Migritude: Migrant Structures of Feeling in a Minor Literature of Globalization
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City University of New York (CUNY) CUNY Academic Works All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects 5-2019 Migritude: Migrant Structures of Feeling in a Minor Literature of Globalization Ashna Ali The Graduate Center, City University of New York How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! More information about this work at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/3221 Discover additional works at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu This work is made publicly available by the City University of New York (CUNY). Contact: [email protected] i Ali Migritude: Migrant Structures of Feeling in Minor Literatures of Globalization by Ashna Ali A dissertation submitted to the Graduate Faculty in Comparative Literature in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree for Doctor of Philosophy, The City University of New York (2019) ii Ali (2019) (c) Ashna Ali All Rights Reserved iii Ali Migritude: Structures of Feeling in a Minor Literature of Globalization By Ashna Ali This manuscript has been read and accepted by the Graduate Faculty in Comparative Literature in satisfaction of the dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. ________________ __________________________________ Date Robert Reid-Pharr Chair of Examining Committee ________________ __________________________________ Date Giancarlo Lombardi Executive Officer Supervisory Committee: _______________ ___________________________________ Date Sonali Perera, Comparative Literature _______________ ____________________________________ Date Ashley Dawson, English THE CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK iv Ali Abstract Migritude: Structures of Feeling in a Minor Literature of Globalization by Ashna Ali Advisor: Robert F. Reid-Pharr Migritude: Structures of Feeling in a Minor Literature of Globalization examines contemporary postcolonial narratives of migration written by women of color writing in English and in Italian under the rubric of “migritude.” Migritude literature describes the work of a disparate yet distinct group of contemporary authors whose work describes the condition of being a migrant under globalization with a critical feminist and anti- imperialist politics and poetics. It is a global justice movement that sees literature as a form of cultural activism. Migritude literatures traces the connections between contemporary globalization and colonial processes of the past and sheds light on how the functioning and expansion of capitalism relies on forced displacement and forced labor authorized and ensured by the nation-state apparatus. I contribute to the field of migritude, which traditionally defines migritude as African and francophone, by expanding its parameters to include literature written by authors with broader orgins in the Global South and by examining works written in English and in Italian. This study also responds to the dominance of male authors by centering the work of women to delineate the gendered subject of migration and the particularity of her ontological challenges as she faces racist, heteronormative, and anti-immigrant systems of law, borders, and checkpoints designed to restrict her mobility. My close reading of these literatures brings together Black Atlantic, Indian Ocean, and Black Mediterranean frameworks to show their transhistorical connections and their exigency in a political and literary landscape in which forcibly displaced communities are underrepresented. I examine the poetics of works by Shailja Patel, Saidiya Hartman, Gaiutra Bahadur, Cristina Ali Farah, and Igiaba Scego through the lens of affect to show how migritude texts share a structure of feeling particular to global migrants with an emphasis on anger, shame, and ambivalence. A careful study of these literatures makes their urgency in a period of rising global ethno-national populism clear. v Ali Acknowledgments This dissertation could not have been written without the generous support of the Institute for Research in African Diasporas to the Americans and the Caribbean (IRADAC) and the Dean K. Harrison Dissertation Fellowship at The Graduate Center, City University of New York (CUNY). It could also not have been written without the support and space offered to me by CUNYBA and the Institute for Language Education in a Transcultural Context (ILETC). I am deeply indebted to Robert Reid-Pharr, my dissertation director, for years of inspiration and mentorship that have fundamentally shaped my thinking and goals. I thank my program advisor, mentor, and friend Giancarlo Lombardi for ushering me into academia and believing in me when I did not. I would not be here without him. I thank Sonali Perera for her extraordinary generosity, clarity of thought and her repeated reminders that the first rule of Marxist Feminism is to never apologize. I am grateful for Ashley Dawson’s kindness and research for teaching me to think of the material world in more meaningful ways. I am thankful for the mentorship and friendship of Christopher Ian Foster with whom I co-chaired the Postcolonial Studies Group (PSG) and with whom I planted the seeds of this project. I salute fellow members of PSG, Shoumik Bhattacharya and Michael Rumore for their support. PSG is collectively in debt to Meena Alexander, whose kindness buoyed us in challenging times. I thank migritude writers and scholars Igiaba Scego, Anna Botta, Eleanor Paynter, Augusta Irele, Camilla Hawthorne, Supriya Nair, Amrita Ghosh, and Nasia Anam with whom I have been blessed to share work and outrage. I will always hear this rich network of voices in my ear. I am honored to contribute parts of this dissertation to Journal of Narrative Theory for their special issue “Refugee Literatures: Migration, Crisis, and the Humanities,” to Text Zur Kunst for their special issue “The Sea” and to Global South for their special issue “Global Migration and International Film History.” A version of Chapter Two: Migritude History: Black Atlantic Sisters, Kala Pani Jahaji-Behen, and the Inheritance of Shame” is under review at Women’s Studies Quarterly for their special issue “Inheritance.” I shall never be able to repay the warm editorial and moral support of Yelizaveta (Liza) Shapiro and Stefania Porcelli. Deep thanks to Bettina Lerner, who believed in the project before I knew what the project was. I thank Adeeb Ali, Nashwa Zaman and Prithi Khalique for our siblinghood in both blood and unbelonging. I thank my parents, Basharat Ali and Yasmin Zaman Ali, for lessons of migrant sacrifice and endurance that I will carry for a lifetime. Finally, I thank K. Rafael Varela, whose commitment to queer migrant social justice and imagining new freedoms inspires and sustains my own. vi Ali Table of Contents Introduction: From World Literature to Global Literature to literatures of globalization ……….1 Chapter One: Migritude Poetics: The Collective Voice of Feminist Anger ……………………36 Chapter Two: Migritude History: Black Atlantic Sisters, Kala Pani Jahaji-Behen, and the Inheritance of Shame ………………………………………………………….....70 Chapter Three: Migritude Contexts: From the Black Atlantic to the Black Mediterranean……129 Chapter Four: Migritude Ambivalence: The Body and Belonging in Cristina Ali Farah and Igiaba Scego’s Italia Meticcia…………………………………………………………..165 Coda: Imaging the Migrant …………………………………………………………………….213 Conclusion ……………………………………………………………………………………..259 Bibliography …………………………………………………………………………………...263 1 Introduction: From World Literature to Global Literature to literatures of globalization Each wave as I kneel closer a migrant flag A tongue with syllables no script can catch. The many births you have passed through, try to remember them as I do mine Memory is all you have. Still, how much can you bear on your back? You’ve lost one language, gained another, lost a third. There’s nothing you’ll inherit, neither per stirpes nor per capita No plot by the riverbank in your father’s village of Kozencheri Or by the burning ghat in Varanasi. All you have is a writing hand smeared with ink and little bits of paper Swirling in a violent wind. —Meena Alexander, from “ Krishna 3:29 AM” The Figure of the Migrant In November 2018, thousands of people fleeing poverty, persecution, and violence Central America traveled toward the United States (US) in hopes of escaping persecution and poverty. International law sees them as asylum seekers entitled to refugee status. Rather than reporting that a large number of asylum seekers were making their way to the US media narratives, right-wing political rhetoric created a singular bogey-man of them: “the migrant caravan.” Their approach was called “an invasion” by US President Donald Trump whose saw it fit to declare a national emergency.1 The rhetoric or crisis was no doubt connected to the upcoming midterm elections, as it continues to fuel electoral rhetoric across the Global North. At no point does any reporting on migrant “crises” make reference to the century of US military intervention and economic neoliberalism in Central America that created vacuums of power and 1 Priscilla Alvarez, “What Happened to the Migrant Caravans?” March 4, 2019. https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/04/politics/migrant-caravans-trump-immigration/ 2 set the conditions for drug cartels and paramilitary networks. The violence and poverty that drives people from Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras toward Mexico and the US is a direct product of North American plunder. Free trade agreements like CAFTA-DR keep these regions economically dependent in a market relationship that can only be