1,721,007 research outputs found
Author Redux: an analysis of the “Self”-translation behavior enacted in Pai Hsien-yung's Taipei people
No full textThis paper addresses the dual identity of Pai Hsien-yung as the author and co-translator in the collaborative self-translation of Taipei People to explore the impact of his identity as the author on the translation process. First, this paper employed Bourdieu’s Theory of Habitus to explain the development of Pai’s writing habitus and zoomed in to analyze the specific writing styles of Taipei People. Subsequently, this paper delves into Pai’s translation attitudes and habitus through text analysis.
The findings of the thesis are that Pai’s life experiences set the foundation for the nostalgia, tragedy, and combination of Chinese classics and western writing styles in his masterpiece, Taipei People. Moreover, his identity as the author yielded substantial effect on that as the co-translator, which was demonstrated both from the establishment of the translation team and the translation progress. The translated target texts to a great extent reflected his writing habitus. The areas impacted by such a habitus are arguably the translation of images, tones, Kunqu Opera, and the use of a stream of consciousness writing technique.
Pai Hsien-yung as the author ensured accuracy in text analysis and further faithfulness in the translation. In addition, he served as an initiator and instructor during the collaborative self-translation.Master's degre
Understanding through fantasy : applying a postcolonial lens to Christopher Paolini’s inheritance cycle
No full textIn this paper, I seek specific answers to the “realistic” implications and function of fantasy novels, specifically, Paolini’s Inheritance cycle. Here, I define “realistic” as our subjective reality outside the novel’s world of magic and dragons, problems that range from the personal to the public. Do fantasy novels have any concrete relation to our subjective reality? In order to answer this question, we have to consider Roland Barthes’ essay, “Death of the Author”, where he asserts that “to give an Author to a text is to impose upon that text a stop clause, to furnish it with a final signification, to close the writing” (Barthes 5). Although Paolini lived through neither colonialism nor the immediate postcolonial times, his work can still create conversation with issues that are essential to the concerns of postcolonial studies. Instead of trying to “explain” the Author beneath the work, or assigning it an “ultimate meaning” (Barthes 5), I seek to discover the Inheritance cycle’s “destination” (Barthes 5) by examining all four novels in the series. I posit that studying the postcolonial potential of the Inheritance cycle through examining cultural diversity, hybridity, language and power would lead us to discover its academic potential, pushing Inheritance beyond being a work of popular culture.Bachelor of Art
Language : key roles in concretization and renunciation of colonisation.
No full textThe focus of Postcolonial literary studies often revolve around a number of tropes and keystones
such as “marginalisation”, “rupture”, “problematic parentage”, “abrogation” and “appropriation”. These
are often techniques and themes employed and expounded upon in Postcolonial texts. As such, it is
interesting to note the commonalities in rhetorical tropes and techniques that allow these texts to cover the
common ground that exists in Postcolonial studies.
Thus, the focus of this paper is to examine the existence of said elements in Postcolonial literature,
as well as the treatment of Language by a number of chosen authors and texts. This paper has chosen
two Postcolonial writers across different continents and circumstances that remain connected by the act
of Colonisation.
The authors chosen are Nigerian author Chinua Achebe and Indonesian author Pramoedya
Ananta Toer. The primary texts for this paper are Things Fall Apart and the english translation of This
Earth of Mankind. This Earth of Mankind will be used in conjunction with the rest of the epic Buru
quartet to which it belongs.Bachelor of Art
Cultural Conservatism and the Sites of Transformation in Meera Syal's Life Isn't All Ha Ha Hee Hee
No full textDeconstructing women : reclaiming their identity and culture.
No full textIn the post-colonial period, women are often said to suffer from “double-colonization”; by both the male gender and by the “previous” colonial power. Just like the colonized people, women are classified as being the “Other” or to be “lack” of [something]. In What is Woman, the author Heinamma explains how women are defined and differentiated with reference to man and not he with reference to her; she is the incidental, the inessential as opposed to the essential, thus is the “Other” while he is the “Subject” (16). A man is both the positive and the neutral, and a woman, represents only the negative. Thus, being a woman means a deviation from their male counterpart, hence implying that they are of the weaker sex.Bachelor of Art
What does quantity have to do with it: a closer look at Chinua Achebe’s short stories.
No full textChinua Achebe, the prolific Igbo author from Nigeria, has long been credited as the
father of African literature, so to speak. Those of his works which have been received with
critical acclaim include what is usually referred to as the African Trilogy, consisting of his
first novel Things Fall Apart, the sequel No Longer At Ease and the final installment in the
series, Arrow of God. Another notable piece of Achebe’s is his critical response to Joseph
Conrad’s Heart of Darkness- in which he famously accuses the Polish novelist of being a
“bloody racist”- in his essay An Image of Africa. Because these writings combine to
overshadow others in Achebe’s repertoire, it is lesser known that he has also penned a
collection of short stories entitled Girls at War and Other Stories. This thesis will focus on
Achebe’s short fiction, which I will contend are undervalued in their own right. I will also
argue that the greatest strength of the stories lie in their demonstration of Achebe’s aptitude
for versatility as he writes specifically about the African people and their experiences.
Simultaneously, he also imbues readers from outside Africa with knowledge about a
misunderstood continent. Hence, Africa, in this context, signifies “not only a geographical
expression... but also a metaphysical landscape - it is in fact a view of the world and of the
whole cosmos perceived from a particular position” (Hopes 92). Nevertheless, that is not to
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say that any other reader from outside Africa cannot also be informed, instructed and/or
interested by the works in this collection. In terms of Achebe’s chosen medium of expression,
this thesis will also discuss the lack of critical success of Girls at War and Other Stories in
relation to the perception of the short story as an inferior literary form.Bachelor of Art
De-constructing Asian diaspora : reclaiming or reshaping identity and culture?
No full textBecause Asian Diasporic predicaments are the hardest to define. No words in the
English Dictionary aptly describe their straddled positions. After dissecting the texts,
protagonists continue to feel the tension between two distinct cultures of opposing values
and belief. As protagonists still feel a sense of affiliation to their native land, they
continue to rely on their cultural patrimony in their decision-making. However, their
reliance is problematic due to the nature of memory and perception. The three selected
texts negotiate this tension in ways that are similar and different. Protagonist Etsuko after
going through so much change finally settled in London leaving the old house where
Keiko had once lived. She feels very much alone for she has clear difficulty passing on
her roots to Niki whose idea of marriage and children went the opposite ways of hers.
However, she continues to hold on to her patrimonial culture to live. She feels aloneness
for no westerners can understand her and therefore finds comfort in the nature that
surrounds her. Ishiguro does not offer a good way forward to this persona. Sunny on the
other hand in The Match seems to have gone to a stage where an epiphany is established,
and that being the acceptance of irreclaimable nature of the past. Although author seems
to offer a possible way out through art, this seems to be preposterous in the end.
Reconciliation with his wife and a returned interest to his child does offer a way forward
but not yet successful.
As with Syal’s Life isn’t all ha ha hee hee, all protagonists have failed but one
which is Tania. Instead of taking a stance that swings too much to the left or right, she is the only one able to maintain a balance between the two cultures. However, a clear understanding that Asian Diaspora has belong to nowhere in particular but are just
flexible enough to constantly adjust to a mid point to make sense of her world. Although
memory and perception continue to be unreliable and warped, ability to maintain this equilibrium of the two cultures suggest a way forward. This is an act to reshape and not reclaim Tania’s identity as it changes with the norms of both cultural patrimony as well as host culture.Bachelor of Art
Beyond the Color Line: Intersectional Considerations in Chuah Guat Eng’s Fiction
Get PDFThis essay argues that the work of Malaysian-Chinese author Chuah Guat Eng gives pause to the culturalism that dominates literary analysis. Articulated primarily through identity politics (the politics of recognition), culturalism’s self- understanding keeps at a distance other forms of social justice commitments including class struggle. However, Chuah spotlights their intersectionality in Malaysia and enjoins us to combine the two – to see the native population’s demand for economic parity and rural development as coterminous in some respects with the demands for recognition made by settler communities. In particular, Chuah’s Echoes of Silence (1994) points to the commensurability between socialist principles that underpinned the left-insurgent activities many Malaysian-Chinese joined or supported during the war and immediate post-war, and the social protection principles that underpin post-independence programmes aimed at alleviating poverty. Chuah’s second novel, Days of Change (2010), in turn suggests that shared ecological conservation ideals provide an arena for redistribution and recognition interests to come together in Malaysia, and this again counters the prevailing tendency to prioritize the claims of cultural otherness. To use terms provided by Émile Durkheim, Chuah highlights organic solidarity and downplays mechanical solidarity. In this regard, her fiction rehearses the theoretical insights of Nancy Fraser, who argues cogently that the framing of redistribution and recognition interests as unrelated or dichotomous commitments is problematic. Like Fraser, Chuah urges an expanded interpretive paradigm unsettling that assumed dichotomy. To the extent that postcolonial literary studies lacks such a focus, a new conceptual vocabulary that extends its horizons is needed
Beyond the Color Line: Intersectional Considerations in Chuah Guat Eng's Fiction
No full textThis essay argues that the work of Malaysian-Chinese author Chuah Guat Enggives pause to the culturalism that dominates literary analysis. Articulatedprimarily through identity politics (the politics of recognition), culturalism’s selfunderstandingkeeps at a distance other forms of social justice commitmentsincluding class struggle. However, Chuah spotlights their intersectionality inMalaysia and enjoins us to combine the two – to see the native population’s demandfor economic parity and rural development as coterminous in some respects withthe demands for recognition made by settler communities. In particular, Chuah’sEchoes of Silence (1994) points to the commensurability between socialist principlesthat underpinned the left-insurgent activities many Malaysian-Chinese joinedor supported during the war and immediate post-war, and the social protectionprinciples that underpin post-independence programmes aimed at alleviatingpoverty. Chuah’s second novel, Days of Change (2010), in turn suggests that sharedecological conservation ideals provide an arena for redistribution and recognitioninterests to come together in Malaysia, and this again counters the prevailingtendency to prioritize the claims of cultural otherness. To use terms provided byÉmile Durkheim, Chuah highlights organic solidarity and downplays mechanicalsolidarity. In this regard, her fiction rehearses the theoretical insights of NancyFraser, who argues cogently that the framing of redistribution and recognitioninterests as unrelated or dichotomous commitments is problematic. Like Fraser,Chuah urges an expanded interpretive paradigm unsettling that assumed dichotomy.To the extent that postcolonial literary studies lacks such a focus, a new conceptualvocabulary that extends its horizons is needed.Published versio
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