Postcolonial Literature

Catalog description

This course studies the literatures of colonized or previously colonized peoples and their diasporas. This may include fiction and essays from a selection of countries with a history colonialism (India, South Africa, Nigeria, Antigua, Haiti, Martinique, Canada). We will analyze these texts in light of the important debates that have been preoccupying postcolonial studies (the field that studies literature and writings from and about colonized and ex-colonized countries). These debates gravitate around issues of cultural difference, agency and resistance, the politics of home and diaspora, globalization and the environment. Close attention will be paid to the different patterns of othering (human/animal, East/West, self/other, male/female) that these potential postcolonial narratives display, challenge, and sometimes unwittingly reproduce.