D. GRACE, Relocating Consciousness. Diasporic Writers and the Dynamics of Literary Experience

Daphne GRACE, Relocating Consciousness. Diasporic Writers and the Dynamics of Literary Experience, Amsterdam / New York, Rodopi (Consciousness, Literature and the Arts), 2007, 252 p.
ISBN 978-90-420-2252-2


RÉSUMÉ

This book deals directly with issues of consciousness within works of postcolonial and diasporic writers. It discusses fiction, autobiography and theory to re-formulate a “writing of consciousness”, addressing contemporary cultural theory related to a wide range of dynamic writers and ground-breaking novels. A critical analysis of literature contextualises consciousness (understood here as the source of language and human creativity), and explores ways in which consciousness is involved in the creative process. Tackling the controversial nature of consciousness itself, the book argues that consciousness must be understood in its philosophical and social contexts. The idea of relocating consciousness calls for a new aesthetics and ethics of living in the diasporic world where we are all to some extent “migrant”. The book explores notions of consciousness as alternative narrative structures to society, while expanding contemporary postcolonial theory beyond the limited dimension of power-based-on-violence to a more visionary exploration of experience based on consciousness as unity-in-diversity. Themes explored include sacred experience as empowerment; trauma, terror and the impact of consciousness; cosmopolitanism and globalisation; and the literature of human survival. Written in a lively and accessible manner the book will appeal to all readers who enjoy being on the cutting-edge of contemporary world literature.


TABLE DES MATIÈRES

Chapter 1: Re(ad)dressing Consciousness, Locating Diasporas
Chapter 2: Exploring Self and Other: Theories of Consciousness
Chapter 3: Trauma, Terror and the Impact of Consciousness
Chapter 4: Empire, Violence, and the Writing of History
Chapter 5: The Self-Reflexive World: Consciousness and Social Responsibility
Chapter 6: African Explorations of the Sacred and the Self
Chapter 7: The Literature of Human Survival: Novels of Haiti, Dominican Republic and The Bahamas
Chapter 8: Encounters in the Earthly Paradise: Relocating Self
Chapter 9: Cosmopolitanism, Political Conscience and Higher Consciousness
Bibliography
Index