Contemporary Postcolonial Theory

Contemporary Postcolonial Theory
Author: Padmini Mongia
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 392
Release: 2021-01-07
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 100032432X

There is a crisis in contemporary postcolonial theory: while an enormous body of challenging research has been produced under its auspices, severely critical questions about the validity and usefulness of this theory have also been raised. This Reader is positioned at the juncture where it can address these contestations. It makes available some of the 'classics' of the field; engages with the issues raised by contemporary practitioners; but also offers several of the arguments that strongly critique postcolonial theory. Although postcolonial theory purports to be inter-disciplinary and frequently anti-foundationalist, traces of disciplinary formations and linearity have continued to haunt its articulations. This Reader, on the other hand, offers a uniquely inter-disciplinary mapping. It is concerned with three main areas: definitional problems and contests including the current challenges to postcolonial theory; the 'disciplining of knowledge', where the multiple resonances of the word 'disciplining' are all engaged; and the location of practice where the relations between intellectual practice and historical conditions are explored. Finally, since the guiding principle of this Reader is simultaneous attention to the enabling and constraining mechanisms of historical realities and institutional practices, the commentary problematizes the writing of histories, the formations of canons, and indeed the production of Readers.

Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital

Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital
Author: Vivek Chibber
Publisher: Verso Books
Total Pages: 321
Release: 2013-03-12
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1844679764

Postcolonial theory has become enormously influential as a framework for understanding the Global South. It is also a school of thought popular because of its rejection of the supposedly universalizing categories of the Enlightenment. In this devastating critique, mounted on behalf of the radical Enlightenment tradition, Vivek Chibber offers the most comprehensive response yet to postcolonial theory. Focusing on the hugely popular Subaltern Studies project, Chibber shows that its foundational arguments are based on a series of analytical and historical misapprehensions. He demonstrates that it is possible to affirm a universalizing theory without succumbing to Eurocentrism or reductionism. Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital promises to be a historical milestone in contemporary social theory.

The Postcolonial Contemporary

The Postcolonial Contemporary
Author: Jini Kim Watson
Publisher: Fordham Univ Press
Total Pages: 353
Release: 2018-07-03
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 082328008X

This volume invokes the “postcolonial contemporary” in order to recognize and reflect upon the emphatically postcolonial character of the contemporary conjuncture, as well as to inquire into whether postcolonial criticism can adequately grasp it. Neither simply for nor against postcolonialism, the volume seeks to cut across this false alternative, and to think with postcolonial theory about political contemporaneity. Many of the most influential frameworks of postcolonial theory were developed during the 1970s and 1990s, during what we may now recognize as the twilight of the postwar period. If forms of capitalist imperialism are entering into new configurations of neoliberal privatization, wars-without-end, xenophobic nationalism and unsustainable extraction, what aspects of postcolonial inquiry must be reworked or revised in order to grasp our political present? In twelve essays that draw from a number of disciplines—history, anthropology, literature, geography, indigenous studies— and regional locations (the Black Atlantic, South Africa, South Asia, East Asia, Australia, Argentina) The Postcolonial Contemporary seeks to move beyond the habitual oppositions that have often characterized the field, such as universal vs. particular; Marxism vs. postcolonialism; and politics vs. culture. These essays signal an attempt to reckon with new and persisting postcolonial predicaments and do so under four inter-related analytics: Postcolonial Temporality; Deprovincializing the Global South; Beyond Marxism versus Postcolonial Studies; and Postcolonial Spatiality and New Political Imaginaries.

Postcolonial Theory

Postcolonial Theory
Author: Leela Gandhi
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 222
Release: 2019-01-08
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0231548567

Published twenty years ago, Leela Gandhi’s Postcolonial Theory was a landmark description of the field of postcolonial studies in theoretical terms that set its intellectual context alongside poststructuralism, postmodernism, Marxism, and feminism. Gandhi examined the contributions of major thinkers such as Edward Said, Gayatri Spivak, Homi Bhabha, and the subaltern historians. The book pointed to postcolonialism’s relationship with earlier anticolonial thinkers such as Frantz Fanon, Albert Memmi, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, and M. K. Gandhi and explained pertinent concepts and schools of thought—hybridity, Orientalism, humanism, Marxist dialectics, diaspora, nationalism, gendered subalternity, globalization, and postcolonial feminism. The revised edition of this classic work reaffirms its status as a useful starting point for readers new to the field and as a provocative account that opens up possibilities for debate. It includes substantial additions: A new preface and epilogue reposition postcolonial studies within evolving intellectual contexts and take stock of important critical developments. Gandhi examines recent alliances with critical race theory and Africanist postcolonialism, considers challenges from postsecular and postcritical perspectives, and takes into account the ontological, environmental, affective, and ethical turns in the changed landscape of critical theory. She describes what is enduring in postcolonial thinking—as a critical perspective within the academy and as an attitude to the world that extends beyond the discipline of postcolonial studies.

Colonial Discourse and Post-colonial Theory

Colonial Discourse and Post-colonial Theory
Author: Patrick Williams
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 584
Release: 1994
Genre: Colonies
ISBN: 0231100205

Provides an in-depth introduction to debates within post-colonial theory and criticism. The many contributors include Frantz Fanon, Amilcar Cabral, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Homi Bhabha, Edward Said, Anthony Giddens, Anne McClintock, Stuart Hall, Paul Gilroy, and bell hooks.

Postcolonialism and Political Theory

Postcolonialism and Political Theory
Author: Nalini Persram
Publisher: Lexington Books
Total Pages: 370
Release: 2007
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 9780739116678

Postcolonialism and Political Theory explores the intersection between the political and the postcolonial through an engagement with, critique of, and challenge to some of the prevalent, restrictive tenets and frameworks of Western political and social thought. It is a response to the call by postcolonial studies, as well as to the urgent need within world politics, to turn towards a multiplicity--largely excluded from globally dominant discourses of community, subjectivity, power and prosperity--constituted by otherness, radical alterity, or subordination to the newly reconsolidated West. The book offers a diverse range of essays that re-examine and open the boundaries of political and cultural modernity's historical domain; that look at how the racialized and gendered and cultured subject visualizes the social from elsewhere; that critique the limits of postcolonial theory and its claim to celebrate diversity; and that complicate the notion of postcolonial politics within settler societies that continue to practice exile of the indigenous. Postcolonialism and Political Theory is an ideal book for graduate and advanced undergraduate level study and for those working both disciplinarily and interdisciplinarily, both inside and outside academia.

Postcolonial Thought and Social Theory

Postcolonial Thought and Social Theory
Author: Julian Go
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 265
Release: 2016
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0190625139

Social scientists have long resisted the radical ideas known as postcolonial thought, while postcolonial scholars have critiqued the social sciences for their Euro-centric focus. However, in Postcolonial Thought and Social Theory, Julian Go attempts to reconcile the two seemingly contradictory fields by crafting a postcolonial social science. Contrary to claims that social science is incompatible with postcolonial thought, this book argues that the two are mutually beneficial, drawing upon the works of thinkers such as Franz Fanon, Amilcar Cabral, Edward Said, Homi Bhabha, and Gayatri Spivak. Go concludes with a call for a "third wave" of postcolonial thought emerging from social science and surmounting the narrow confines of disciplinary boundaries.

Shakespeare and Postcolonial Theory

Shakespeare and Postcolonial Theory
Author: Jyotsna G. Singh
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 266
Release: 2019-01-24
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1408185261

Now available in paperback, Shakespeare and Postcolonial Theory is an up-to-date guide to contemporary debates in postcolonial studies and how these shape our understanding of Shakespeare's politics and poetics. Taking a historical perspective, it covers early modern discourses of colonialism, 'race', gender and globalization, through to contemporary intercultural appropriations and global adaptations of Shakespeare. Showing how the dialogue between Shakespeare criticism and postcolonial studies has evolved, this book offers a critical vocabulary that connects contemporary and early modern cultural struggles. Shakespeare and Postcolonial Theory also provides guides to further reading and online resources which make this an essential resource for students and scholars of Shakespeare.

Postcolonial Theory and Organizational Analysis: A Critical Engagement

Postcolonial Theory and Organizational Analysis: A Critical Engagement
Author: A. Prasad
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 326
Release: 2003-05-01
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1403982295

This book takes up a question that has rarely been raised in the field of management: 'Could modern Western colonialism have important implications for the practices and theories that inform management and organizations?' Employing the frameworks of postcolonial theory, an international group of scholars addresse this question, and offer remarkable insights about the implications of the colonial encounter for management. Wide-ranging in scope, the book covers major topics like cross-cultural management, control and resistance, corporate culture, the discourse of exoticization in museums and tourism, and stakeholder issues, and sheds new light on the troubling legacy of colonialism. Scholars and practitioners searching for a new idiom of management will find this book's critique of contemporary management invaluable.

Edouard Glissant and Postcolonial Theory

Edouard Glissant and Postcolonial Theory
Author: Celia Britton
Publisher: University of Virginia Press
Total Pages: 244
Release: 1999
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9780813918495

Glissant has written extensively in French about the colonial experience in the Caribbean. Britton (French, Aberdeen U., Scotland) situates Glissant within ongoing debates in postcolonial theory, making connections between his novels and theoretical work and the work of Frantz Fanon, Gayatri Spivak, Homi Bhanha, and Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Focusing on language and subjectivity, discussion moves between analysis of Glissant's theoretical work and detailed readings of his novels. Major themes central to his writing, such as the reappropriation of history, standard and vernacular language, and the colonial construction of the Other, are addressed. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR