Otras lits

• The two main issues in this subject are the writing of empire, and the writing in opposition of the empire, in the period of High Imperialism
• Literature is never neutral; there is always a political agenda behind it
• Literature was a very important weapon used to carry out the whole colonization process in the making and unmaking of the empire
• Colonialism/Colonisation


  The actual process of settlement by Europeans in Asia, African, American and Antipodean spaces, carried out by force without invitation from Natives. It implied violence in the appropriation and exploitation of native races, spaces and resources. It involved military-political conquest and cultural conquest (production of knowledge about the colonised to better control them and imposition of the colonisers' culture)
• Colonial discourse


  The construction of the native, usually in stereotypical ways, in European narratives, as primitive, depraved, criminal, immoral, effeminate, inferior, the OTHER. This discourse became the unquestionable 'truth'
• Imperialism


  The governance/control of other lands from the metropolis through remote control, without actual settlement. It is the ideology that recommends, implements and justifies colonial rule
• Neo-colonialism


  The on-going economic exploitation of Asian and African nation-states by the former metropolises (European and North American powers) through nation-state control, economic control, and business control
• Post-coloniality


  The contemporary, present-day, historical and material conditions of formerly colonised nations, emphasizing the impact of global geopolitics and economic globalisation
• Decolonisation


  A process or critical methodology whereby non-white nations and ethnic groups try to secure freedom (economic, political, intellectual) from their European masters, involving resistance against oppression and the revival of native culture and knowledge
• Postcolonialism


  A cultural term, a critical mode of reading that revisits and interrogates the colonial past and colonial discourses with critical eyes, emphasising the formerly colonised subject's agency in the face of on-going oppression
• Postcolonial Theory


  A set of critical approaches, ideas and critical methodologies that enable us to disclose and question colonial/colonising practices and structures
• Colonial


  A chronological term referring to literature related to or dealing with the colonial period
• Colonialist


  A political term referring to literature that strives to justify the colonial enterprise
• Post-colonial


  A chronological term referring to literature written after independence
• Postcolonial


  A critical/political term referring to an umbrella term for critics, although it poses some problems like chronological confusion, wide meaning, and suggestion of subordination
• Commonwealth literature


  Literature from a loose group of nations which were British colonies prior to 1947, although the term is sometimes used in a paternalistic way and excludes non-English literature
• New Literatures in English

  A problematic term that suggests these literatures are inferior derivatives of English and North American literature
• World Literatures in English

  A term that may recall linguistic or cultural imperialistic notions
• Third World Literature


  A term used to denounce economic and political dependence in a post-imperial world, referring to the poor, undeveloped countries
• Anglophone literature


  Literature written in English, based on linguistic and socio-cultural factors rather than political or ideological positions. The terms 'mother tongue' and 'stepmother tongue' are used, although they have some disadvantages
• English Literature


  • Literature written IN English
  • Literature written BY the English
• Disadvantages of the term 'stepmother'

  • May have negative connotations (stepmother = a problematic figure)
  • However, with the new fluidity and flexibility of contemporary family structures this term could even be positive
  • Often in fairy-tales 'mother' and 'stepmother' are the same person; the child projects onto the stepmother her/his unresolved feelings of hostility towards his/her biological mother
  • 'Mother' and 'stepmother' look like yet another binary construct, privileging the motherly figure ( = white ....)
  • However, sometimes 'mother tongue' and 'stepmother tongue' conflate. Some did not have the option of rejecting English, and now English has become yet another 'mother tongue' of theirs
• Salman Rushdie: 'Those of us who do use English do so in spite of our ambiguity towards it, or perhaps because of that, perhaps because we can find in that linguistic struggle a reflection of other struggles taking place in the real world, struggles between the culture within ourselves and the influences at work upon our societies. To conquer English may be to complete the process of making ourselves free.'
• In India, English has become their mother tongue, not their stepmother's tongue. Very often, they prefer English to Hindi, since Hindi is the language of just ONE of the many communities of India. Also, the English language allows writers to be widely read. Now, according to Rushdie, English is no longer the language of the English, but it has become a lingua franca which Indians can use and abuse.
• Colonialist and anti-colonialist literatures did not simply articulate colonialist or anti-colonialist preoccupations. They contribute to their making and also to change it.
• Rudyard Kipling


  One of the big names of the so called Colonial English Literature
• Stories define us. Literature was used as a powerful weapon to indoctrinate the colonised. When English literature began to be taught, some kind of canon was necessary, that is, they had to make choices.
• Rudyard Kipling


  • Born in India in 1865, a period often referred as the climax of the English Colonisation process
  • Very clever, sensitive and aware of the dark side of the imperial enterprise
  • Known for many tales about Indians, his range of topics is wide
  • Associated India with happiness, his experience in England was rather painful
  • Mastery of the Hindi language enabled him to become familiar with aspects of the country, normally inaccessible to English people
  • Came into close contact with the local people and the Indian market
  • Was in both words, Indian and English
  • Awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907
  • Spent much time in Africa, mainly because of his friend Cecil Rhode
  • Grew more conservative and narrow-minded as liberal ideas were gaining more strength
  • Believed that every Englishman had the duty to educate all the people
  • Did not like politicians and criticized them very often
• Kipling's writing


  • Contributed to the making of the empire and favouring the colonial enterprise
  • The addressee was always the white, male, middle class and patriotic
• Kipling's writing about India often corroborated and showcased existing prejudices about India and Indian people
• Frantz Fanon


  Expatriate Martinican, psychiatrist, political radical philosopher, Pan-Africanist, and Marxist humanist concerned with the psychopathology of colonisation and the human, social, and cultural consequences of decolonisation. He wrote in French.
• Black Skin, White Masks


  He psychoanalyses the oppressed black person who is perceived as a lesser creature in the white world in which they live, and studies how they navigate the world through a performance 'white-ness'.
• Australia was a penal colony, which has raised several insidious traumas because of the suffering experienced by Australian natives during the integration
• Kipling's love for India is very obvious in his writings
• If you wanted to survive in the black world, you must wear a white mask, comply with all the rules of society and forget about your own black culture. You are black inside but white in appearance.
• Main states of Australia

  • Western Australia (Perth)
  • Northern Territory (Darwin)
  • Queensland (Brisbane)
  • South Australia (Adelaide)
  • New South Wales (Sydney)
  • Australian Capital Territory (Canberra)
  • Victoria (Melbourne)
  • Tasmania (Hobart)
• The Wretched of the Earth


  This influential work focuses on what he believed is the necessary role of violence by activists in conducting decolonisation struggles. Politeness and compliance is more often than not, not enough to win a fight in the name of an oppressed minority.
• Canberra is the country's capital, though common imaginary tends to consider it Sydney, because it is a halfway between Melbourne and Sydney, main cities
• Kipling systematically projects his fantasies and fears upon all of his descriptions of India
• To put an end to the competition between both cities, they agree to create a city, a fictitious place, built in order to cease the disputes between both cities