Negotiating Identity in Post-Colonial Literature: Culture, Memory, Diaspora and Resistance

Abstract

The question of identity is one of the vital problems in post-colonial literature. With the collapse of the empires the former colonies became politically independent but they also uncovered psychological, cultural, linguistic and historical dilemmas of the individual and collective identity. Colonialism was an attempt to alter the identities of colonized societies by stating that the cultures of the colonized societies were irrational, primitive, inferior and that the European civilization was the one that represented the universal standard of progress. This was very closely linked with the struggle for independence from colonial domination; and the struggle for identity was a struggle against colonial domination. The questions of identity in postcolonial literature are raised by questioning what has been considered to be an “unproblematic self,” an “unproblematic” notion of self that is challenged by the colonial discourse. Postcolonial literature looks at issues of identity, while considering the nature of colonial discourse and how it has resulted in divided consciousness and divided subjectivities among people and communities. The notion of identity is not static and consistent for the post-colonial writer; rather, it is a process of negotiation, resistance, migration and displacement within the context of historical memory and cultural contact. They uncover the far-reaching psychological consequences of imperialism in the novel, poetry, drama and essay, and re-imagine identities through native histories and cultural practices.