This thesis discusses the concept of cultural identity in relation to three literary works. It argues that Kiran Desai’s novel, The Inheritance of Loss, highlights the postcolonial structure of its...Show moreThis thesis discusses the concept of cultural identity in relation to three literary works. It argues that Kiran Desai’s novel, The Inheritance of Loss, highlights the postcolonial structure of its characters’ identities, Jhumpa Lahiri’s novel, The Namesake, focuses on the concept of diaspora identities, as defined by Stuart Hall; her short stories collection, Interpreter of Maladies, on the other hand, centres around the interplay between social and personal identities, as put forward by Margarita Azmitia. Instead of portraying cultural identity as a monolithic construct, all three literary works make a case for the fact that cultural identity is ever-changing and dynamic.Show less
This thesis set out to study Andrei Kurkov’s role as a writer within Ukraine’s alleged postcolonial condition. Firstly, I analysed the relationship between Ukraine and postcolonialism with regard...Show moreThis thesis set out to study Andrei Kurkov’s role as a writer within Ukraine’s alleged postcolonial condition. Firstly, I analysed the relationship between Ukraine and postcolonialism with regard to Russia. Secondly, I applied this theoretical framework, especially the concept of hybridity, on the public statements and political opinions of Andrei Kurkov. This thesis has found that Andrei Kurkov fits perfectly the postcolonial frame and can be called a postcolonial writer. The main feature which defines him as such is the fact that he promotes the official recognition of the Russian language as a Ukrainian specificity. Such proposition aims at solving mechanisms of cultural dependency between Ukraine and Russia. Ultimately, I argue that this recognition can positively influence the role of Russian-speaking writers in Ukraine.Show less
This Thesis analyses the path toward a hybrid identity of the female protagonists in The Woman Warrior and White Teeth. The main theory is Homi Bhabha's Hybridity and Third Space. By comparing the...Show moreThis Thesis analyses the path toward a hybrid identity of the female protagonists in The Woman Warrior and White Teeth. The main theory is Homi Bhabha's Hybridity and Third Space. By comparing the similarities and differences between the two female character's search for an identity, the thesis concludes that the narrator in The Woman Warrior is in a primary stage of hybridity and that Irie in White Teeth is in a much advanced and modern stage of hybridity.Show less
This thesis explores how the hybrid form of photo-fiction suits migrants’ experiences. Taking Aleksandar Hemon’s The Lazarus Project (2008) and W. G. Sebald’s The Emigrants (1996) as my case...Show moreThis thesis explores how the hybrid form of photo-fiction suits migrants’ experiences. Taking Aleksandar Hemon’s The Lazarus Project (2008) and W. G. Sebald’s The Emigrants (1996) as my case studies, I focus on themes of history, memory, and identity. I analyze how the tensions between photographs and prose complicate our understanding of the way traumatic historical events shape the present, the unjust historical treatment that migrants endure, the mobilization and materialization of memories, the constructed nature of migrant identities, and the way exile becomes a desired state of being in the world. Through comparative close readings of Hemon and Sebald’s novels I explore how both authors challenge the conventional notion that photography’s telos is bearing witness to historical truths and how their novels also call for a reconsideration of the relationship between memory and photography. I seek to show that the hybrid photo-fiction form, which emphasizes blurriness and dualities inherent in acts of memory and in constructions of self-histories and identities, illuminates how migrants meaningfully engage with the world. Sebald and Hemon’s novels move us between two aesthetics, engage us with two modes of storytelling, and in doing so highlight the positive nature of hybridity and the beauty in rootlessness and rupture.Show less
Through the process of cultural ruination, the ancestral cult of the Inka was supposedly lost in exchange for Christian funerary practices. Though there is an outward façade of acculturation in...Show moreThrough the process of cultural ruination, the ancestral cult of the Inka was supposedly lost in exchange for Christian funerary practices. Though there is an outward façade of acculturation in relation to the treatment of death during the Colonial Era in Cusco, Peru, all was not lost. This particular study suggests that through the introduction of Western artistic media, the colonial Inka were able to maintain aspects of their pre-Hispanic belief system. Specifically, this thesis argues that there are distinct parallels between the way the Inka mummies and the practice dynastic portrait paintings that was adopted during the late 16th century.Show less
Research master thesis | Archaeology (research) (MA/MSc)
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In the light of the current interests in hybridity in archaeology this thesis tries to find a transparent way to detect hybridity in grey-ware of Early Iron Age Iberia. This pottery type is...Show moreIn the light of the current interests in hybridity in archaeology this thesis tries to find a transparent way to detect hybridity in grey-ware of Early Iron Age Iberia. This pottery type is presumed to be a hybrid ware that has evolved from the influences of local preference for ceramics made with techniques introduced by the Phoenician ‘colonizers’. A case study investigates this issue in the grey-ware assemblage from the site of Cerro Manzanillo in the province of Badajoz, Extremadura. Clearly the analysis of this assemblage poses theoretical as well as practical problems. The obscurities around the parameters to classify grey-ware in the past together with a general lack of understanding about the boundaries and meaning of the stylistic evolution of material culture lead to the conclusion that hybridity is not a good concept to describe this type of material culture. Rather, hybridity can be used to describe the processes behind stylistic change although this is only a valuable classification when this term is defined more accurately.Show less
