Edward Said

This is linked to the power that narrates the history through colonialism. Furthermore, this issue relates to the idea of representation. How the non-European cultures connoted. Realizing this notion, theorists such as Edward Said developed and introduced postcolonial theory. Said highlights the prevailing binary opposition between the west and the rest. There are some findings such as the rest is often depicted especially in Literature as the other which is exotic and less…

“An Ant Enclosed in a Circle”: The function of space and Identity in Shani Mootoo’s Cereus Blooms at Night “However, I cannot escape myself, and being a narrator who also existed on the periphery of the events, in am bound to be present. I have my own laments and much to tell about myself. It is my intent, however, to refrain from inserting myself too forcefully.” This is a quote from the character Tyler in Shani Mootoo’s Cereus Blooms at Night. This shows Tyler’s character in his conscious…

Tiffin makes a comparative study of the use of colonial motifs in The Cat and Shakespeare and The Double Hook. In her comments on Rao’s book, she says that both the title and the concerns of the novel points at a political purpose is jumbled up with a philosophical theme. Further in the course of her article, she asks whether the book can be called a postcolonial text. Because it displays that “the community, its beliefs and rituals are in no sense disrupted by the history of British colonialism…

By means of arranging intertextual approaches, Rushdie has problematized postmodernist representational systems of the West, specifically, its colonial and imperial discourse. Besides, his novels are interested in the study of Eastern cultural traditions and history, particularly those of India and Pakistan. As a postcolonialist writer, Rushdie attempts to deconstruct the colonial historical account of the colonizer and subvert it through the creation of another explanations and accounts. The…

Orientalism has became one of the founding principles of racial theories. It is how the way the West imagines about the East. Many stereotypes were first created during the Marco Polo’s travels to the East. The fantasy of Orientalism has been framed and reinforced through the differences of the Eastern cultures and traditions. Due to the strange clothings, foods, religions, and beliefs, Asia seemed very abnormal to the Europeans. Which lead them to think that everyone is the East are considered…

In ‘The Rhetoric of Empire’, David Spur explores the discourse that Western journalists, travel writers and imperial administrators have used to depict the non-Western world using tropes, which he identifies through a careful analysis, tracing various sorts of writings from different historical contexts, and studying the way in which these tropes have been deployed. Among these rhetorical modes are surveillance, classification, and affirmation; framing these themes proves very much useful, as it…

Racism is something that has been something occurring in the world for a very long time. The novel Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad represents the time period of imperialism; when Belgium colonized the Congo. Conrad depicts the racism that occured in the Congo of Africa because of the Europeans colonization. The main protagonist named Marlow, a European sailor, goes on an adventure with his crew through his perspective going up the Congo River with the goal of meeting an idealistic man, Kurtz.…

Colonialism took many different forms throughout history; political, economic, social and cultural. Literature itself can serve colonial objectives through the use of a colonial language that describes the Non-western countries as inferior, uneducated, uncultured and uncivilized. This type of colonial discourse mainly serve the colonial powers who give false image about the other in order to emphasize their superiority and to defend the real intentions behind colonizing other countries such as…

Bending the Culture: Hybridization of Punjabi Ethos in Gurinder Chadha’s Bend it Like Beckham “Sometimes we feel we straddle two cultures; at other times, that we fall between two stools.” - Salman Rushdie ‘Diaspora is the term used to describe any population which is considered deterritorialized, dislocated and disintegrated fostering feels of ‘unbelongingness’ and ‘dispossession’. The…

The term Mimicry underlines the gap between the norm of civility presented by European Enlightenment and its colonial imitation in distorted form. .This notion is based on Foucault‘s term that was based on Kant‘s notion. Bhabha‘s term mimicry is a part of a larger concept of visualizing the postcolonial situation as a kind of binary opposition between authority and oppression, authorization and de-authorization. He states ahead that all modes of imposition including the demand on the colonized…