More on Post-Colonial Writing

Just in time for the midterm, I'd like to return to this entry.  If you are going to respond to essay prompt #2, you may want to know a little more about post-colonial writers.  We've read Things Fall Apart, a pioneering example of post-colonial writing, but you may want to know what else is out there.

Let's start with some definitions of post-colonialism.  As Deepika Bahri states in her page on post-colonialism, the definition of this term is not always hard and fast.  This is good to keep in mind.

 http://www.english.emory.edu/Bahri/Intro.html 

Even in 1998, Paul Brians had some concerns with the term:

http://www.wsu.edu:8001/~brians/anglophone/postcolonial.html

Some students at Brown University attempt to define and respond to this term:

http://www.postcolonialweb.org/poldiscourse/stolorow1.html
http://www.postcolonialweb.org/poldiscourse/washburn1.html
http://www.postcolonialweb.org/poldiscourse/yancovitz4.html
http://www.postcolonialweb.org/poldiscourse/hander5.html
http://www.postcolonialweb.org/sarowiwa/hander6.html
http://www.postcolonialweb.org/achebe/hander7.html






For more information about the authors and books above, see the following links. I will be posting from top to bottom, starting with Buchi Emecheta, a Nigerian writer now living in the UK.

http://emeagwali.com/nigeria/biography/buchi-emecheta-voice-09jul96.html

http://www.english.emory.edu/Bahri/Emech.html

http://readallday.org/may12.html

Let's move on to Ben Okri and The Famished Road.
http://emeagwali.com/nigeria/biography/ben-okri-19jul92.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/mar/25/ben-okri-poem-twitter

http://armenianodar.wordpress.com/2009/01/02/the-famished-road-by-ben-okri/

Wole Soyinka's The Man Died is an example of life writing.

http://prelectur.stanford.edu/lecturers/soyinka/

http://nigeriaworld.com/feature/publication/molara-wood/072604.html

We'll conclude with Ama Ata Aidoo, a writer from Ghana.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/arts/features/womenwriters/aidoo_life.shtml

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/arts/features/womenwriters/aidoo_work.shtml

In addition, here is a list of some post-colonial (and colonial) writers:

http://www.literaryhistory.com/20thC/Groups/postcolonial.htm#authors

As you can see from the list, not all are African, and the list is not all inclusive.

Here is a link to Indra Publishing's list of post-colonial novels.  The publishing company is based in Australia.

http://indrabooks.com/category/theme/post-colonial-literature/






For information about the authors above, see the links below.  Let's start with Salman Rushdie. 
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/rushdie.htm

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2008/jul/26/salmanrushdie.bookerprize

http://www.kaysbookshelf.com/2008/12/midnights-children-salman-rushdie/

Field Trip for Fall 2008

Link

Just to let you know that you're invited to join my world literature class on our field trip to see an exhibit of Indian paintings at the Smithsonian.  (The picture above is an example of the type of work we will see.)  The field trip will be on Saturday, November 1.  For more information, check the link above.  Hope to see you there.  

More on Mirabai

Link

As promised, here is the link to the entry on Mirabai and her work!  Her poems are also song lyrics, and she was a devotee of the Hindu god Krishna.

Indian Music

Link

The picture above is from a bhajan (a type of Indian poetry) session at a festival in Mysore, India.  Here's a little more information about this festival:  http://www.dattapeetham.com/india/festivals/ganapati2004/ganapati2004.html

The link above is to a blog entry on Indian music that goes along with the entry on poet & lyricist Mirabai that I will post soon.  However, if you're not familiar with Indian music, you will need this background information before I post the entry on Mirabai and her poems.