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198 pages

English

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Immigrants who travel and settle in foreign countries face challenges due to cultural differences or even deliberate segregation by dominant groups. In their attempt to negotiate their existence, some decide to stick to the culture of their mother nations and some stand in the middle, and blend some aspects of their mother culture and the new culture. Although immigrants who remain closer to their own cultures are easily spotted and relegated, they are assigned a place on the identity continuum, whereas immigrants who choose to stand in the middle run the danger of being neither this nor that, neither here nor there, and can undergo severe internal fragmentation. In this book, Cultural Hybridity and Fixity: Strategies of Resistance in Migration Literatures, Andrew Nyongesa delves into these two strategies of resistance and analyzes the merits and demerits of each with reference to Safi Abdi�s fiction.

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Publié par	Mwanaka Media and Publishing
Date de parution	20 août 2018
Nombre de lectures	3
EAN13	9780797496842
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	3 Mo

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,1100€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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with reference to SaI Abdi’s Iction.

and is pursuing PhD in the same Ield.

CULTURAL HYBRIDITY and FIXITY Strategies of Resistance in Migration Literatures

Andrew Nyongesa

Cultural Hybridity and Fixity: Strategies of Resistance in Migration Literatures Andrew Nyongesa

Mwanaka Media and Publishing Pvt Ltd, Chitungwiza Zimbabwe * Creativity, Wisdom and Beauty

Publisher: Mmap Mwanaka Media and Publishing Pvt Ltd 24 Svosve Road, Zengeza 1 Chitungwiza Zimbabwe mwanaka@yahoo.comhttps//mwanakamediaandpublishing.weebly.com Distributed in and outside N. America by African Books Collective orders@africanbookscollective.comwww.africanbookscollective.comISBN: 978-0-7974-9547-0 EAN: 9780797495470 © Andrew Nyongesa 2018 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical or electronic, including photocopying and recording, or be stored in any information storage or retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher DISCLAIMER All views expressed in this publication are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views ofMmap.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Just as a tomato plant needs a stake so did I need stakes to raise this project to maturation. It gives me particular pleasure to note that most of those mentioned below contributed to the birth and nurture of this project. The evolution of it owes a personal debt to Dr. J.K.S. Makokha of Kenyatta University for his in-depth coverage of African Literature, specifically literatures of Somalia during our course work. His technical advice on topic choice and attention to details cannot be taken for granted. I want here to acknowledge the foundational advice of Dr. Kimani Kaigai of Kenyatta University, Kericho Campus. Besides being my first supervisor, his insight in postcolonial migration and resourcefulness bolstered my mastery of the topic. It will be absurd to forget his dedication to my work and ability to adhere to deadlines. They are such virtues of work that enabled me to complete this project on time. Much gratitude to senior lecturers at Kenyatta University: Dr. Paul M. Mukundi, for setting high standards for graduate studies in the Literature Department. His guidance has enabled us to choose quality topics. I also acknowledge Dr. John Mugubi for his guidance on graduate studies and in-depth exposition of Caribbean literature, some of which concerns ambivalence and alienation are similar to those of migration literature. Finally, I recognize Professor Obura, whose wise and fatherly counsel has determined formulation of many careers at the department. It will be preposterous to forget my colleagues, Julia Njeri Karumba and Asuka Ondigo, for the encouragement and inspiration.

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Table of Contents Abstract………………………………………………………..............v Operational Definition of Terms……………………………………..vi Chapter 1: Purpose, Scope and Context of the Study…………………1Chapter 2:Characterization and Author’s Concerns…………………40 Chapter 3:Cultural Hybridity and Identity Formation……………….84 Chapter 4:Hybridity and Fixity as Modes of Resistance………….....126 Chapter 5:Summary and Conclusions…………...…………………170 Cited Works………………………………………………………..176 Appendix 1………………………………………………………....185 Appendix 2………………………………………………………....187 Appendix 3………………………………………………………....189

ABSTRACT The focus of this project is the examination of identity politics and acts of resistance staged by migrant characters living overseas as represented in Safi Abdi’sOffspring of Paradise (2004) andA Mighty Collision of Two Worlds (2002). Over the years, literary critics have explored the impact of transnational migrations on identity negotiations of immigrants from Africa and Asia in western cities. However, postcolonial migrant literature from East Africa has received sparse critical attention. This is against the reality that literary works from East Africa, especially from Somalia, profoundly depict the phenomenal postcolonial migration. Using selected strands of postcolonial theory, the study investigates the role of hybridity in textualizing migrant identity formation. The study then evaluates fixity and hybridity as modes of resistance. Finally, the characters are analysed to show how the two modes express concerns typical of migration literature as a genre. The ideas of Stuart Hall, Frantz Fanon, Gayatri Spivak and Homi Bhabha will form a theoretical basis for interpretation. The study is a comprehensive qualitative library research that will proceed via close reading of primary, secondary texts and refereed journal articles.

OPERATIONAL DEFINITION OF TERMS Binary factions:The phrase is used in the study to mean two distinct, discordant cultures in an eternal state of tension. Cosmopolitanism: Used in the study to refer to community that has people from diverse backgrounds, races, religions and tribes. Diaspora:The term has been used in the study to mean a community that has dispersed and settled in a foreign land because of natural disasters, war and other causes in their land. Essentialism:in the study to refer to the belief that some Used cultures are pure and more important than others are. Fixed characters:Used in the study to refer to conservative characters that stick to their culture Fixity: The term is used to refer to the attribute of being proud of one’s culture and looking down on the culture of the other group. Hybridity:means the migrant adopting accommodating attitude It towards the culture of the other group, accepting some of its aspects while holding on one’s identity. Hybrid characters:characters who opt for hybridity as a immigrant coping strategy abroad. Immigrants: Used in the study to refer to people who arrive in a foreign country from their country voluntarily or involuntarily to live there. Liminal space: The phrase has been used to refer to the space between two cultures, the border where they negotiate their coexistence (also third space or in-betweenness). Metropolis:big city in a former colonizer’s territory held by A immigrants as a land of opportunities. Migrancy:Used in this study as synonym for ‘migration’.

CHAPTER ONE Purpose, Scope and Context of the Study Introduction he modern world is under constant transition and not of changeTand no field of knowledge has been left out of this purge as even an invention lasts for a year without being replaced. Traditions, customs and beliefs pulsate under the throes humankind resolves to adopt new lifestyles to better their existence in the world, those that stick to past forms of life become irrelevant; hence to remain relevant, all forms of knowledge adapt to these changes. Literature has not lagged behind, it has adapted to the shift to continue playing its role in the changing, modern society. Unlike the ancient times when movements were tied to droughts and other natural calamities, the contemporary society has many causes of migrations, some of which are voluntarist thereby making the human race more restless. Even those communities that were traditionally perceived as settler communities like Bantus in East Africa are no longer settler; they migrate to other parts of the world to seek for better opportunities. These movements have had a remarkable impact on literature because literature is about people and their experiences in the world. Fatemeh Poujafari and Vahdipour Abdolali write: We live in world of constant changes and movements, the result of which nothing is stable and borders have become mixed. The outstanding technological advancements like satellite, internet and modern means of transport and globalization of world

economy are influential factors in making our age the age of mobility and borderlessness. The traditional settler life has given place to a new nomadic lifestyle and migration has become a familiar trend. (679) The scholars reiterate that the world is today characterized by migrancy, which renders everything temporary and cosmopolitan, by ‘everything’ we mean, cultural identities, including racial and religious forms of life. They attribute it to the ease with which information and people flow from one part of the world to the other due to revolution in transport and information technology. As humankind changes to adapt to changes brought by migration and globalism, literature has also changed leading to the emergence of a new kind of literature referred to as literature of migration. Sabina Hussain notes that “postcolonial migrant literature comprises of texts by authors with direct or indirect connections to formerly colonized countries” (106). She adds that “these texts not only include first generation authors who live in a former colony but also second generation authors still under the influence of historical and political effects of former colonial times” (106). Vladimir Nabokov, (cited from Jin Ha) observes that “a writer’s nationality is of negligible importance; a writer’s art is his real passport into foreign lands” (ix). Migrant literature is hence art that traverses boundaries regardless of the author’s nationality. Robin Cohen observes that “transnational migrations are as old as the Jewish dispersal after the destruction of Jerusalem and razing of the walls of the temple by Babylonians in 586 B.C” (2). He refers to it as prototypical, classical victim Diaspora, the only diaspora with capital ‘D’. It was then that the word Diaspora was first used. The word is derived from a Greek word “[d]iasperein,” which means “dispersal or