'n 'Paradise Lost': 'n Ondersoek na swart arbeid en wit ongemak in stedelike Suid-Afrika: Marlene van Niekerk se kortverhaal 'Klein vingeroefening rondom die nosie van hibriditeit'
| Autor: | Mary West |
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| Rok vydání: | 2009 |
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| Zdroj: | Journal of Literary Studies. 25:90-105 |
| ISSN: | 1753-5387 0256-4718 |
| DOI: | 10.1080/02564710902869328 |
| Popis: | Summary Marlene van Niekerk's short story “Klein vingeroefening rondom die nosie van hibriditeit” (2001) confronts the ambivalence inherent in the legacy of Madamhood which is coupled with a post-apartheid sense of white displacement. This “small finger exercise on the notion of hybridity” offers a productive site to investigate theories of whiteness as an empty signifier and as a social construction. In this article, I trace manifestations of the reification of whiteness and suggest ways in which the narrative reveals the crises of whiteness and paradoxes upon which it is built. I argue that van Niekerk's deployment of layers of self-ironisation evident in her use of first-person narration, and the focalising perspective of the character “Marlene” allows her to examine her own duplicity in resisting and perpetuating normative Western whiteness inscribed in social narratives. This paper examines the narrator's multiple encounters with coloured and black domestic labourers and their white employers. Tracin... |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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