Looking back in anger: multiculturalism, ethnicity, and the commodification of university space in Ouyang Yu’s The Eastern Slope Chronicle

Bhattacharya, S. (2012) Looking back in anger: multiculturalism, ethnicity, and the commodification of university space in Ouyang Yu’s The Eastern Slope Chronicle. Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities, 4(2), pp. 163-171.

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Abstract

The proposed paper attempts to investigate the nuanced layers of multiculturalism and ethnicity in Australia through the lens of the Chinese-Australian writer, Ouyang Yu. His novel, The Eastern Slope Chronicle, written from the perspective of a student’s cooperation with the term ‘postcolonial’, throws a compulsive doubt on the celebration of multiculturalism. Whereas the novel deals with central ‘postcolonial’ questions like nationhood, political relation between countries, repatriation, violence, and immigrant identity, its unabridged and cut-and-dried presentation of the corporate packaging of terms like multicultural and postcolonial or the body of the diasporic student as the product of study and university research invites more critical thoughts on university space, the category of international student or the commodification of feelings like love, emotion and soul. In a way, it seeks the irony and economy of ‘affect’ in a supposedly ‘postcolonial’ novel.

Item Type:Articles
Status:Published
Refereed:Yes
Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID:Bhattacharya, Dr Sourit
Authors: Bhattacharya, S.
College/School:College of Arts & Humanities > School of Critical Studies > English Literature
Journal Name:Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities
Publisher:AesthetixMS: Aesthetics Media Services
ISSN:0975-2935
ISSN (Online):0975-2935
Copyright Holders:Copyright © 2012 Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities
First Published:First published in Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities 4(2): 163-171
Publisher Policy:Reproduced under a Creative Commons License

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