1. ASSIGNMENT OF: post colonial
ASSIGNMENT SUBMITTED TO: DR.saiyma
TOPIC: post colonial writers after year 2000
ASSIGNMENT SUBMITTED BY: maryam tariq
ROLL NO: 1401MA F11
DATE: 24May, 2013

2. 1. The Cambridge Companion to Postcolonial Literary Studies
Edited by Neil Lazarus
This book offers an introduction to post colonialism; this Companion examines different
aspects of postcolonial thought and culture that have had a significant effect on contemporary
critical thought. Topics discussed by experts in the field include post colonialism‟s relation to
modernity, and its significance and relevance to literature, film, law, philosophy, and modern
cultural studies. Additional material includes a guide to further reading and a chronology.
Cambridge companion to post colonial studies proposes a lucid introduction and
overview of one of the most important strands in recent literary theory and cultural studies. The
volume aims to introduce the key concepts, methods, theories thematic concerns and
contemporary debates in the fields. Drawing on a wide range of disciplines, contributors explain
the impact of history, sociology and philosophy on the study of post colonial literatures and
cultures. Examined topic in the book include from anti-colonial nationalism and decolonization
to globalization, migration flows and the „brain drain‟ which constitute the past and present of
„the post colonial condition‟. It also takes into account the sociological and ideological
conditions surrounding the emergence of post colonial literary studies as an academic field in
late 197os and early 1980s. The Companion turns as authoritative, engaged and discriminating
lens on post colonial literary studies.1
1
http://www.google.com.pk/url?q=http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Cambridge_Companion_to_Postcol
onial.html%3Fid%3DX66n_xiHn9EC&sa=U&ei=QgyfUcSQFpS5hAfi4YBY&ved=0CBkQFjAA&usg=AFQjCNH0GQCY2Qv
eB4-Vg9FPmmSgPZQISQ

3. 2.Homi Bhabha by David Huddart
Homi K. Bhabha (born 1949) is the Anne F. Rothenberg Professor of English and
American Literature and Language, and the Director of the Humanities Center at Harvard
University. He is one of the most important figures in contemporary post-colonial studies, and
has coined a number of the field's neologisms and key concepts, such as hybridity, mimicry,
difference, and ambivalence. Such terms describe ways in which colonized peoples have resisted
the power of the colonizer, according to Bhabha's theory. In 2012, he was awarded the Padma
Bhushan award in the field of literature and education by the Indian government.
Being the most highly renowned figures in contemporary post-colonial studies, this
volume Homi Bhabha By David Huddart, explores Homi‟s writings and their influence on
postcolonial theory, introducing in clear and accessible language the key concepts of his work,
such as 'ambivalence', 'mimicry', 'hybridity' and 'translation'. David Huddart draws on a range of
contexts, including art history, contemporary cinema and canonical texts in order to illustrate the
practical application of Bhabha's theories. This Introductory book throws light on cultural and
postcolonial theories.
David Huddart draws examples from a range of fields including cultural theory, film and
literary studies in order to illustrate the practical application of Bhabha‟s thought. Offering a
starting point for readers new to this crucial theorist‟s sometimes complex texts, or support for
those who wish to deepen their understanding of his work, this guidebook is ideal in the fields of
literary, cultural and post-colonial theory.

4. Cultural theory has often been criticized for covert Eurocentric and Universalist
tendencies. Its concepts and ideas are implicitly applicable to everyone, ironing over any
individuality or cultural difference. Postcolonial theory has challenged these limitations of
cultural theory, and Postcolonial Theory and Autobiography addresses the central challenge
posed by its autobiographical turn.
Despite the fact that autobiography is frequently dismissed for its Western, masculine
bias, David Huddart argues for its continued relevance as a central explanatory category in
understanding postcolonial theory and its relation to subjectivity. Focusing on the influence of
post-structuralist theory on postcolonial theory and vice versa, this study suggests that
autobiography constitutes a general philosophical resistance to universal concepts and theories.2
3. Post-Colonial Literatures: Expanding the Canon
Edited by Deborah L. Madsen
Deborah Madsen remarks on the "privileged texts and [. . .] national and regional
literatures" that comprise "the post-colonial canon" from which America is excluded, which,
exclusion, then,Post-Colonial Literatures seeks to redress. Unlike Hulme who views
"postcolonial" as a "useful word" that "refers to the process of disengagement from the colonial
syndrome, which takes many forms and probably is inescapable for all those whose worlds have
been marked by that set of phenomena", Madsen confines the usefulness of the term "post-
colonial" to "the ethnic literatures of the United States." In so doing, she confines its deployment
in the case of America to comparisons that can be drawn (based on their putative "colonized"
status) between "writers of color, publishing in America" and "post-colonial writers of Africa
2
http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/109493.David_Huddart

5. and the Caribbean, and indigenous post-colonial writers of Canada and Australia and New
Zealand" as they negotiate "the problems of marginalization and cultural erasure" in dominant
society.
Madsen remarks that she has organized the collection such that the "post-colonial
literatures of North America" appear "in relation to more familiar (British Commonwealth) post-
colonial areas".The implication is that through this organization, where analyses of American
texts appear check by jowl with those more conventionally regarded as postcolonial, the
necessity for deploying the term postcolonial for the former will become self-evident.
By and large, however, the essays in the collection proceed as if postcolonial and ethnic
literatures are either synonymous (Patricia Linton, for example) or that there are such significant
continuities between the two as to be self-evident. Despite some fine contributions on interesting
subjects (Debra Castillo's essays, "Border Theory and the Canon," for example), there is, in
effect, no convincing case being made for the inclusion of America in any of the essays.3
4. PURPLE HIBISCUS
BY CHIMAMANDA NGOZI ADICHIE
Published 2005 by Harper Perennial
“Purple Hibiscus”, written by contemporary Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, tells
the story of a lonely and reclusive 15-year-old girl, Kambili, in present-day Nigeria. The
tumultuous social, political, and religious climate, typical to that time in Nigeria, permeates
every aspect of Kambili‟s life. But Kambili‟s situation is different than that of most of her
countrymen: her father is a rich newspaper publisher whose public façade is one of a brave and
3
http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/ral/summary/v032/32.4needham.html

6. courageous man who dares to publish the truth about the military coup and the new government.
Kambili‟s narration of a life shaken by domestic violence and turmoil reflects her painfully shy
and submissive character. Only after she and her brother, Jaja, visit their outspoken Aunty
Ifeoma does Kambili break out of her shell and finally realize the unjustifiable cruelty of her
father.
Kambili‟s father is a prominent member of society who always must sit in the front pew at mass
and donates huge sums of money to the poor. Everybody loves and respects him for his
generosity and compassion. But behind her father‟s wall of lies, resides a family of four living
under his fanatical religious tyranny. Self-justified by Catholicism, Kambili‟s hypocritical father
mercilessly wipes out “sin” out of his life and out of everyone else around him. Dragged down
by his fanaticism are his two children and his wife, whom he ironically beats ruthlessly. He sets
nonsensically strict rules and regulations upon his household that restrict Kambili and Jaja from
even speaking to each other. Just as he is attracted the conformity and rules of his religion, he
likewise finds utter bliss in writing out individual schedules that dictates how each member of
the household spends every minute of their day. Kambili is traumatized almost to the point of a
mental breakdown by her father‟s suppression and how he maliciously beats her mother. “The
black type blurred, the letters swimming into one another, and then changed to a bright
red, the red of fresh blood. The blood was watery, flowing from Mama, flowing from my
eyes”. The craziness continues until the military coup, and Kambili‟s father‟s life is potentially
endangered. He decides to send Jaja and Kambili to their Aunty Ifeoma‟s house.
Aunty Ifeoma is a college professor at a local university who raises her children to challenge
authority and push ideological boundaries, an idea unheard of to Kambili. Aunty Ifeoma‟s home
is loud, noisy, and full of laughter and fluid conversation. Kambili is envious of her three
cousins‟ ability to speak and make decisions on their own. Her cousins‟ freedom and liberty
growing up is new and alien to Kambili. She slowly acknowledges that there are other ways to
live your life other than by following her father‟s authoritarian daily schedules.
Kambili, awkward and timid, slowly grows into a young adult who better understands her
emotions and feelings. She is forced out of the confines of father‟s limitations and into the real
world.
Some of the quotes from texts area as follow

7. “We did that often, asking each other questions whose answers we already knew. Perhaps
it was so that we would not ask the other questions, the ones whose answers we did not
want to know.”
“...he did not want me to seek the whys, because there are some things that happen for
which we can formulate no whys, for which whys simply do not exist and, perhaps, are
not necessary.”
“I was stained by failure.”
“People have crushes on priests all the time, you know. It‟s exciting to have to deal with
God as a rival.”
“Being defiant can be a good thing sometimes," Aunty Ifeoma said. "Defiance is like
marijuana - it is not a bad thing when it is used right.”
“Papa sat down at the table and poured his tea from the china tea set with pink flowers on
the edges. I waited for him to ask Jaja and me to take a sip, as he always did. A love sip,
he called it, because you shared the little things you loved with the people you love.” 4
4
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/126381.Purple_Hibiscus