ISSN 0976-0814
Labyrinth
An International Refereed Journal of Postmodern Studies
Vol.6 - No.4 October 2015
Abstracted & Indexed at
Literary Reference Centre Plus, EBSCO HOST, USA
Editor
Lata Mishra
Dept. of English Studies & Research,
Govt. KRG (PG) Autonomous College,
Gwalior, MP
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Table of Contents
Articles
Multidisciplinary Approach and Literature as
Knowledge Area
-Bir Singh Yadav
5
Lilith: A Woman's Tale of Surfacing
- Sujatha Aravindakshan
16
Towards Her “Poetics”: Mahadevi Varma's Shrinkhala ki
Kariyan in the light of Gynocriticism
-Almee Raza
22
"Was it a boy or a girl": Exploring Gender Issues in Martin
McDonagh's The Lieutenant of Inishmore
- Muhammed Sobhi Salama
30
Mahasweta Devi's Water: A Critique of Social Reality
and its Relevance
-Krishna Singh
37
Masculinity, War and the Politics of Ethnic Identity:
A Study of Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner
-Mriganka Sekhar Sarma
41
Free Will vs. Determinism: An Existential Reading of
Jhumpa Lahiri's The Lowland
-A.Sharada & N.Usha
47
Some Traits of Human Psyche and the Attainment of
Moksha/Mukti in Girish Karnad's Naga-Mandala:
Play with a Cobra and Flowers: A Dramatic Monologue
-Abhinandan Malas
57
Media and Practices of Mediation: Role of Activist
Documentary Films in Indian Mediasphere
- Sudhir Kumar Pandey & Manjari Johri 69
Reviewing Chitrangada: The Crowning Wish: An Exploration
of the Issues of Adaptation and Gender-Crisis in
Rituparno Ghosh's Film -Arundhati Tarafdar
79
Women in Purdah: Representation of Indian Women in
Women's Travel Writing in Colonial India
-Nurjahan Begum
91
From the Margins to the Mainstream: Magical Realism
and the Creation of a Feminist Space in Toni Morrison's
The Bluest Eye
-Vijay Kumar Rai
100
Julia Kristeva's “semiotic chora” and its Subversive
Potential
-Sonal Singhvi Choudhary
107
Western Influence in Queen – A Critical Study
- Ranveer
111
Ahdaf Soueif's The Map of Love: Writing a SelfThe Female Voice
- Papri Sultana
118
Indian Womanhood: A Picture of Freedom and Fear in
R.K. Narayan's The Dark Room
-Prashant Mahajan, Pragyaa Gupta
124
Search for Identity and Independence in A House for Mr. Biswas
- Swarupananda Chatterjee
128
Feminism in the Novels of Shashi Deshpande
-Rashmi Jain
133
Songs of Baul A Strategic Essentialism Surrogates over
The 19th Century Hegemonized Societal Format
139
- Auritra Munshi
Widows and women: Soueif's presentation of women and widows in
The Map of Love
-Mir Mohammad Tonmoy
146
Indian Youth Perceptions & Attitudes towards Homosexuality
- A Qualitative Study -Ruhi Jadhav
151
Post-colonialism and Indian Literature
-Farhana Sayeed
160
Social-Economic Conditions of the Contemporary Deori Women of
Assam in India
- Guptajit Pathak
166
An Indian English Poem: The Use of Stylistics in Innovative
Teaching
-Ashok P. Khairnar
172
Depiction of Devotional Songs as Borgeets: The Wonder of Assam
-Azizur Rahman Sarkar
184
Deconstructing the African American Womanhood:
A Critical Analysis of the Recalcitrant Black woman in
Alice Childress's Wine in the Wilderness
- N.Vijayalakshmi & Soumya Jose
186
Short Stories
The Seminar
The Botanist's Resignation
- ND Dani
- Sayantan Pal Chowdhury
193
199
- IK Sharma
203
- Albert Russo
205
Book Review
The Vacanas of Sarvajna
Poem
Adieu, Adios & Farewell
Our Esteemed Contributors
207
Labyrinth: Volume-6, No.4 October-2015
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 5-15
Multidisciplinary Approach and
Literature as Knowledge Area
- Bir Singh Yadav
Abstract: Knowledge is the grace, glory, and dignity of human beings as
it leads to peace, progress, prosperity and happiness of the world,
thereby in its holistic form it creates a halo of admiration with magnetic
aura around the human face elevating and uplifting the mortal beings to
divine status. Hence the flow of the entire peace and sustainable
development emerges out of the holistic whole of the knowledge that
comes through the pipelines of the multidisciplinary approach. In this
holistic system of multidisciplinary approach, different branches of
knowledge crossing their boundaries are merged together in such a
harmonious way that without harming one another they form a broad
system to generate pure knowledge with zero or minimum negative
effect coupled with maximum welfare of the human and non-human
world.When knowledge of one discipline crossing its boundaries goes to
the other discipline, it does not harm that discipline but enriches it
through idealization by adding something of nobility to it that makes its
knowledge more beneficial, valid, vast, true and useful. But the wrong
thing happening in the present world is that knowledge is being abused
and misused in the name of the specialization. Currently in the
epistemological field the main problem is that the modern scientific
culture accomplished with modern technology and blinded with
material progress is rapidly moving towards its own annihilation without
caring and curing the loss of the non-human world as well as moral and
spiritual values.
Literature which has the right to say everything in any way provides
fertile ground to multidisciplinary system of knowledge for the welfare
of the world as a whole. Hence this paper concentrating on the seminal
works of some literary bards intends to reflect how different disciplines
interwoven in the web of literature create a whole of holistic knowledge
that shapes better and bright future for humanity on this planet.
Keywords: Deep ecology, Interdisciplinary approach, Holistic
knowledge, Science, Spirituality, Technology.
Knowledge is the grace, glory, and dignity of human beings as it leads to
peace, progress, prosperity and happiness of the world, thereby in its
holistic form it creates a halo of admiration with magnetic aura around
the human face elevating and uplifting the mortal beings to divine status.
The Vedas also assert that knowledge is the pivot of all kinds of progress.
Hence the flow of the entire peace and sustainable progress emerges out
of the holistic whole of the knowledge that comes through the pipelines of
the multi-disciplinary approach. In this holistic system of multidisciplinary approach, different branches of knowledge crossing their
boundaries are merged together in such a harmonious way that without
harming one another they form a broad system to generate pure
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Labyrinth: Volume-6, No.4 October-2015
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 16-21
Lilith: A Woman's Tale of Surfacing
- Sujatha Aravindakshan
Abstract: The object of this paper is to present the theme of surfacing
in Sara Maitland's short story, “Lilith.”The quest for self-revelation that
Lilith has undertaken is an eternal one, while the journey of Cain is
ephemeral and comes to an end with his death, which relieves him of his
sense of sin and guilt.
Keywords: Feminism, feminine, Jewish and Bablyonian myths.
“Myths often have some serious underlying purpose beyond that of
telling a story” – Diane Purkiss
The object of this paper is to present the theme of surfacing in Sara
Maitland's short story, “Lilith.” Most of Maitland's short stories fall
under the genre of mythic feminism, where she rewrites popular myths
with the sole aim of exploring the feminist vein in them. In “Women's
Rewriting of Myths”, Diane Purkiss discusses the problematic approach
of feminist authors who, by
... rewriting the myth—changing the narrative, changing the position of
the speaker, changing the spaces available for identification—are held to
be at once making a dramatic break with the myths as told by the fathers,
and also to be recovering the dark, secret, always unconscious truths
which the fathers have struggled to repress. (444)
Generally, feminists are of the opinion that there are three major phases in
a woman's life – Scooting, Succumbing, and Surfacing. Women pass
through either of these phases or all of them in succession. Scooting is the
phase where woman flees either out of fear or hatred from the ideals of
men. But not every woman succeeds in this attempt. Dorothy
Dinnerstein rightly points out, “The prevailing symbiosis between men
and women is something more than a product of societal coercion” (234).
In other words, women cannot evade men for long, for men, through the
exertion of patriarchal authority, manage to force women either into
willing or unwilling subjugation. Women therefore are forced to
encounter the succumbing phase. According to most women,
subservience is predestined, but when it becomes intolerable, a few begin
to discover methods of extricating themselves from the yoke of
subordination and oppression. The desire to acquit oneself from the
norms of an androcentric society is the first symptom of the surfacing of a
woman's personality. Radical feminists affirm that surfacing is the phase
of rejuvenation or rebirth in a woman's life.There are two types of women.
The obsequious woman knows that she has succumbed to man either
willingly or unwillingly and yet makes no attempt to break free from those
shackles that have bound her to the male-centred society. This could be
probably out of fear or her unwillingness to change. The second type of
woman, unlike her docile counterparts, is bold enough to emerge free
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Labyrinth: Volume-6, No.4 October-2015
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 22-29
Towards Her “Poetics”: Mahadevi
Varma's Shrinkhala ki Kariyan in
the light of Gynocriticism
- Almee Raza
Abstract: If literature is a representation and reflection of society, a
society, then comprises both man and woman. It would therefore, be
injustice on the part of women if their silence remains unspoken and
their agonies persist without representation. The representation of
women in literature was felt essential for an authentic representation of
society. With this objective many women writers took the responsibility
to represent and give an expression to the agonizing, voiceless women
resulting, thus, in the role of 'woman as writer' and creator of their body
of literature. The present paper emphasizes this aspect. This paper
attempts a study of Mahadevi Varma's Shrinkhala ki Kariyan as a gyno
text in the light of Elaine Showalter's notion of 'gynocriticism'.The paper
reflects on Showalter's theory of “gynocritics” and offers a parallel
significance of 'woman as writer' in Mahadevi Varma's plea to women to
write and create 'a literature of their own'. It also focuses on the multiple
issues and problems facing women as described in Shrinkhala ki
Kariyan and portrays not only the suppression, suffering and
humiliation of women but also emphasizes the necessity for articulation.
Keywords: Gynocritics, representation, articulation, woman's
language, selfhood.
Jean Jacques Rousseau, the great French philosopher and leader of the
French Revolution, once mentioned that a man is born free but he is
everywhere in chains. The statement by the well known philosopher can
symbolically be applied to the status and existence of a woman in a
patriarchal social set up. A woman, though, was born free, yet is
everywhere in “chains”. She is stifled by the everlasting shackles of the
society. She gasps under the harsh, stubborn and biased social customs,
norms and prejudices and is even suppressed by her own family. The
paraphernalia of her peripheral existence is demarcated by the hypocritic
social order.History bears evidence how a woman has been subjugated
and ruled at the hands of her changing rulers - father, brother, husband,
son. She is governed by what can be called the law of the threshold which
has been imposed on her and which she is forced to abide. A breach of this
law brings her doom and her plight can even be more hazardous than
'Judith Shakespeare', the “wonderfully gifted sister” (Woolf, 1998, p.53)
of William Shakespeare, as Virginia Woolf mentions in her feminist
treatise, A Room of One's Own. Commenting on the inferior status and
abuse of women,Woolf quotes historian, Professor Trevelyan:
Wife-beating was a recognized right of man, and was practised without
shame by high as well as low...the daughter who refused to marry the
gentleman of her parents' choice was liable to be locked up, beaten and
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Labyrinth: Volume-6, No.4 October-2015
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 30-36
Was it a Boy or a Girl : Exploring
Gender Issues in
Martin McDonagh's
The Lieutenant of Inishmore
- Muhammed Sobhi Salama
Abstract: This article aims at analyzing various views/definitions of
gender and how these can be applied to Martin McDonagh's most
political play, The Lieutenant of Inishmore. Further, it intends to provide
insights into the concepts of backlash and stereotypes. The article
illustrates how Davey and Mairead clearly break society-governed
confines, which everybody else succumbs to. They boldly assert aspects
of their personalities in an attempt to be who they are, and not who they
ought to be. The conclusion is a summing up of the ideas and points
discussed in the paper.
Keywords: gender, masculine, feminine, backlash, society, sociocultural, stereotypes, Irish drama
The article attempts to provide answers to the following questions: How are male
and female images represented? Why are these roles depicted as reversed? Within
the play, do these reversed roles revert to their original stereotypical states or do
they remain as they are?
This is fixt/ As are the roots of earth and base of all;
Man for the field and woman for the hearth:
Man for the sword and for the needle she:
Man with the head and woman with the heart:
Man to command and woman to obey;
All else confusion- Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Catherine Villanueva Gardner (2006) affirms that “Gender is the set of
socially constructed behavioural and psychological characteristics
associated with masculinity and femininity.” But, the term gender has
often been related to women and women's rights and freedom. Although
critics state that the world has seen too much of feminism and feminist
thought and ideology, it is a fact that gender issues have pervaded the very
existence of society and will continue to do so. Therefore, the concept of
gender is undoubtedly an interpreter's Paradise that unravels layer after
layer of interpretation endlessly like a humongous onion. This,
apparently, is the reason for having selected gender issues as one of the
central themes in Martin McDonagh's most political play and his second
of the Aran Trilogy, The Lieutenant of Inishmore. The article attempts to
provide answers to the following questions: How are male and female
images represented? Why are these roles depicted as reversed? Within the
play, do these reversed roles revert to their original stereotypical states or
do they remain as they are? McDonagh entered the realm of drama in an
unusual fashion, without attending a drama school or earning a theatre
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Labyrinth: Volume-6, No.4 October-2015
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 37-40
Mahasweta Devi's Water:
A Critique of Social Reality
and its Relevance
- Krishna Singh
Abstract: The present paper endeavours to analyze Mahasweta Devi's
play Water translated by Samik Bandyopadhyay as a document of social
reality and its critique. Untouchability, caste and culture conflict,
extreme poverty, illiteracy, lack of basic amenities of life, Naxalism,
Government officials' apathy and administrative reluctance, nexus
between Zamindars, administrative and police officers to exploit poor
untouchables are the core issues dealt in dexterously. Rooted in history
and following myth as well as contemporary reality, with socioeconomic milieus ranging from the urban bourgeoisie to the urban
under world, rural untouchable settlements to rural tribal communities,
the present play offers a view of India rarely seen in literature. Further, it
closely studies the thematic concerns in her plays and different modes of
exploitation prevalent in both urban and rural world. Uniqueness of her
dramatic vision and her artistic excellence are also incorporated in the
present study.
Keywords: Culture, Knowledge, Caste, Community, exploitation.
Mahasweta Devi is one of our foremost literary personalities, a prolific
and best-selling author in Bengali of short fiction and novels; a deeply
political social activist who has been working with and for tribals and
marginalized communities like the landless labourers of eastern India for
years; the editor of a quarterly, Bortika, in which the tribals and
marginalized peoples themselves document grass root-level issues and
trends; and a socio-political commentator whose articles have appeared
regularly in the Economic and Political Weekly, Frontier and other journals.
Mahasweta Devi has made important contributions to literary and
cultural studies in India. Her empirical research into oral history as it lives
in the cultures and memories of tribal communities was a first of its kind.
Her powerful, haunting tales of exploitation and struggle have been seen
as rich sites of feminist discourse by leading scholars. Her innovative use
of language has expanded the conventional borders of Bengali literary
expression. Standing as she does at the intersection of vital contemporary
questions of politics, gender and class, she is a significant figure in the
field of socially committed literature. Mahasweta Devi was born in 1926
in Dhaka, to literary parents. Her father Manish Ghatak was a wellknown poet and novelist of the Kallol era and mother Dharitri Devi was
also a writer and a social worker. Mahasweta Devi's schooling was in
Dhaka, but after the partition of India she moved to West Bengal and
thereafter joined Vishvabharti University in Shantiniketan and
completed B.A. (Hon's) in English and M.A. in English at Calcutta
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Labyrinth: Volume-6, No.4 October-2015
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 41-46
Masculinity, War and the Politics of
Ethnic Identity: A Study of Khaled
Hosseini's The Kite Runner
- Mriganka Sekhar Sarma
Abstract: This paper explores the proximity between masculinity and
war, and examines how these two concepts are related to the politics of
ethnicity-based identity through a study of Khaled Hosseini's debut
novel, The Kite Runner. The novel portrays the plight of the various
marginalised sections in the war-ravaged Afghanistan. However, a close
reading of the novel exposes the novelist's complicity in the hegemonic
order which has perpetuated the exploitation of the marginalised, and
the novel's consequent failure to offer any alternative to the violent,
exploitative space, created by masculinity and war.
Keywords: Masculinity,War, Ethnicity, Khaled Hosseini
There is a dialectical relationship between masculinity and war. War
creates a fertile ground for the flourishment of the masculine traits.
Similarly, an over glorified masculinity prepares the ground for war.
Khaled Hosseini, the Afghanistan-born American novelist's debut novel,
The Kite Runner (2003) can be read as an interesting case study for
exploring this relationship between masculinity and war. Hosseini's novel
also reflects how the concepts of masculinity and war are closely related to
the politics of ethnicity-based identity. The Kite Runner depicts the
victimisation of ethnic minorities, women and children in a war-ravaged,
male-dominated society. However, Hosseini's novel cannot be considered
as a radical critique of the dominant, exploitative order. By portraying the
ethnic minorities and women in stereotypical terms as weak and passive,
and as almost absent figures, the novelist reinforces the same ideological
presuppositions which help the racist, patriarchal society to maintain its
hegemony over the marginalized. The Kite Runner encapsulates a very
turbulent period of modern Afghan history, starting with the overthrow of
monarchy and invasion of the Soviets, and ending with the rise of the
Taliban. The novel intertwines the personal life of Amir, the son of an
wealthy Afghan businessman with the violent political events of the
twentieth-century Afghanistan. In the early part of the novel, Amir is
shown enjoying a fun-filled childhood in the company of Hassan, the son
of the family's long-time, trusted servant, Ali. However, Amir shares a
tensed relationship with his father, whom he calls “Baba”. Though Amir
constantly seeks the attention and affection of Baba, he feels neglected.
Baba is often critical of Amir since he considers the latter as weak and
effeminate. The tension in the father-son relationship eases a bit when
Amir wins the kite-fighting tournament. However, Amir's happiness after
the win lasts only for a few moments since his relationship with Hassan
41
Labyrinth: Volume-6, No.4 October-2015
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 47-56
Free Will vs. Determinism: An
Existential Reading of Jhumpa
Lahiri's The Lowland
- A. Sharada & N. Usha
Abstract: The 9/11 attacks on the twin towers in U.S.A, was a kind of
inflection point in American history. Many Americans, who had been
led by the illusion of American power and global reach and enjoyed a
sense of invincibility, were shattered, as they began to sense the
precarious nature of their existence. Confronted by a bleak prospect of
the world, they felt compelled to put behind them their naïve optimism
and simplistic dichotomies with which they had been accustomed to
view the world. Post 9/11 traumatic phase, was a period of deep
introspection for Americans as they began to confront the tragic nature
of their existence. Lacan had once said, “… the philosopher`s cognito is
at the centre of the mirage that renders modern man so sure of being
himself even in his uncertainties about himself” (Ecrits, p.167). Written
in an existential vein, Lahiri's The Lowland (2013), holds a special appeal
for the twenty-first century readers, as it dwells on modern man's
perplexity in the face of a major personal.Though the backdrop for most
of the story is mid twentieth century India and America, the historical
context of The Lowland is very contemporary as Lahiri engages with
some of the dominant ideological discourses of our time.
Keywords: Free will, Determinism, Existentialism, Consciousness,
Quietism.
Introduction: As a new school of thought, existentialism emerged in the
years following World War II. It stressed on an individual's capacity to act
autonomously in accordance with his own desires and interest.The chief
proponent of the school, Jean Paul Sartre (1905-1980) says “Man is
nothing else but that which he makes of himself” (1948, p.24). This
central tenet, “existence precedes essence” aims at resolving one of the
oldest dilemmas related to human freedom and determinism. It attempts
to understand the human condition in the world by taking into account
the subjective states of a human, i.e. anxiety, alienation, and awareness of
death. Man is not a prefabricated being; his life should not be understood
as predetermined or as unfolding of an essence that persists through time.
The Lacanian view posits, if there is any essence it is precisely “the lack of
essence” (Chaitin, 196). Lacan, the psychoanalyst would also say,
knowledge of the world to a large extent involves knowledge of the
conditions of our mind. Sartre concedes, there are certain a priori limits
which outline man's fundamental situation in the universe; his necessity
to exist in the world, be at work there, be in the midst of other people, be
mortal, etc. However, these “existential aspects” (a term used by
Heidegger) are universal and transcendental. They do not prevent men
47
Labyrinth: Volume-6, No.4 October-2015
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 57-68
Some Traits of Human Psyche and
the Attainment of Moksha/Mukti in
Girish Karnad's Naga-Mandala:
Play with a Cobra and Flowers:
A Dramatic Monologue
- Abhinandan Malas
Abstract: Girish Karnad's Naga-Mandala: Play with a Cobra and
Flowers: A Dramatic Monologue provide the reader with immense
opportunities to explore the human psyche from various perspectives.
Since Indian history, society, myths and folktales play a huge role in
forming the background of Karnad's plays; therefore, a researcher finds
it more comfortable to explore the Indian psyche in Karnad's
characters. In both these plays the concept of Indian psyche plays an
important role in sketching out the human unconscious and without
which Freud's theory of unconscious remains incomplete in this regard.
While Naga-Mandala depicts the feminine desires Flowers displays the
various traits and consequences of the male sexual instincts. But, in
both the plays, the theme does not remain confined within the sexual
instincts of the unconscious and develops into an incident that makes
the individual realize the freedom of the spirit and the devotion to God.
My research paper focuses on Karnad's presentation of the human
unconscious in Girish Karnad's two plays Naga-Mandala and Flowers.
This paper attempts to highlight the basic traits of human psyche that
add to the general concept of human unconscious propounded by
Sigmund Freud and make it easier for us to understand the working of
this unconscious when placed against the backdrop of Indian myth and
folktales. My paper also focuses on the concept of Moksha and Mukti
that seem to become the ultimate goal of the individual and which get
manifested in different ways to bring to the subject a sense of relief,
satisfaction and emancipation in these two plays.
Keywords: Human Psyche, Unconscious, Shiva Linga, Mandala,
Moksha, Mukti, Female and Male Desires, Myth, Folktales, Freedom.
A psychoanalytical reading of Girish Karnad's Naga-Mandala: Play with
a Cobra and Flowers: A Dramatic Monologue provides us with enough
scope and opportunity to explore and understand the human
unconscious that stores the psychic energy and motivates it to flow
through various levels of human psychology and enables the subject to
realize the pleasure through fantasy and avoid the pain through
repression thus empowering him or her with the ability to keep the libido
and other instinctive desires in check. Karnad's subjects become the very
battleground over which reality and fantasy lay their claim. In both the
plays Freud's pleasure-principle and reality principle come into a serious
conflict which is manifested and executed through the phallic object
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Labyrinth: Volume-6, No.4 October-2015
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 69-78
Media and Practices of Mediation:
Role of Activist Documentary
Films in Indian Mediasphere
- Sudhir Kumar Pandey & Manjari Johri
Abstract: After the Second World War, there has been a significant
increase in the production of documentary films. It comes under the
category of non-fiction films, because it engages with the reality of the
present time. Films in general and non-fiction films in particular have
always been a popular source of communication. This paper explores
the role of activist-documentary films in the present Indian sociopolitical environment. As a communication tool, it is well known that in
the moment of social crisis; films, magazines, and television become a
significant medium. Particularly, in the post-modern era, popular texts
such as film, television and newspapers work as a mediating agency
which reveals the system-supporting ideologies.
Keywords: activist documentary films, cultural texts, mediating
agency, system-supporting ideologies.
The present paper deliberates on the intersection of cultural texts and
social change through activist documentary films. Unlike the fiction
films, an activist documentary film uses camera as a tool for social justice
in terms of production, as well as, distribution. Its unique feature is the
use of citizens as content and medium. It employs sound and image to
capture and demonstrate strikes, protests, and harsh realities of the time.
Consequently, it creates an organization of citizens into instrumental
public— the mass audience.
What is a Documentary Film: The Definition?; A documentary film
epitomizes the real world. Veracity is the crux of a documentary film.
However, there has been a debate over the definition of documentary
film, whether it is the 'creative treatment of actuality' as Grierson puts it.
Grierson is believed to be the first one who used the term 'documentary'
for the first time. John Grierson, in First Principles of documentary, states
that 'the French who first used the term only meant travelogue (p.19)'.
For Grierson the distinguishable point of documentary films is the
natural material of which it is made. He defines the nature and functions
of documentary in three ways: first is that documentary photographs the
living scenes and the living story; second native actor and native scenes
add up to the originality which further provides 'a greater fund of
material; and the third is that 'the raw material' and 'spontaneous gesture'
have more real and screen value. It seems that for Grierson camera
occupies the central position. Nonetheless, this definition has been
criticized and modified by the documentary scholars; it is one of the most
famous definitions till date.
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Labyrinth: Volume-6, No.4 October-2015
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 79-90
Reviewing Chitrangada:
The Crowning Wish: An Exploration
of the Issues of Adaptation and Gendercrisis in Rituparno Ghosh's 2012-Film
- Arundhati Tarafdar
Abstract: Gender studies has spread its wings and has taken a flight to a
horizon of various possibility. Though it started with 'Feminism', but
with passing of time the term 'Queer' has been tagged with it.This paper
gives a glimpse of a gay, who fights vigorously with his inner and outer
self, fights with society and himself in search one's 'self'. This paper is a
juxtaposition of the issue of 'Adaptation' and the fight of a gay
personality in a society, where 'gay' and 'lesbian' are mere words taken as
taboo or as mere psychological disorders.
st
Keywords: Section 377 of Chapter XVI, postmodern 21 century
literature, 'Visva-sahitya' and 'Weltliteratur', my choice, androgynous,
nrityanatya, adaptation.
Foreword:
“My body, my mind, my choice; […]
My choice.To love temporarily or to last forever; [...]
My choice.To love a man, or a woman, or both; […]
My choices are like my finger prints, they make me unique; […]
I am the Universe, Infinite in every direction.
This is MY choice”
– Deepika Padukone 1
Even before specific explanations by the Austrian psychoanalyst
Sigmund Freud, wishes and desires have been considered by intellectuals
and common people alike to be an integral part of the workings of the
human psyche.The supreme importance of wishes and individualism has
also been upheld in the definition of the 'Fundamental Rights' in the
Constitution of India, which guarantee civil liberties to Indian citizens.
These liberties champion individual rights by including under their
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Women in Purdah: Representation
of Indian Women in Women's
Travel Writing in Colonial India
- Nurjahan Begum
Abstract: Representation of Indian women is one of the most
significant aspects of nineteenth century travel writing. The purdah
(seclusion) aroused great curiosities among colonizers and was often
the subject of numerous fantasies and speculations. Almost all the
women travel writers in their narratives have extensively discussed the
secluded life of Indian women. As women had privileged access to
Indian households, their values were of paramount significance in
forming popular opinion about women in India. In fact, stories of the
harems are the most desired information in most travel writing of the
nineteenth century. This paper is an attempt to look at the projection of
life of Indian women in the harem by women travel writers in Colonial
India, that is, to study the trajectories of everyday life that both these
writers highlights in their travelogues. The texts chosen for analysis are
–– Anne Elwood's Narratives of a Journey Overland (1830), Fanny Parks'
Wanderings of a Pilgrim in search of the Picturesque (1850), and Mary
Billington's Woman in India (1895).
Keywords: Representation, Harem, Seclusion, Women's Travel
writing, Colonial India
I
The aim of this paper is to examine the representation of Indian women
in the zenana in women's travel writing in colonial India. British women
working as journalists (for example Mary Billington), tourists (for
example Fanny Parks), social reformers (for example Mary Carpenter),
missionaries (for example Sara Tucker) as well as those in the roles of
mothers, wives, daughters and sisters played an important part in
establishing and forwarding the imperial project and in writing about
that project from their own different perspectives. It is noteworthy that
the gender of the author plays a vital role in shaping the way s/he views
foreign culture. The purdah aroused great curiosities among colonizers
and was often the subject of numerous fantasies and speculations. With
women alone having access to the zenana, their writings became an
important source of information about zenana life. For the British
women travel writers, one of the most remarkable aspects of Indian
women's lives was its preoccupation with the purdah, which was subject
to numerous fantasies, curiosities and myth-making, creating a divide
between the observers and the observed. Almost all the western women
travel writers have included discussions on the life of Indian women in a
zenana/harem. The texts chosen for analysis are –– Anne Elwood's
Narratives of a Journey Overland (1830), Fanny Parks' Wanderings of a
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From the Margins to the
Mainstream: Magical Realism and
the Creation of a Feminist Space
in Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye
- Vijay Kumar Rai
Abstract: In this paper it is my intention firstly to introduce and
discuss the genre or mode called magical realism. Secondly I intend to
analyse the text The Bluest Eye by Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison. I plan
to examine how this text fits into the tradition of magical realism. The
mode has been considered to be a subversive literary movement in the
postcolonial regions or the world and I intend to investigate whether
this nature of subversiveness has survived in the hands of this BlackAmerican author.The novel has been very successful and i will examine
whether it can be considered as containing subversive elements in it
from a feminist point of view or is it merely representation of how
marginal phenomena tend to move from the side lines to the centre.
Keywords: Magic Realism, Subversiveness, Feminist Space.
Magic realism is basically a postmodern mode, which has the subversive
nature and therefore feminism has acquired a space by shifting margins
to the centre in it. Its a genre where magic elements are a natural part in
an otherwise mundane, realistic environment. On the surface the story
has no clear magical attributes and everything is conveyed in a real
setting. Professor Matthew Strecher defines magic realism as, "what
happens when a highly detailed, realistic setting is invaded by something
too strange to believe." The term "magic realism" first appeared in the
context of art. The German art critic Franz Roh used it to describe the
work of post-Expressionist artists in the mid 1920s (Baker). To Roh,
magical realism (or Magischer Realismus) was a way of reacting to reality
and pictorially representing the mysteries inherent in it (Chanady, 17).
The term migrated across the Atlantic Ocean, and in Latin America in
the nineteen-forties it became a means of expressing the authentic
American mentality and developing an autonomous literature for the
continent. This has been commonly referred to as the Latin American
Boom of magical realism. Irene Guenther speculates that the effect of the
Second World War might have been crucial for the migration of the term
since many cultural luminaries travelled from Europe to South American
in the wake of those events (61). After the appearance of Angel Flores'
article on magical realism in 1955, the term became a concept in literary
criticism and has been applied to authors who have adopted certain
themes and techniques in their writing. Luis Leal also goes about
explaining magical realism:
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Julia Kristeva's “semiotic chora”
and its Subversive Potential
- Sonal Singhvi Choudhary
Abstract: Julia Kristeva considers “Poetry” to be “the privileged site of
analysis”. This statement of Kristeva is one that is loaded with meaning
as she draws upon the relationship between gender and language.
Adhering to the Poststructural theory, she begins with the premise that
gender difference dwells in language which is our tool for applying
meaning to the world. Kristeva is indebted to the poststructural
psychoanalyst Lacan for her theory of poetry because she believes that
the site at which psychological subjugation takes place and can be
investigated is “language”. Kristeva differs from Lacan in that she
reveals a “semiotic dimension” of language which exhibits a new poetic
maternal linguistic practice”. This paper attempts to analyze the
concept of the “semiotic” dimension of language as proposed by Julia
Kristeva, and how this new poetic maternal linguistic practice gives
women a voice in the phallocentric language of the “symbolic” order.
Keywords: gender, language, psychoanalysis, semiotic, symbolic,
phallocentric.
The paradoxical task of voicing the silence that has enveloped women
and their predicament for centuries is only possible if women write from
their own perspective. “Serious literature”, says Shashi Deshpande in
her essay “Writing from the Margin”, “is supposed to be written by men
about men; when women write, it is never regarded as just 'writing', it is
always 'women's writing'”. So when a woman writes, she cannot be just a
writer, she is always a woman writer. Deshpande raises the very pertinent
question in this essay, “Why is women's writing, specially when it deals
with women's lives, considered to be both insignificant and marginal?
What confers the badge of inferiority on women's writing? Why do we
have so many men disclaiming any interest in a woman's work? Are
women's lives and their works of interest only to other women? The
answer she says lies in the history of women. We live in a patriarchal
society, a patriarchal culture, which is in every way a man's world. The
laws, customs, practices and beliefs are therefore all designed to suit male
needs. So when women write from a female perspective it is considered
“minor”, “inferior”, and “trivial”. “Marginalization begins here, for
with this label one is steadily edged away from the group of writers in
general”(Deshpande 145). Very rarely have women been encouraged to
express themselves because in many respects women's lives, and
experiences have been assumed to be normative. Even if women's writing
was acknowledged it was done if it was in line with men's perspective.
Activities which occur in public are coined “important,” while private life
and feelings are less important. Even if women's writing was
acknowledged it was done if it was in line with men's perspective. And as
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Western Influence in Queen –
A Critical Study
- Ranveer
Abstract: Western culture with its different ingredients has greatly
influenced the film Queen. It is visible in the title, setting, story and
characters of the film. The rediscovery of Rani, the leading character of
the film is not something brought about because of her brief interaction
with western culture and atmosphere but as a result of her evolved inner
strength. Other characters are variously affected by this western
influence. Contradicting the popular belief concerning liberating
influence of western culture, most of these characters remain shackled
in their narrow prejudices despite remaining in touch with it (western
culture) for long.
Keywords: Western influence, Culture, Rediscovery, Interaction,
Intervention, Inner strength.
Considering the success and wide critical acclaim received by the movie
'Queen' it is beyond doubt that director Vikas Bahl must have put a
considerable thought and research into its making. There have been a
number of movies, which could become successful because of a foreign
and exotic setting in addition to other vital ingredients warranting this
success. Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge (DDLJ), Aa Ab Laut Chalein,
Pardesh, Love Aaj Kal and English Vinglish are some of the names that
prove the point. The filmmaker must have been enamored with adding
the element of foreignness and exotica keeping in mind the earlier trend.
John Desmond Bernal, famous scientist and writer observes in his essay
The World, the Flesh & the Devil (1929): “the present aristocracy of
western culture, at the moment when it most clearly dominates the
world, is being imitated rapidly and successfully in every eastern
country”. As far as this film is concerned this imitation is evident in more
than one ways – from the selection of the title to the setting of the film and
from story to selection of characters. The demand of the story of this
movie made it easier for the director to find a suitable foreign location for
the planned honeymoon of the planned marriage. We just cannot
question the choice of Paris and Amsterdam, the two hottest destinations
for honeymoon goers who can afford.We cannot even blame the director
for not choosing any other beautiful location in India as Vijay, the wouldbe-groom, a London return must have a lot to spend. Our (Indians')
mindset and colonial attitude of attributing all the charm, goodness and
wonder with everything foreign, particularly the West, must have also
been taken care of by the director. Then the story, having hardly any
elements of the so-called formula of masala movies, required to have
something of the exotica and foreignness to compensate. The choice of
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Ahdaf Soueif's The Map of Love:
Writing a Self-The Female Voice
- Papri Sultana
Abstract: In the novel The Map of Love, Ahdaf Soueif has portrayed a
living picture of a society where women are conquering the time and
space boundary. The bonding among women of different generations
and land are exposed throughout the novel. This novel concerns about
the comprehensibility of women among each other. Paperno (2004)
says, “scholars (…) can be judged based on their ability to deal with
diaries, which calls for attention to the form (or genre), context, and
individual subject simultaneously (573)”. These women, from this
perspective, are truly scholar as they have well dealt with the diaries and
have got the interpretation of their ancestor's life along with their own.
It is difficult for a person to be aware of all the movements taking place
within her; and it is of course inaccessible to external observers. A
person pays attention to only some aspects of this stream. And a person
can only provide some aspects of this stream to others. This paper gives
us the impression of such linguistic and emotional reading; and the
capability of interpretations of other women and self. This paper
focuses on the power of understanding and comprehensibility of
women and expression of women. It also discusses the reason, why it
has been done through the use of diary and letters conquering the
emotion, generations and time.
Keywords: Diary, letters, expression, comprehensibility, relationship,
feeling, thought, self and other.
Though not often taught in English literature courses, in Bangladesh,
Ahdaf Soueif's The Map of Love is an especially valuable text for exploring
female gender issues. Living away from her beloved husband along in
London she has spent a long time; from that time of her life until her
death, Anna wrote constantly. However, most of her writing is not only
about the life she is living or experiencing but also about what is
occurring outside there in the war. She has also written about the impact
of these wars in her life. We have seen how she has lost her first husband,
Edward in the war of Sudan. Though he came back live from there, he
was not healthy. He imprisoned himself and it was not very long that he
lived after he was back from Sudan. Anna also lost her second husband,
Sharif, in a bomb blast in Egypt. In The Map of Love, the reader witnesses
the unfolding of female self as Anna navigate from the known life of her
youth and comfort of companionship towards a much more complex
female persona of self-questioning and self-censorship. Freud has
designed of a psychoanalytical setting which is meant to facilitate the
externalization of the stream of thought. In this process, the person lies
down and talks to an unseen analyst sitting behind her. This is meant to
lower her level of self-consciousness which helps her to express as closely
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Indian Womanhood: A Picture of
Freedom and Fear in
R.K. Narayan's The Dark Room
- Prashant Mahajan & Pragyaa Gupta
Abstract: This paper is an attempt to study freedom and fear in the
women characters of the novel, The Dark Room. Here, Narayan draws
the poignant picture of a middle class south Indian domesticity run by
an irritable husband. It is a tale of a tormented wife, Savitri. She is a true
symbol of traditional Indian womanhood.
Keywords: R.K. Narayan, Indian Womanhood, Domesticity.
R.K. Narayan is one of the greatest of Indian writers of English. He
occupies remarkable position among the top ranking Indian novelists in
English, for his great achievements. About the writings of the novel in
India as a literary phenomenon, K.R.S. Iyengar says:
For the novel, properly so called, we have to wait till the latter half of
nineteenth century when the Western impact on India's cultural front
has resulted among other things in the development of formal written
prose in the regional languages, first as a financial and presented as an
artistic medium. (314)
R.K. Narayan is the most artistic of the Indian writers; his sole aim
begins to give aesthetic satisfaction, and not to use his art as a medium to
serve some social purpose. He gives the reader a picture that strikes him
as typical of everyday reality. His picture of life is always true to facts. The
Dark Room, published in 1938, is the third novel of R.K. Narayan, which
did not receive much appreciation. It is entreated only on the plight of
women locked up within the confines of an orthodox society. In the novel
there are many interesting aspects as the concept of Indian atmosphere
and reality. But this paper is an attempt to study freedom and fear in the
women characters of the novel. In the novel, Narayan draws the poignant
picture of a middle class south Indian domesticity run by an irritable
husband. It is a tale of a tormented wife, Savitri. Ramani, the office
secretary of Engladia Insurance Company, is very domineering in his
ways, and hence governs his home according to his own sweet will. Savitri
is a true symbol of traditional Indian womanhood. All goes well, till there
arrives at the scene a beautiful lady, Shanta Bai, who is able to seduce
Ramani. Ramani is attracted by her beauty. This upsets the peace of his
domestic life, till seeing no way of correcting her husband, Savitri revolts
against him and leaves the house to commit suicide. She goes to the river
and throws herself into it. But the blacksmith, Mari, saves her. Persuaded
by Mari's wife Ponni, she goes to their village and lives upon an
independent living of her own by working in temple. The feeling of home
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Search for Identity and
Independence in
A House for Mr. Biswas
- Swarupananda Chatterjee
Abstract: This article tries to explore the different struggles of the
protagonist, in Naipaul's The House for Mr. Biswas to achieve his aim in a
diasporic world of West Indies.
Keywords: Diasporic fiction, Identity, colonization.
Among the issues, then, treated in A House for Mr. Biswas is the problem
of geographical uprooting of peoples and the results of culture contact.
Each uprooting brings a farther weakening of traditional forces- a
problem faced by all racial groups in the west Indies and which raises
the constant dilemma of identity -Maureen Warner Lewis (102)
V.S. Naipaul was born is an age the principle doctrine of which was
composed of dislocation and rootlessness. The works of many famous
writers of that age was prevailed by a sense of alienation, isolation and the
crisis of identity. V.S. Naipaul was a descendant of an Indian emigrant to
Trinidad. He had a strong revulsion towards the multiracial character of
the society of Trinidad and as well as to his caste-ridden Hindu heritage.
So he had a destabilized ethnic-identity and simultaneously the
subconscious anxiety of enslavement of the family of an indentured
labour. This created in his pen a strong desire for a stable identity and
independence. The protagonist of his magnum opus A House for Mr.
Biswas –Mr. Mohun Biswas-suffers from spiritual and existential
colonization and his character portrays a rebel's struggle for freedom and
a dignified identity. This article tries to explore the different struggles of
the protagonist to achieve his aim in a diasporic world of West Indies.
Mr. Biswas was born is an unpropitious moment with a deformity of
being six-fingered. His desire for a secure, private space called home
leads him to a life-long struggle. He is actually an ugly, Comic, improper
yet venerable, jeopardized yet undaunted man. But in spite of these he
becomes the unusual hero of A House for Mr. Biswas mainly for his being
the quintessential 'everyman'. He has limited capabilities and resources
nevertheless with his indomitable spirit he fights his best to establish his
dignity and identity. His struggle to achieve a permanent home is an
exposure of his search for freedom and identity to retain his individuality.
Mr. Biswas's sense of homelessness and subserviency, the subject of this
paper, is inherited by him from his preceding generations who had
migrated from India to the West Indian World of Trinidad. He lost his
father in his early childhood. So he had to live a life of dishonor and his
self-respect as well as his identity is threatened at every moment from his
first encounter with the outside world of adversity up to his premature
death with a burden of debt.Yet finally he gains a house of his own though
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Feminism in the Novels of
Shashi Deshpande
- Rashmi Jain
Abstract: Feminism is a movement or call for liberation of women
from certain forms of gender based discrimination which deprives
women of opportunities of self promotion and equality. Shashi
Deshpande a Sahitya Akademi awardee explores suppression,
domination and restrictions on women at every step of life but when self
realization dawns upon them, it gives voice, a hope to the protagonist.
Her novels like That Long Silence, The Dark Holds no Terror, Roots and
Shadows, A Matter of Time, Binding Vine and others express feministic
views. Indu of Roots and Shadows, Jaya of That Long Silence and Saru of
The Dark Holds no Terror exhibits the position of women in India. They
are educated but stress on education is only to get a good match for
them. It is expected from them to be a good daughter, wife, daughter in- law but nobody cares for the real person in them. The inner struggle
and suffering of new middle class women is exposed. Their alienation
and question of identity is evoked. Towards the climax all the three
protagonist i.e. Indu, Jaya and Saru revolts against the conventions of
society to assert their identity and individuality.
Keywords: Feminism, Patriarchy, identity, alienation, self-realization
Feminism is a movement or call for liberation of women from certain
forms of gender based discrimination which deprives women of
opportunities of self promotion and equality. The epoch-making work of
Feminism is Mary Wollstonecraft's Vindication of rights of Women and
Simone de Beauvoir's Second Sex. Indian novelists were influenced by
western movement of feminism and tried to project feminine emotions,
sentiments and consciousness in their works. Shashi Deshpande a
Sahitya Akademi awardee explores suppression, domination and
restrictions on women at every step of life and their searching for
individual identity. When self realization dawns upon them, they break
all the bondages and silence which also showcases a glimpse of hope. Her
important works includes That Long Silence, The Dark Holds no Terror,
Roots and Shadows, A Matter of Time, Binding Vine and others. Shashi
Deshpande's That Long Silence, The Dark Holds no Terror, Roots and
Shadows exposes the patriarchal social system in India which refers to the
autocratic rule of male head in the family and subordination of female.
Sociologist Sylvia Walby has designed six overlapping structure to define
patriarchy “that takes different forms in different cultures and different
times: First the state: women are unlikely to have formal power and
representation. Second, the household: women are more likely to do the
house work and raise the children. Third, Violence: women are more
prone to being abused. Fourth, Paidwork : women are likely to be paid
less. Fifth, Sexuality: women's sexuality is more likely to be treated
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Songs of Baul A Strategic
Essentialism Surrogates over
The 19th Century Hegemonized
Societal Format
- Auritra Munshi
Abstract: Bauls, an esoteric group of people vacillating from place to
place having no cultural moorings is totally different in terms of their
attire and attitude which invariably essentialises the otherness of them.
The essence of their activity is to strive for the ultimate reality which
can be achieved by self-realisation having a close rapport with sahajiya
principle redolent with Tagorian concept of Monermanush. Though
owing to their grotesque nature of exposing voices they have been
categorized as Samprodai or heretic but still they tried to topple such
discursive metaphor with a great resistance to the socalled colonial
induced Bhadralok or babu sampraday who sought to occlude their
voices by representing the Bauls. But bauls have forged their alternative
voices against the hegemonic social formations.
Keywords: Baul songs, subaltern; everyday resistance, hegemony,
Permanent Settlement and colonial Bengal
The Bauls belong to the lower ranks of both the Hindus and Muslim
communities of Bengal and they are composed partly of the
householders and mainly of wandering mendicants. The word 'Baul'
with its hindi variant 'Baur' may be variously derived. It may be derived
from the Sanskrit word 'vatula' (affected by wind diseases i.e., crazy),
from 'Vyakula' (impatiently eager). Both these derivations are consistent
with the apparent lifestyle of the Bauls which denotes a group of inspired
mystics with an ecstatic eagerness for a spiritual life beyond the shackles
of scriptures and religious institutions. The name 'Baul', as also its
cognate form 'Aul' can well be associated also with the Arabic word
'awliya'(Plural of 'wali', a word originally meaning 'near' which is used for
'friend' or 'devotee') that refers to a group of perfect mystics.
Bauls actually debunk the institutional religion where natural piety of
soul is eclipsed by the useless paraphernalia of ritualism and ceremony
on the one hand and pedantry and hypocrisy on the other. 'Ulto sadhan
'or reverse journey becomes the motto of their lives which actually
denotes their wistful lingering to realize their own selves which is
'sahajiya' or inborn in nature. So they sing
'Reverse are the modes and manners | Of the man who is a real
lover | Of the true emotional life. '
So to return to ones ownself or sahajiya is the natural path to attain
ultimate reality. To conform to the emotional approach of the bauls, the
sahaja or the ultimate reality has gradually been transformed into a
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Widows and Women: Soueif's
Presentation of Women and
Widows in The Map of Love
- Mir Mohammad Tonmoy
Abstract: In her novel The Map of Love, Ahdaf Soueif has created
women and widow characters with a better understanding that a writer
could ever do. Generally widows are thought to be a kind of stereotype
who always mourn the loss of their husband.They are also expected not
to have any other feelings and desires. But in Soueif's writing there is
empathy and sympathy for these women. For her widows are similar
alike other women. According to her novel, they have equal
independence and right to live there life as much as other women have.
That is why all prominent characters of this novel, The Map of Love, are
women. These women characters are created with as much diversity as
possible. These women characters are considerate and concerned
about each other. They have a kind of bonding with the writer as well.
However, Soueif has tried to establish the women's and widow's place
in the society through the novel.
Keywords: women, inherence, sympathy, society, bonding
Ahdaf Soueif'sThe Map of Love, is one of her prominent piece of writings
where we see insightful representation of women. This gives us an
opportunity to perceive women in the society with a wider range of
prospect. Soueif has focused on the condition of women from
multicultural zone. She has also put up the position of women in the
society and their expectations and dissatisfaction. She has also talked
about the social desire and personal desire and their ultimate
achievement. In this novel, she particularly focuses on women in
widowhood.Two prominent characters of this novel Anna Winterbourne
and Amal go through widowhood. Widows are viewed as suspect in all
culture because they do not conform to patriarchal idea of the standard
women. According to this ideology they are the women who have lost
their husband and also lost all rights to live their lives. They are not
supposed to have any feelings or desires anymore. They are just expected
to invisible to society and yet submissive to the patriarchal laws and
regulations. As Kehler comments:
But like their real-life counterparts, literary widows regardless of age
are inherently embedded within a specific and individual set of
political, social, and economic circumstances. Ideological preceptors,
whether in the name of morality or decorum, were prone to ignore the
particular circumstances that each widow faced. Rather, they lay down
rules and made value judgments as if widows were a monolithic
abstraction.(2)
To show how similar the patriarchal ideology is in all countries and
culture Ahdaf Soueif has created most of her writing on the contact zone.
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Indian Youth Perceptions and
attitudes towards Homosexuality A Qualitative Study
- Ruhi Jadhav
Abstract: Homosexuality has existed for generations in the human
society yet normative culture legitimizes only heterogeneous sexuality
while homosexuality or bisexuality are deemed as an aberration. With
the Indian society being predominantly homophobic and political
persuasion being highly contingent upon 'public sentiment',
understanding attitudes and sentiments of the people, particularly the
youth, toward homosexuality becomes an important aspect in
analyzing resistance or acceptance of homosexuals in our society. The
overarching objective of this micro-level study is to explore the Indian
youth perceptions and attitudes toward homosexuality. This research
into the broad theme of homosexuality was attempted as a qualitative
study to be able to do a fine grained thematic analysis as a way of
developing deeper appreciation of the content.
Keywords: homosexuality, youth, Indian society
1.1 Introduction: Adolescence is that period of time of emerging
sexuality where one's feelings, identities and behaviors become more
pronounced. Homosexualism is a behavior or a phenomenon in which
persons of the same sex are attracted or have sexual relations with each
other. Such a behavior has existed for generations in the human society
yet normative culture legitimizes only certain a sexuality
(heterogeneous) while others such as homosexuality or bisexuality are
deemed as an aberration. We perceive ourselves to be living in an era of
heightened self-awareness and individualism, and yet when a certain
section of society with non-heterosexual feelings, identities, or behaviors
choose to conform to their sexual orientation we create an unwelcoming
environment for them. American Psychological Association reports that
“verbal harassment and abuse are nearly universal experiences among
lesbian, gay, and bisexual people and that discrimination against lesbian,
gay, and bisexual people in employment and housing appears to remain
widespread” 1. Such discrimination and unequal treatment calls into
question the notion of natural rights or more appropriately, human
rights. Homosexual intercourse in India was treated as an offence,
punishable by law, under the Indian Penal Code 1860 until 2009 when
this law was struck down by the Delhi High Court. The Delhi High
Court judges commented that the 148 year old ban that denied gay rights
was an “affront to human dignity” and that “it cannot be forgotten that
discrimination is antithesis of equality and that it is the recognition of
equality which will foster dignity of every individual.” 2 Although the lift
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Post-colonialism
and Indian Literature
- Farhana Sayeed
Abstract: The purpose of this research paper is to highlight the
importance of Indian tradition and culture in response to the
Macaulay's Minutes on Indian Education in 1835 (period of
colonization) by taking the examples from Bhatrhari's Vakyapadiya,
Bharat's Natyasastra, Bhamaha's Kavyalankara etc. It would not be
exaggeration if we say that a single shelf of Indian classics is worth the
whole European literature.It is debated that post-colonialism provides
a means of defiance by which any exploitative and discriminative
practices, regardless of time and space, can be challenged. The paper
discusses various experiences of anti-slavery and anti-colonial
movements in India comprising the development of post-colonialism.
The paper consists of a section where in a discussion of the elements
that functioned as justification of humanitarianism, democracy and
culture in colonial and post-colonial India in context of linguistic
colonialism through several eminent texts of Indian writers, followed
by a reflection on the concept of “hybrid identities”.
Keywords: Post-Colonialism, Indian literature, Macaulay's minutes
on Indian Education.
In order to define Post-Colonialism it is necessary to understand
Colonialism first. Colonialism is the establishment, upholding,
possession and extension of colonies in one terrain by people from
another terrain. It is a process whereby the metropole claims sovereignty
over the colony, and the social structure, government, and economics of the
colony are altered by colonizers from the metropole. Colonialism is a set
of lopsided relationships between the metropolis and the colony; and
between the colonists and the indigenous population. Most of the
indigenous people were oppressed and enslaved by the ruling power. At
the same time, they were forced to give up their cultural heritage and to
assimilate the colonizers' culture. This strategy, which is also known as
culture colonization, was supposed to manipulate the colonized people's
minds. Most of the colonial powers tried to integrate their language, the
major aspect of their civilised culture, in foreign societies. Language and
literature have always been used as a powerful tool by colonisers in the
process of colonisation. For example, in India the Aryans and Moghuls
came to the sub-continent; established their rule and settled down over
the area for a long time. Both the Aryans and the Moghuls produced their
literature in their own languages like the Vedas, the Upanishads, etc in
Sanskrit. In fact, the Moghuls created a new language, Urdu, in this subcontinent. Though they colonized at the beginning and settled down in
India. Did their literature sustain its impact? Similarly the British and the
other Europeans like French and Portugese came to India as colonizers
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Labyrinth: Volume-6, No.4 October-2015
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 166-171
Social-Economic Conditions of
The Contemporary Deori Women
of Assam in India
- Guptajit Pathak
Abstract: IDifferent Studies on women's questions now exist all over
the globe. These issues have newly caught the concentration of many
and have expanded impact in the academy through student and faculty
activism. A variety of issues interrelated to women have been evolving
in the feminist movement in India from the demand of changing socioeconomic values and demands. In nineteenth century for the first time
the women's issues comes to the front position. Social reformers all over
the country explained deep apprehension for women issues for
example sati, child marriage, female infanticide, widowhood, purdah,
education, polygamy and so on. Different scholars have been focusing
critical explanation on women's position in the nineteenth century.
From the early twentieth century women's unions began to form and a
special category of women activities was constructed. It is noted that
from the first decades of the twentieth century, the verbalization of
women's topics was based on liberal ideologies of equality in each
meadow of society. A mixture of works is going on through out the
academia on women's concerns. Although a hub from a verity of
viewpoint is needed when we talk of the problems connected to tribal
women, as it differs a bit in there nature. While the condition of tribal
women in India has been recognized as being better than that of their
non tribal counterparts, in actual fact, these meticulous women are
deprived of social and economic autonomy in lots of respect. The
proposed Research Project is an effort to highlight the different socioeconomic conditions of Deori women, who form one of the weakest
sections of the society in Assam and Arunachal Pradesh.
Keywords: Contemporary, Deori Women, Assam, India, Ethnic,Tribe
Introduction: Deori is one of the foremost ethnic tribes in Assam and
Arunachal Pradesh. The Deori community has its own Society, culture
and traditions which are hidden treasures for the Anthropologies,
sociologists and the Researchers. The Deoris were originally priests and
worshippers and depended mostly on agriculture for their livelihood.In
North-East India the Deoris are identified as well civilized people. They
have their own language to converse amongst themselves. History states
that the Deori language was the original language in the Chutaan
kingdom before the reign of the Ahomes in Assam they worship kundi
Mana (Shiva-Parvati) and hence fall under Hinduism by default.Deori
women contributed whole heartedly towards Society, culture, language,
literature and economic status for the making of entire Assamese culture.
They have century long culture and tradition. It is important that the
Deori women have something more peculiarities which may have been a
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An Indian English Poem:
The Use of Stylistics in
Innovative Teaching
- Ashok P. Khairnar
Abstract: This paper attempts to demonstrate the appreciation
procedure of a poem through its critical textual analysis. The stress of
the textual scrutiny is on the use of lexical items in a poem.Word classes
like adjectives, pronouns and other content classes are analysed in
terms of their length, sound pattern and structural design and in
respect of the grammatical features like articles, tenses and others. The
balanced and parallel constructions and the rhymes are studied
minutely. The poem 'Father Returning Home' by Dilip Chitre is a
comment on the dull, drab routine of an alien in the city life of Mumbai.
This idea is conveyed through the use of the length and completeness of
the lines.Various devices have been mathematically assessed in order to
display the use of Stylistics in literary appreciation. The paper brings
out the fact that mechanics of stylistic analysis enhance the pleasure of
enjoying a poem. It is a practical lesson that uses the art and science of
stylistics.
Keywords: lexical items, stylistics, appreciation, balance, parallelism,
structure-length, rhyme, imagery, symbolical suggestiveness, critical
analysis, textual scrutiny.
Stylistics is a branch of modern linguistics “devoted to the detailed
analysis of literary style or of the linguistic choices made by speakers and
writers in non- literary contexts”(Baldick 215). Stylistics makes a
rigorous and systematic study of the language of a text and enables a
reader to appreciate its meaning in its totality. But this basic assumption
is often questioned by critics of stylistics. Gower opposes any literary
stylistic analysis of literature and he “considers it to be too mechanistic
and cerebral in operation and maintains that instead of helping readers
appreciate literature, a stylistic analysis actually impedes the whole
process of reading and appreciating literature”(Misra 47).But Gower's
criticism of the use of literary stylistics in the study of literature is difficult
to accept because the analysis of the different parts of a literary text
following a literary stylistics model is never an end in itself. On the other
hand it enhances the appreciation of the aesthetic qualities of the text.
Literary stylistic analysis offers the necessary tools to understand the
aesthetic qualities of a text. Lexis is considered as a starting point for the
study of the nature of language and a study of the ways lexical items are
patterned in a poem offers the reader valuable clues to the meaning of the
poem. Stylistic analysis enhances our appreciation of the artistic quality
of the poem. The present paper attempts to make stylistic analysis of
'Father Returning Home' by Dilip Chitre.
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Depiction of Devotional Songs as
Borgeets: The Wonder of Assam
- Azizur Rahman Sarkar
Abstract: While talking about the devotional songs of India we have to
talk about the 'Borgeets' of Assam. 'Borgeets' the magnitude of Assam
and is the compilation of lyrical songs that are set to specific ragas but
not necessarily to any 'Tala'. These songs, composed by Srimanta
Sankardeva and Madhavdeva in the 15th-16th centuries, are used to
begin prayer services in monasteries related with the Ekasaran Naan
Dharma.
Keywords: Borgeets, Assam, devotional song, Sankardeva,
Madhavdeva
'Borgeets' composed by Srimanta Sankardeva and Madhavdeva in the
15th-16th centuries, are used to begin prayer services in monasteries
related with the Ekasaran Naan Dharma. They go to the range of Music
of Assam outer the spiritual background. They are a lyrical strain that
eloquent the spiritual feelings of the poets responding to special
conditions, and vary from other lyrics connected with the Ekasarana
Dharma. Comparable songs composed by others are not generally
considered Borgeets. The Borgeets are written in the Pada form of rhyme.
The first Pada, noticed as Dhrung, works as desist and is repeated over
the path of praying of the following verses. In the last couplet, the name
of the poet is normally stated. The construction of Borgeets is said to
replica the songs of 8-10th century Charyapada.
It is noted that, the first Borgeet was composed by Srimanta Sankardeva
for the duration of his first pilgrimage at Badrikashram in c1488, which is
contemporary to the birth of Dhrupad in the court of Man Singh Tomar
(1486-1518) of Gwalior. The name Borgeet, commonly submits to a
particular set of devotional songs. Shankardeva and Madhavdeva
highlighted their songs as 'Geet' only. The adjectival prefix 'Bar', sense
grand or superior, must have been a later respectful addition by their
pious followers, which might stand upon the harmonious splendor of the
songs also. Shrimanta Shankardeva, the resourceful genius, even though
primarily referred to as the advocate of Vaishnavism in Assam, was
fundamentally a community reformer. For the cause of the sociocultural inequality and immorality that had been crippling the society in
the name of religion (Barnashram Dharma and Tantrik Buddhism), he
upheld Vaishnavism as a superior option before the human. In this arena,
religion was not his chief agenda. He highlighted at changing the society
from side to side an inclusive cultural revolution by increasing the art and
music of Assam and gave religion as a creative shape by declaring the
leading of Shravana and Kirtana among the nine types of Bhakti.
Srimanta Sankardeva had his artistic creations, particularly dance,
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Deconstructing the African
American Womanhood: A Critical
Analysis of the Recalcitrant Black
woman in Alice Childress's
Wine in the Wilderness
- N.Vijayalakshmi & Soumya Jose
Abstract: The doubly marginalized African American women are
always portrayed as stereotypes in the plays of mainstream playwrights.
The real identity of the African American women has been brought to
the limelight by the emergence of women playwrights. The present
paper makes an attempt to analyse how Alice Childress projects the
identity of black women which was unknown to the American society
and the world in general. The resilient protagonist springs out as a real
African queen and she edifies the myopic African American characters
in the play.
Keywords: stereotype, marginalization, grass roots, black
womanhood, “lost” women
The relations between the sexes govern the network of relations in the
black community. On the basic union between man and woman rests the
cohesion of the family and, more important, the nation. The theatre
explores the experience and sentiments of blacks through two poles of
sensibility and consciousness, the masculine and the feminine, which
create and sustain life. At the core of the conflict of drama lies the contest
between man and woman, either as parents or as mutual antagonists or
complements. (Fabre 137-38) African American theatre portray the
dogged determination, resilience, struggles, marginalization and the
“real identity”of the African Americans. The concurrent African
American theatre has emerged from the National Black Theatre.
National Black Theatre is described as the “Temple of Liberation,
designed to preserve, maintain and perpetuate the richness of the black
life-style”(qtd in Harris 85). Theatre has always been a medium for the
African Americans to express their real entity as opposed to the African
American characters portrayed in the plays of mainstream playwrights.
The African American women are not given due space in the plays
written by African American male playwrights. The emergence of
African American women playwrights have given voices and space to the
doubly marginalised African American women. The mainstream
playwrights have most of the time depicted stereotype black characters.
Black women are portrayed as adulteresses, mammies and having an
erotic demeanour. African American women playwrights have made an
optimum use of theatre as a tool to highlight the “real identity” of the
186
Our Esteemed Contributors
Ÿ Bir Singh Yadav, Associate Professor, Department of English,
Central University of Haryana, Mahendergarh, Haryana.
Ÿ Sujatha Aravindakshan, Assistant Professor, Department of
English, Jazan University, KSA.
Ÿ Almee Raza, Assistant Professor, Department of English, Isabella
Thoburn College, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh.
Ÿ Muhammed Sobhi Salama, Assistant Professor, Department of
English, Jazan University, KSA.
Ÿ Krishna Singh, Professor & Head, Department of English and
Ÿ
Ÿ
Ÿ
Ÿ
Ÿ
Ÿ
Ÿ
Ÿ
Ÿ
Ÿ
Ÿ
Ÿ
Ÿ
Foreign Languages, Indira Gandhi National Tribal University,
Amarkantak, Madhya Pradesh.
Mriganka Sekhar Sarma, PhD Scholar, Department of
Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Delhi.
A. Sharada, Associate Professor, Department of English, Vignan
University,Vadlamudi, Guntur, Andhra Pradesh.
N. Usha, Head of Department of English, Krishna University,
Machilipatnam, Andhra Pradesh.
Abhinandan Malas, Assistant Professor and Head, Department of
English, Shishuram Das College(CU),West Bengal.
Sudhir Kumar Pandey, Faculty, English and Communication,
B.K.M.I.B.A., Ahmedabad University, Ahmedabad, Gujarat.
Manjari Johri, Assistant Professor, Amity School of Languages,
Amity University, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh.
Arundhati Tarafdar, M.A. Student, Department of English,
Central University of Rajasthan, Bandarsindri, Kishangarh, Ajmer,
Rajasthan.
Nurjahan Begum, Research Scholar, Department of English &
Foreign Language, Tezpur University (A Central University), Tezpur,
Assam.
Vijay Kumar Rai, Research Scholar, Department of English,
D.D.U. Gorakhpur University, Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh.
Sonal Singhvi Choudhary, Assistant Professor, Department of
English Govt. Benazeer Science and Commerce College, Bhopal,
Madhya Pradesh.
Ranveer, Research Scholar, Department of English, Guru Gobind
Singh Indraprastha University, New Delhi.
Papri Sultana, Teaching Assistant, BRAC Institute of Languages,
BRAC University, Bangladesh.
Prashant Mahajan, Department of P.G. Studies and Research in
English, Rani Durgavati Vishvavidyalaya, Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh.
207
208 Labyrinth | Vol.6 No.4 (October 2015)
Ÿ Pragyaa Gupta, Department of P.G. Studies and Research in
English, Rani Durgavati Vishvavidyalaya, Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh.
Ÿ Swarupananda Chatterjee, UGC-NET, Assistant Teacher, Pasara
Pitulsha High School,Tamluk, Purba Medinipur,West Bengal.
Ÿ Rashmi Jain, Research Scholar, Department of English and MEL
University of Allahabad, Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh.
Ÿ Auritra Munshi, Research scholar, Department of English,
University of North Bengal,West Bengal.
Ÿ Mir Mohammad Tonmoy, Senior Lecturer, Department of
English, Southeast University, Bangladesh.
Ÿ Ruhi Jadhav, Research Officer B.R. Amedkar Research & Training
Institute (BARTI), An Autonomous organization under the
Department of Social Justice and Special Assistance, Government of
Maharashtra, Pune, Maharashtra.
Ÿ Farhana Sayeed, Ph.d Scholar, BPS Mahilavishwavidyala,
Khanpur Kalan, Sonipat, Haryana.
Ÿ Guptajit Pathak, Assistant Professor, Department of History,
Kanya Mahavidyalaya, Affiliated to Gauhati University, Guwahati.
Ph. D. Research Scholar, Department of Women's Studies, Magadh
University, Bodh Gaya, Bihar.
Ÿ Ashok P. Khairnar, Principal and Head, Department of English,
Adarsh College of Arts, Nizampur, Sakri, Dhule, Maharashtra.
Ÿ Azizur Rahman Sarkar, Assistant Professor, Department of
Assamese, Bilasipara College, Bilasipara, Dhubri. Ph. D. Research
Scholar, Department of Assamese, Visva-Bharati
University,
Santiniketan, Bolpur,West Bengal.
Ÿ N. Vijayalakshmi, Research Scholar, Department of English,
School of Social Sciences and Languages VIT University, Vellore,
Tamil Nadu.
Ÿ Soumya Jose, Assistant Professor Department of English, VIT
University,Vellore,Tamil Nadu.
Ÿ N.D. Dani, Associate Professor, Department of English, Sri Jai
Narain Postgraduate College, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh.
Ÿ Sayantan Pal Chowdhury, UGC-NET qualified, Assistant
Teacher, Siliguri Baradakanta Vidyapith (HS),West Bengal.
Ÿ I.K. Sarma, Former Professor & Chairman, Department of English,
University of Rajasthan, Jaipur, Rajasthan.
Other Esteemed Contributor/s are on the Editorial Board of Labyrinth.