A Gaze on Postmodernism in Diana Abu Jaber’s Crescent and Ahdaf Soueif’s The Map of Love

Authors

  • Layla Farouq Abdeen The World Islamic Science and Education University Department of English Language and Literature

Keywords:

Postmodernism, hybridity, identity, and culture

Abstract

This study sheds light upon postmodernism in Arab-American Diana Abu Jaber’s Crescent (2003) and Arab-British Ahdaf Soueif’s The Map of Love (2000). These two novels in particular are chosen for examination due to the fact that both of them span over a period extending over more than one generation of cultural interaction between the Orient and the Occident and because they weave a story of mutual love and understanding across different cultures and ethnic conflicts.

The objective of this study is to focus upon several main features of postmodernism such as hybridity, identity, diversity, multiculturalism, narrative techniques, fragmentation, intertextuality, parody, settings, magic realism, metafiction, mixing of genres, and ending in each novel in order to demonstrate how these novelists deviate from the traditions of the genre of the novel not only in terms of structure but also content. Consequently, this study will shed light on prominent characters in both novels since the writing of these two stories entails a travel through space and time as they depict a quest for an identity and an initiation of a harmonious coexistence among several ethnicities and cultures.

Author Biography

Layla Farouq Abdeen, The World Islamic Science and Education University Department of English Language and Literature

Department of English Language and Literature

Assistant Professor

References

- Abu Jaber. Crescent. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2003.

- Bakhtin, Mikhail. The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays. Trans. C. Emerson and M.

Holquist, Ed. Michael Holquist. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1981.

- Fadda-Corney, Carol. “Arab American Literature in the Ethnic Borderland: Cultural

Intersections in Diana Abu Jaber’s Crescentâ€. MELUS 31.4: 178-206, 2006.

http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/30029689?uid=3738320&uid=2&uid=4&sid=211

- Gaines, Luan. An Inteview with Diana Abu Jaber. http://www.curledup.com/intabu.htm.

- Klages, Mary. “Literary Theory: A Guide for the Perplexedâ€. Continuum Press, 2007.

- Lyotard, Jean-Francois. The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge. Minneapolis:

University of Minnesota Press. Reprint 1997. Translated by Geoff Bennington and

Brian Massumi, 1984.

- McHale, Brian. Postmodernist Fiction. New York: Methuen, 1987.

- Said, Edward W. Culture and Imperialism. London: Vintage, 1994.

- Soueif, Ahdaf. The Map of Love. New York: Anchor Books, 1999.

- Thornborrow, Joanna and Shân Wareing. Patterns in Language: An Introduction to

Language and Literary Style. Ed. Roland Carter. London: Routledge, 1998.

- Webster, Roger. Studying Literary Theory: An Introduction, 2nd ed. New York: Arnold, 1996.

- Williams, Raymond. Culture is Ordinary, 1958.

http://artsites.ucsc.edu/faculty/Gustafson/FILM%20162.W10/readings/Williams.Ordinary.pdf

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Published

2014-08-15

How to Cite

Abdeen, L. F. (2014). A Gaze on Postmodernism in Diana Abu Jaber’s Crescent and Ahdaf Soueif’s The Map of Love. Asian Journal of Humanities and Social Studies, 2(4). Retrieved from https://ajouronline.com/index.php/AJHSS/article/view/1408

Issue

Vol. 2 No. 4 (2014): August 2014

Section

Articles

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