to Britain, ethincally diverse population
Nationalist movements and literature/Culture
nations are imagines countries— Benedict Anderson
independent, free nation is the goal
nation has to be rehearsed and reinvented (symbolism like anthems and flags)
Postcolonial Studies, three main points
- rereading and relearning the colonial/ imperialist period of Britain
- overcoming former hierachies
- it is a interdisciplinary subject
deal with legacies of culture and economics
Commonwealth Literature
British literature not included (invisible centre)
generally rejected term
India/ Africa never been part of the Commonwealth of Nations
its a political term
New English Literatures and Cultures
good: plural, points out the diversity
bad: ‘new’, counts out the postcolonial literature during colonisation
Anglophone Postcolonial Literatures and Cultures
postcolonial has established as the proper term, means ‘after’ independence
What do the Postcolonial Literatures have in common?
they have special and distinctive regional characteristics BUT
that in their present form they all emerged from the experience of colonization
enphazise their differences from the assumptions the imperial centre has
Areas of Study of POCO
- Anglophone literatures and cultures in former British Colonies (convict narratives, apartheid nation
- British literature and culture reflecting Britains postcolonial position
- Empire writing and culture (travel reports)
- Ethnic minority literatures and cultures in Britain
terra nullis
nobodys land
Robinson Crusoe
writes journal, talks to his parrot
tries to produce sameness, wants to project englishness on the person, but fails
(concept of mimicry)
failed to produce sameness, created ambivalence
Anglo- english Literature
written by MRI’s= non- resident Indians
diaspora
magic realism
fusion of realistic and fantastical elements
Indo- English Literature
written by Indian residents
Danger of a single Story
stories can empower/dispower
show only one thing over and over again
emphazise otherness/ create stereotypes
historiographic metafiction
metafiction: reminds the reader through structure abd literary devices that it is fiction
historical fiction: plot takes place in the past
constant self-reflexitiy and concern with history
certain known details about past deli. falsified to emphaz. error of rec. history
rediscovers histories of surpressed people
chutnification of history
metaphor for historiography and memory
