Tekst- og litteraturhistorie i de engelsksprogede lande Session Eight The Empire Writes Back: Postcolonialism

Agenda The postcolonial situation Coping with the postcolonial situation: Ngugi vs Rushdie, and John Agard. Rushdie and Magic Realism ”The Prophet’s Hair” Feedback and exam Evaluation

The postcolonial situation Former colonies are independent and free of colonial rule. However, former colonies remain dependent politically, economically, socially, ideologically, linguistically, aesthetically, etc. Thus, former colonies are hybrids, mongrels, and in-betweens

Coping with the postcolonial situation Ngugi vs John Agard and Rushdie Ngugi Return to ’harmony’ by embracing your original culture and language (Gikuyu) ”Language carries culture …(2538)

Coping with the postcolonial situation Ngugi vs John Agard and Rushdie John Agard: embracing the languages of the colonised (West Indian Creole, British Guiana) and the coloniser (the Queen’s English). Writing broken English is an attempt at breaking English linguistically, aesthetically, politically, etc…)

Coping with the postcolonial situation Ngugi vs John Agard and Rushdie Rushdie: Embracing English as a global language (”The English language ceased to be the sole possession of the English some time ago”), but chutnifying it, spicing it up according to how it is used.

Salman Rushdie and ideas of multiplicity, pluralism, and hybridity ‘My’ India has always been based on ideas of multiplicity, pluralism, hybridity: ideas to which the ideologies of the communalists are diametrically opposed. To my mind the defining image of India is the crowd, and a crowd is by its very nature superabundant, heterogeneous, many things at once. (2854)

Ethnic,cultural, ideological, political linguistic, aesthetic variety, diversity, and difference Multiplicity vs uniformity Pluralism vs essentialism, nationalism Hybridity vs purity Heterogeneity vs homogeneity

Magic realism ”These writers interweave, in an ever- shifting pattern, a sharply etched realism in representing ordinary events and descriptive details together with fantastic and dreamlike elements, as well as materials derived from myth and fairy tales” (Abrams)

Discussion Is "The Prophet's Hair" a work of magic realism or postcolonialism or both? Elements of realism, of magic? Why and how are they used? Elements of postcolonialism: multiplicity, pluralism, hybridity. Why and how are they used?