From cannibals to radicals: Towards a theory of exoticism.
Item
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Title
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From cannibals to radicals: Towards a theory of exoticism.
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Identifier
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AAI9000019
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identifier
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9000019
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Creator
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Celestin, Roger.
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Contributor
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Adviser: Vincent Crapanzano
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Date
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1989
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Literature, Comparative | Anthropology, Cultural | Literature, Romance | Literature, Caribbean
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Abstract
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Exoticism, a term that designates an already crystalized concept in 19th century Europe, is used here as an analytical tool to explore a more generic phenomenon: the representation of the foreign in Western literature. This displacement raises a problem: can we apply the term exoticism to texts such as V. S. Naipaul's An Area of Darkness or Roland Barthes' L'empire des signes, a term that both authors would themselves disclaim? Further: the attempt is to arrive at a "theory of exoticism" but, rather than limit itself to 19th century Europe where the term is extensively and specifically applied, this analysis also focuses on Renaissance, Enlightenment, and post-War representations of the foreign in Western texts.;This study proposes that although the term exoticism is already invested with a set of connotations that seem to confine it in an already delineated period and place, it nevertheless contains the essential characteristics of what constitutes the more generic representation of otherness in Western texts: a hovering between two tendencies that can be summarized as exemplification and experimentation. The first, a tendency to inscribe the foreign as an exemplar against the background of Center-elaborated systems, a background against which the Other, at the extreme of that tendency, ultimately disappears. The second, a tendency that is stamped by the individual will to explore the foreign, thus discovering (or recovering) material that confirms individuality rather than illustrate systems; paradoxically, at its extreme, this tendency sometimes results in the "loss of self" or "merging with the Other" that is sometimes referred to as "madness.".;This study examines the two tendencies by focusing on what can be called the aporia of exoticism (which is also the more generic aporia of representation in general): to what extent can a Western subject represent a foreign subject without automatically producing exoticism, that is, without eliminating himself and without eliminating the subject of his discourse.;The works used: Montaigne's "Des cannibales" and "Des coches," Diderot's Supplement au voyage de Bougainville, Flaubert's Salammbo, Barthes' L'empire des signes, and Naipaul's non-fiction. Naipaul's work appears as a break in the French tradition this study focuses on, and poses the question of the limits, both historical and rhetorical, of exoticism.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
