Comparing Black Album And White Teeth

Discourses on migration have become extremely dominant in European political debates and among its population in the last 60 years as Europe faced great societal changes after World War II. These changes have caused by immense migration of workers within Europe but also from non-European, mainly from former colonies during the 1960s and 1970s. Now it is not anymore migration alone that contributes to discussions about cultural changes in Europe, but the children and grandchildren of the migrants have also come into the focus of discourses on unity and diversity. As a result, heterogeneity has not only brought cultural enrichment of European societies but has always been exploited for xenophobic activity and cultural particularism. Debates on diversity have stimulated also an upheaval of cultural theory that discusses not the contents of different cultures and compares them, as it has been done in the modernist discourse, but tries to explain how culture can be defined or described, attending to the significance power relations for the construction of identity. Literary works mirror discussions about migration, identity, and power, and thereby, highlight the currency of these topics. Dilemmas and difficulties caused by the impossibility to arrive at a final definition of identity and culture, are expressed in art, such as literature, where solutions are not anticipated or even expected. Hence, fiction suggests multiple options to contemplate and discuss about societal changes and is a useful resource in educational domains. My diploma thesis aims at the construction of a didactic concept that gives students the opportunity to discuss power, identity and culture. The concept suggests learners to unveil discriminatory discourses, to reflect on the construction of cultural identity, and encourages acceptance of inconsistencies. Readiness to tolerate difficulties is an essential aspect as it emphasises the impossibility of creating coherent explanations as a solution to overcome inner as well as societal conflicts. If that would be the goal of my thesis it would not be compatible with the theories I introduce as these deconstruct the idea of metaphysical truth, but rather opens a space where complexities are revealed instead of simplified. My thesis starts with a presentation of postcolonial theories on identity by focussing on questions of participation and self-determination; then multiculturality, interculturality, transculturality and hybridity are defined and compared to each other; thereby it is attended to the relevance of power relations for the representation of cultural identities. The attention to hierarchical structures within a society attempts to expose the constructiveness and instability of identity. These theories are tried to be linked with the literary works The Black Album and White Teeth for these will be the main sources for teaching and learning about different approaches to view culture and identity. …show more content…
The Black Album and White Teeth are both set in the diverse society of London and have in common that the protagonists are teenager or young adults whose problems may in some ways correspond with the supposed reader/student of a language classroom. These fictional texts not only represent issues of non-belonging, stereotyping, and identity formation, they also have the quality to uncover, through their form, the multiplicity of meanings manifested within a text, owed to an absent authoritarian voice. Teaching cultural theory through migration literature may sound risky for its complexity may extend the purpose of a language classroom. However,