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Global Literatures

Tony Hughes-dAeth
2016

Pursue Impossible
A brand new unit
So, what is it?
An introduction to the literature of the world
... in 13 weeks
How are we going to do this impossible task?
Is this not a project, after all, built on a
stupendous arrogance?
That we can know the world in its entirety?
Its hard enough to know our own literature, how
can we possibly know that of others?

Heres our plan, 5 strategies

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Concede defeat
Use concise texts
Random sampling
Contemporaneity
Thematisation

1. Concede Defeat

We must straightaway acknowledge that certain things


are not possible
We will not develop a total picture of world literature
Huge swathes of the globe will remain untouched
whole languages, cultures, histories, peoples will elude
us
On the other hand ...
We will still know a lot more at the end than we knew
at the beginning
And isnt it even more disrespectful not to try at all?

2. Concision
We are looking at short texts
Short novels, short stories and one play
This allows us to read carefully each week,
without feeling swamped by the texts we are
studying
And the cultures they are disclosing

3. Sampling
We are drilling down at select points into world
literature
If we just drill one hole, then it is not possible to
generalise
If we drill two and find resemblances then that
could still be coincidence
But if we drill ten holes at completely different
places and find things in common
We might be able to make inferences about global
literatures

4. Contemporaneity

Mainly, the works we are studying are contemporary


The exceptions are:
E.M. Forsters Where Angels Fear to Tread (1905)
Lu Xuns Diary of a Madman (1918)
Wole Soyinkas Death and the Kings Horseman (1975)
So, we are choosing to study global literature as an
aspect of the contemporary phenomenon of
globalisation

Thematisation

We are not just studying texts that are global in


the weak sense of coming from planet earth
We are studying texts that thematise the global
Texts where we see the intrusion of things that we
now recognise as being part of globalisation
So, our texts are not just global in origin but
display the presence of globalisation

Imagining the Global


Taking this last point
That we are examining texts that depict or
thematise the process of globalisation
Lets now ask ...
How do you represent globalisation?
We are going to briefly borrow an example from
cinema
The study of global cinemas faces many of the
same issues as the study of global literatures

Babel (2006)
Alejandro Irritu & Guillermo Arriaga
What stands out from this clip?
1. A sense of crisis, urgency
2. An image of the world as multiple, fragmented
3. A Biblical fall some catalytic event which cannot
be undone and which we experience as:
a. The loss of unity
b. The inability to be understood and to understand

Babel (2006)
Alejandro Irritu & Guillermo Arriaga
4. Modernity as a fulcrum the pre-modern, the postmodern
5. The repetition of a traumatic border crossing, where
our very right to exist is called into violent question
6. There appear to be different globalisations

A Global Itinerary
3 interwoven stories
Morocco, Japan, USA/Mexico
1. Yasujiro Wataya gives hunting rifle to Hassan Ibrahim
2. Hassan sells it to Abdullah the goat-herd
3. Abdullah gives it to his two sons, Yussef and Ahmed
4. Yussef shoots Susan Jones (Cate Blanchett)
5. The Joneses (Blanchett and Brad Pitt) cant return
as planned to California

A Global Itinerary
6. Amelia (their maid) has to take the two Jones children
to Mexico
7. As a consequence she is deported and her nephew,
presumably, imprisoned

So, what do we mean by


globalisation?
A certain intricate consequentiality
Where things happen that cause other things to
happen
Like dominoes falling
To make us feel the hidden connections of
globalisation
Where action in one place affects life in another place
Is it capitalism? Technology?
We see effects at the level of mass migration,
ecological changes, and many other things

Reading Globally

So, our aim in this unit is thus to learn to read


globally
This means two things:
1. To develop a capacity for apprehending literary
works in their cultural difference
2. To see in the texts of the world, a process by
which the world is becoming ever more connected
(for good and bad)

What now?

1. Go and buy the texts


this is an exciting time in any English unit
... student poverty notwithstanding
But you get 5 of our books for as much as it
costs to buy one textbook in another unit

What now?
2. Start reading Where Angels Fear to Tread (150
pages long)
We need you to have it finished by next week
3. Go to LMS and check it out
Particularly Weekly Learning Material: has
little introductions to each week, as well as
reading materials
Thanks, and see you on Wednesday morning!

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