‘Pens that confound the label of citizenship’: self-translations and literary identities

Modern Italy ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 213-224
Author(s):  
Rita Wilson
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Identity Formation ◽  
Transnational Literature ◽  
Remarkable Case ◽  
Jhumpa Lahiri ◽  
Literary Practices ◽  
Linguistic Units ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Literary Canons

The linguistic and cultural identity of transnational writers who choose to write in an adopted language or to self-translate, has gained increasing interest among researchers over the last decade. Approaches to the topic have ranged from textual analyses of translingual narratives and language memoirs to more ontological investigations of the processes of identity-formation in transcultural frameworks. Acknowledging that there is no one-to-one correspondence between linguistic units and ethnic, social or cultural formations, this paper considers the relationship between the literary practices of contemporary translingual writers and the role of language both in the formation of personal identities and in the reconfiguration of constructions of national identity and literary belonging. Specifically, I examine how two contemporary women writers, Francesca Marciano and Jhumpa Lahiri, who each represent a remarkable case of self-conscious linguistic transformation, interrogate the traditional construct of a monolingual, mono-ethnic and mono-cultural national identity. I argue that their autofictions reflect the multilingual and transcultural reality of contemporary transnational literature and instantiate broader issues connected with the definition, categorisation and consequent evaluation of literary canons and literary citizenship.

TENSIONS OF NATIONALISM: THE MZABI STUDENT MISSIONS IN TUNIS AND THE POLITICS OF ANTICOLONIALISM

2015 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amal N. Ghazal
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Identity Formation ◽  
National Identities ◽  
Religious Reform ◽  
National Movements ◽  
Student Missions ◽  
National Identity Formation ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Shed Light

AbstractThis article examines the significant yet largely overlooked role of the Mzabis, a community from the northern edges of the Algerian desert, in Algerian and Tunisian anticolonialism and nationalism. In so doing, it pursues two aims: first, to shed light on the importance of Tunis to the politicization of the Mzabis in the 1920s and to their induction into local and regional anticolonial and national movements; and second, to highlight the tensions of subsuming regional identities into overarching national identities by focusing on Mzabi political activists’ negotiation of the relationship between the Mzab and Algeria as a national project. The article also explores the spectrum of political possibilities and alternatives envisioned by Mzabis as they participated in religious reform, anticolonial, and nationalist movements. This spectrum, I argue, conveys the fluid relationship between local, national, and regional identities, thus undermining teleological readings of national identity formation.

scholarly journals MIGRATION, WAR, AND THE MAKING OF A TRANSNATIONAL LEBANESE SHIʿI COMMUNITY IN SENEGAL

2010 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 269-290 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mara A. Leichtman
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Public Opinion ◽  
Turning Point ◽  
West African ◽  
Local Responses ◽  
Religious Rituals ◽  
Political Ties ◽  
First Time ◽  
The Relationship

The July 2006 Lebanon war was an important turning point for West African Lebanese. For the first time since their formation as a community, the Lebanese in Senegal organized a demonstration in Dakar displaying solidarity with Lebanon. This protest illuminates the dynamics between global forces and local responses. Hizbullah's effectiveness in winning the international public opinion of both Sunni and Shiʿi Muslims in the war against Israel led to a surge in Lebanese diaspora identification, even among communities who had not been similarly affected by previous Lebanese wars. By analyzing the role of a Lebanese shaykh in bringing religious rituals and a Lebanese national identity to the community in Senegal, this article explores how members of the community maintain political ties to Lebanon even when they have never visited the “homeland” and sheds new light on the relationship among religion, migration, and (trans)nationalism.

Social Media and Identity

2019 ◽  
pp. 1365-1386
Author(s):  
Erika Melonashi
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Identity Development ◽  
Identity Formation ◽  
Political Identity ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Theoretical Frameworks ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Media And Identity

The present chapter aims to explore the relationship between social media and identity by reviewing theoretical frameworks as well as empirical studies on the topic. Considering the complexity of the concept of identity, a multidisciplinary theoretical approach is provided, including Psychological Theories, Sociological Theories and Communication Theories. These theories are revisited in the context of online identity formation and communication through social media. Different aspects of identity such as gender identity, professional identity, political identity etc., are discussed and illustrated through empirical studies in the field. Moreover, the role of social media as a factor that might either promote or hinder identity development is also discussed (e.g., phenomena such as cyber-bulling and internet addiction). Finally recommendations and suggestions for future research are provided, including the need for multidisciplinary theoretical frameworks to the investigation of the relationships between social media and identity.

Complicating the Relationship Between Sport and National Identity: The Case of Post-Socialist Slovenia

2010 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 371-389 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mojca Doupona Topič ◽  
Jay Coakley
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Developing Nations ◽  
First Century ◽  
Nation State ◽  
Global Identity ◽  
Sociology Of Sport ◽  
Nation States ◽  
The Relationship

Sociology of sport knowledge on national identity is grounded in research that focuses primarily on long established nation-states with widely known histories. The relationship between sport and national identity in postsocialist/Soviet/colonial nations that have gained independence or sovereignty since 1990 has seldom been studied. This paper examines the role of sports in the formation of national identity in postsocialist Slovenia, a nation-state that gained independence in 1990. Our analysis focuses on the recent context in which the current but fluid relationship between sport and Slovenian national identity exists. Using Slovenia as a case study we identify seven factors that may moderate the effectiveness of sports as sites for establishing and maintaining national identity and making successful global identity claims in the twenty-first century. We conclude that these factors should be taken into account to more fully understand the sport-national identity relationship today, especially in new and developing nations.

scholarly journals Subversive Writing: Mona Prince’s ‘Laughing Revolution’ from pre- to post-2011 Egypt

1970 ◽  
Vol 17 ◽  
pp. 35-52
Author(s):  
Patrizia Zanelli
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Political Activism ◽  
Religious Issues ◽  
Non Fiction ◽  
The Relationship

Although it may seem absurd, it is no exaggeration to say that humour is a very serious matter in Egypt, where dozens of intellectuals have analysed this phenomenon, often linking it to their national identity. This article presents various opinions on Egyptian satire to introduce a 2015 novel by Mona Prince, one of the Egyptian writers of the 1990s generation. In 2012, the author published a memoir of the January 25 Revolution. This study tries to explain the relationship between her political activism and her literary career; the role of humour in her œuvre; and how she deals with gender and religious issues in her 2015 work, which is also autobiographic. Moreover, since the novelist wrote the text between 2008 and 2014, this article offers some notes on satiric literature in pre- and post-2011 Egypt.Key words: Egyptian writers, fiction, non-fiction, memoirs, humour, satire, subversion, revolution.

scholarly journals Adaptare și imitație în romanele "No Time Like the Present", de Nadine Gordimer și „Vremea Minunilor", de Cătălin Dorian Florescu / Adaptation and mimicry in the novels “No Time Like the Present”, by Nadine Gordimer and “Vremea minunilor”, by Florescu

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-98
Author(s):  
Simina Pîrvu
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Gender Discrimination ◽  
New Order ◽  
Nadine Gordimer ◽  
Literature And Politics ◽  
Complex Process ◽  
Cultural Implications ◽  
And Gender ◽  
The Relationship

In a series of lectures in 1994, Nadine Gordimer remarks the different status of Africa which is no longer at the edge of the empire, but on the contrary, in the center of it. In this respect, post-apartheid Africa has rebuilt its national identity on the background of global events that write universal history, offering citizens the chance to escape their country's constraints and bring important key elements in the globalization process. Thus, replacing apartheid themes in a new country is an extreme task by the applicant. Some of the favourite subjects of the "old guard" are the following: the importance of multiculturalism in post-apartheid South Africa, the writer's status, vulgarisation of violence due to mass-media, reconciliation with a violent past and their economic and cultural implications, the fight against AIDS, sexual emancipation, globalization and loss of cultural and national identity, uprooting, migration and economic exile which replaced major pre-existing concerns about violence, racial and gender discrimination, the relationship between literature and politics, or the role of ethics in literature. The same situation can be applied to eastern countries. Even though they were not "postcolonial" in the classical sense of the term, applicable to the former British, French, Spanish, Portuguese or Dutch colonies, the "post-communist transition" through which they passed included the disarmament of a certain political and economic "occupation". People had to adapt to the new order, to the new reality, which was a complex process, a difficult one, that implied, many times, exile. Therefore, the purpose of my argument is to present what consequences can occur at the psychological level because of the attempt of adaptation of the characters to the new social and political order, by imitation, postcolonial and post-communist context. And here comes the question: does imitation facilitate adaptation? Although the logical answer would be yes, we will notice, by discussing the two texts, exactly the opposite.

scholarly journals A Consideration of the Relationship Between Music and Collective Identity: From the Viewpoint of Cultural Psychology of Music

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ana Đorđević
Keyword(s):  
Identity Formation ◽  
Collective Identity ◽  
Cultural Psychology ◽  
Methodological Approach ◽  
Cultural Artifact ◽  
Social Trends ◽  
Identity Processes ◽  
Psychology Of Music ◽  
The Relationship

The aim of the present study lies in an effort of converging anthropological, ethnomusicological and psychological approach to the relationship between music and collective identity. Music is considered a socio-cultural artifact, which mediates the processes of collective identity construction, and whose function in such process can be multiple. In order to understand the ways in which it is sutured into (in)formal processes of collective (self)identification, we propose simultaneous consideration of various dimensions: cultural, social, political, psychological. Although there already has been interdisciplinary research of the role of music in the emergence of identity, we advocate for a more complementary approach, by a consideration of the psychological accounts, adjusted to the needs of ethno-anthropological analysis. As the most comprehensive theoretical approach, we propose cultural psychology of music. Future empirical research on specific identity processes mediation by music as cultural artifact, should include the analysis of intersecting local and global social trends, aspects of musicological analysis, specificities of psychological development of identity, the role of socio-political strategies of identity formation, and, last but not least, cultural specificity of the community in focus of the research. We find the complexity of the phenomenon in focus to be obligatory for the complexity of the theoretical and methodological approach.

scholarly journals Nationalism, cosmopolitanism and statelessness: An interview with Craig Calhoun

2014 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 61-74 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barzoo Eliassi
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Middle East ◽  
Identity Formation ◽  
Power Relations ◽  
Citizenship Status ◽  
Asymmetrical Power ◽  
The Right ◽  
Diasporic Identities

This interview with Professor Craig Calhoun expands on issues of nationalism and cosmopolitanism in relation to the question of statelessness. Since the 1990s, Calhoun has worked on nationalism, ethnicity and cosmopolitanism. For Calhoun, nations still matter despite post-national and cosmopolitan elaboration and repudiation of so-called parochial and provincialised identities like nation or national identity and citizenship. In this interview, Calhoun dis-cusses the material, political and cultural situations of the Kurds in the Middle East and the role of Kurdish nationalism in the context of statelessness. Calhoun finds class-based understanding of inequalities between the Kurds and their dominant others in the Middle East as problematic and incomplete since the cultural, political and material inequalities are intimately interlinked in rendering the Kurds to a subordinated position in the states they inhabit. The interview also engages with diasporic identities and examines how countries of residence can impinge on the identity formation of diasporas and how they obstruct or facilitate migrants translating their citizenship status into the right to have rights (Arendt). An important issue that Calhoun discusses is that there are both asymmetrical power relations between dominated (Kurdish) and dominating nationalisms (Turkish, Iraqi, Iranian and Syrian) and within the same nationalisms.

Celts, Romans, Britons

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Identity Formation ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Interdisciplinary Approach ◽  
British Identity ◽  
Classical Reception ◽  
History Of ◽  
A Site ◽  
Classical Cross

This interdisciplinary volume of essays examines the real and imagined role of Classical and Celtic influence in the history of British identity formation, from late antiquity to the present day. In so doing, it makes the case for increased collaboration between the fields of Classical reception and Celtic studies, and opens up new avenues of investigation into the categories “Celtic” and “Classical”, which are presented as fundamentally interlinked and frequently interdependent. In a series of chronologically arranged chapters, beginning with the post-Roman Britons and ending with the 2016 Brexit referendum, it draws attention to the constructed and historically contingent nature of the Classical and the Celtic, and explores how notions related to both categories have been continuously combined and contrasted with one another in relation to British identities. Britishness is revealed as a site of significant Celtic-Classical cross-pollination, and a context in which received ideas about Celts, Romans, and Britons can be fruitfully reconsidered, subverted, and reformulated. Responding to important scholarly questions that are best addressed by this interdisciplinary approach, and extending the existing literature on Classical reception and national identity by treating the Celtic as an equally relevant tradition, the volume creates a new and exciting dialogue between subjects that all too often are treated in isolation, and sets the foundations for future cross-disciplinary conversations.

Sport and National Identity

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dilwyn Porter
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Mass Media ◽  
Everyday Life ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
National Identities ◽  
Imagined Communities ◽  
Nation States ◽  
The Mass Media ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter explores the role of sport in the construction of national identity. It focuses initially on sport as a cultural practice possessing the demonstrable capacity to generate events and experiences through which imagined communities are made real. The governments of nation-states or other political agencies might intervene directly in this process, using sport as a form of propaganda to achieve this effect. More often, however, the relationship between sport and national identity is reproduced in everyday life, flagged daily by the mass media as an expression of banal nationalism. Particular attention is given to the role of sports that are indigenous to particular nations and also to sports engaged in competitively between nations. These have contributed in different ways to the making of national identities.

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