Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Special Commissioned Essay on Modern African Literature, Pauline Dodgson - Modern African Literature And Other Literary Movements

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MODERN AFRICAN LITERATURE AND OTHER LITERARY MOVEMENTS

COLONIAL AND POSTCOLONIAL WRITING

Colonial Discourse: Colonial discourse theory, particularly the theory of Orientalism, expounded by Edward Said in Orientalism (1978), has shown how the Western male colonialist constructed the native as “Other” to himself. This Other was seen as inferior, subservient, effeminate, and emotional rather than rational. In this representation, the Western male is able to define himself in relation to his difference and superiority to the Other. The Other may represent an underground or surrogate self that the Western male fears will come to the surface but that he wishes to repress. Said developed his theory through analysis of the power relations of the West and the Orient, but the concepts of Orientalism and the Other have been used in interpreting works written by colonial writers and set in Africa, such as Rider Haggard's King Solomon's Mines...

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1. Introduction
2. Essay: Introduction
3. Representative Writers
4. Modern African Literature And Other Literary Movements
5. Hallmark Works Of Modern African Literature
6. Critical Responses To African Literature
7. Further Reading
8. Copyright

1. African Literature