The Diasporic Writer in the Post-Colonial Context: the Case of Ahdaf Soueif
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The Diasporic Writer in the Post-colonial Context: The Case of Ahdaf Soueif Yvette Katherine Lebœuf Thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the M.A. in Globalization and International Development School of International Development and Global Studies Faculty of Social Sciences University of Ottawa © Yvette Katherine Lebœuf, Ottawa, Canada, 2012 ABSTRACT The purpose of this study of Anglo-Egyptian writer Ahdaf Soueif’s two novels, In the Eye of the Sun (1999), first published in 1992, and The Map of Love (2000), first published in 1999, is to examine how they are arenas for hybrid politics in the post-colonial Egyptian context and the Arab diasporic context. This thesis examines how Soueif deals with residual colonial logics by using Post-colonial theories of transculturation. These theories reveal, through an analysis of Soueif’s use of Pharaonicism and her depiction of social and religious divides, that Soueif sometimes legitimizes and sometimes contests the results of transculturation by using products of this very process of transculturation. In the diasporic context, Soueif’s work deterritorializes these hybrid politics of legitimation and contestation by collapsing disparate temporalities and emphasizing continuity between them. To do this she deterritorializes and reterritorializes Pharaonicism, as well as Western literary tradition, the English language and political activism, to emphasize the cultural affinities between Egyptians/Arabs and Western culture. In this manner, she composes an integration strategy designed to facilitate her incorporation into her Western society of settlement, Great-Britain. This allows her to build a political platform from which she can contest and influence politics in her homeland, her society of settlement and the shape of Western cultural and political hegemony on a global scale. She is consequently able to transcend residual colonial logics through the very hybrid politics that they have created. Moreover, in the process, through the political agency that she exercises in her writing and activism, she builds a deterritorialized diasporic identity based on integration into many spheres of belonging that problematizes the victim model of diaspora in Diaspora studies. i ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Limitless thanks to Ma, Dad, Karl, Christine, Gramma, my whole family and my wonderful friends, old and new. Especially Kinda and Kenana Dahlan, who saw me through it all, and Hesham Hassounah and Jonathan Janisse who listened to me whine about discouraging and mindboggling administrative absurdities more than anyone. And most importantly, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my thesis supervisor, Dr. May Telmissany, for her boundless helpfulness, patience, guidance and intelligence. Thank you! ii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT .......................................................................................................................................... i ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................................................................................................................... ii TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................................................... iii INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................... 1 Literature Review .............................................................................................................................. 2 Approach and methodology ............................................................................................................. 18 PHARAONICISM ............................................................................................................................. 23 Mobilizing the Pharaonic Past: the Discourse of Pharaonicism ...................................................... 25 Pharaonicism in In the Eye of the Sun ............................................................................................. 28 Pharaonicism in The Map of Love ................................................................................................... 30 Reversing the Terms of Cultural Exchange ..................................................................................... 36 SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS DIVIDES ........................................................................................... 40 The Continuum of Transculturation in Soueif’s Novels .................................................................. 41 Love Stories and Western Hegemony ............................................................................................. 55 DETERRITORIALIZING IDENTITY: SOUEIF’S WORK FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF DIASPORA ........................................................................................................................................ 62 Pharaonicism as a Myth of Return................................................................................................... 63 Literature and Language .................................................................................................................. 68 Political Activism ............................................................................................................................ 74 Overcoming the Colonial Past ......................................................................................................... 79 The Victim Model of Diaspora vs. Political Agency ....................................................................... 84 CONCLUSION .................................................................................................................................. 91 LIST OF REFERENCES .................................................................................................................. 96 I- Corpus .......................................................................................................................................... 96 II- References .................................................................................................................................. 96 iii INTRODUCTION Ahdaf Soueif is a recognized Anglo-Egyptian writer of fiction, essays, articles and commentaries. In 1999, she was shortlisted for the Booker prize and in March 2010 she won the Mahmoud Darwish Award in recognition of her creative work in support of the Palestinian cause. In fact, Soueif is an activist interested in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as well other human rights and other political issues.. Furthermore, her writing is representative of topics and themes connected to her position as an Arab diasporic writer in the post- colonial context. Indeed, Soueif’s work presents an interesting case study because she is a well-known Anglo-Egyptian writer, writing from within the society of Egypt’s former colonizer, Great Britain. Moreover, while critical of Britain’s colonial legacy, she has become part of the former colonizer’s society. Overall, the relationship that Soueif establishes with the former colonizer as a diasporic writer problematizes the usual power dynamics between colonized and colonizer and reveals new avenues of academic inquiry for Post-colonial studies. The object of this research project is to investigate how politics of hybridity operate in Soueif’s two novels, In the Eye of the Sun (1999), first published in 1992, and The Map of Love (2000), first published in 1999. These politics of hybridity arise from the (residual) colonial logics created through the processes of transculturation and the opportunities that they create for their own problematization. The resulting tensions will underpin the following analysis of Soueif’s novels. 1 It is my goal to analyze how transculturation manifests itself in Soueif’s negotiations of her identity as a Westernized Egyptian and how this identity informs her identity as Arab diasporic writer. First, I will examine how processes of transculturation have created hybrid identities that operate according to (residual) colonial logics in Egypt and how Soueif’s work exhibits the maintenance and/or problematization of these logics. Then I will look at how these same logics shape the way in which Soueif forms her Arab diasporic identity and if this identity creates new platforms from which to challenge residual colonial logics. Literature Review To address Soueif’s work as a diasporic writer in the post-colonial context, literature from various fields will be used. Articles about and interviews with Soueif will provide information about the author’s life and work. What is more, this project will rely heavily on Post-colonialism and Diaspora studies, and will integrate texts dealing with Arab identity, globalization and Egyptian politics and history. Post-colonial Theories The post-colonial context is not a context that can be reduced to the historical period marked by the independence of former colonies in the mid-twentieth century. Although the shift caused by independence movements did allow for the context to arise and for its theorization to develop, as will be discussed below, this context can be defined as one in which a multitude of voices from disparate temporalities1 are able to come together more readily, in the spirit of collaboration or confrontation, and in which their cultures mix, 1 A temporality is here defined as the collective cultural and historical experience which provides cultural points of reference