| In Stereotype: South Asia in the Global Literary Imaginary Contributor(s): Chakravorty, Mrinalini (Author) |
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ISBN: 023116596X ISBN-13: 9780231165969 Publisher: Columbia University Press OUR PRICE: $64.35 Product Type: Hardcover - Other Formats Published: September 2014 |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Literary Criticism | Asian - Indic - Literary Criticism | Semiotics & Theory - History | Asia - India & South Asia |
| Dewey: 891.4 |
| LCCN: 2013040700 |
| Series: Literature Now |
| Physical Information: 1.1" H x 6.3" W x 9" (1.15 lbs) 336 pages |
| Themes: - Cultural Region - Indian |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: In Stereotype confronts the importance of cultural stereotypes in shaping the ethics and reach of global literature. Mrinalini Chakravorty focuses on the seductive force and explanatory power of stereotypes in multiple South Asian contexts, whether depicting hunger, crowdedness, filth, slums, death, migrant flight, terror, or outsourcing. She argues that such commonplaces are crucial to defining cultural identity in contemporary literature and shows how the stereotype's ambivalent nature exposes the crises of liberal development in South Asia. In Stereotype considers the influential work of Salman Rushdie, Aravind Adiga, Michael Ondaatje, Monica Ali, Mohsin Hamid, and Chetan Bhagat, among others, to illustrate how stereotypes about South Asia provide insight into the material and psychic investments of contemporary imaginative texts: the colonial novel, the transnational film, and the international best-seller. Probing circumstances that range from the independence of the Indian subcontinent to poverty tourism, civil war, migration, domestic labor, and terrorist radicalism, Chakravorty builds an interpretive lens for reading literary representations of cultural and global difference. In the process, she also reevaluates the fascination with transnational novels and films that manufacture global differences by staging intersubjective encounters between cultures through stereotypes. |
Contributor Bio(s): Chakravorty, Mrinalini: - Mrinalini Chakravorty is associate professor of English at the University of Virginia. She is the author of In Stereotype: South Asia in the Global Literary Imaginary (Columbia University Press, 2014). I selected Chakravorty for her expertise in South Asian literature, particularly among a global audience. |