Griffiths, and Tiffin 2002: 86 state that V.S Naipaul‟s works examine the
dilemma of the post-colonial writer, but particularly in The Mimic Men 1976. Naipaul‟s dilemma also can be seen in his novel, Magic Seeds. In Magic
Seeds Naipaul scrutinizes his dilemma th rough Willie‟s perspectives. Willie is
characterized as a man who travels from India to London. In his travel, Willie is trying to find his “true identity”.
Notably, Magic Seeds emphasizes the diasporic movement of Naipaul. Robert Balfour in his article “V.S Naipaul’s Half a Life, Magic Seeds and
Globalisation ” examines that Magic Seeds compromises a single narrative of
migration and identity politics, describing the brutalization and diaspora of peoples as a result of slavery, colonization and decolonization and
industrialization. According to Post-Colonial Studies, diasporic movement is a product of
colonialism. Here, diasporic movement involves the temporary or permanent dispersion and settlement of millions or Europeans over the entire world 2007:
61. Wolfreys, Robbins and Womack identify that diaspora as settling of various people away from their homelands; often associated with the notion of the Jewish
diaspora in modern Israel, but extended in cultural studies, postcolonial studies and race theory to consider the displacement of peoples by means of force, such as
slavery Wolfreys, Robbins and Womack, 2006: 32. Naipaul is as the descendant of diasporic movement. The descendants of
the diasporic movements generated by colonialism have developed their own distinctive cultures which both preserve and often extend and develop their
originary cultures Ashcroft, Griffiths, and Tiffin, 2007: 62. Thus, it can be concluded that the diasporic movement does not only lead the colonized people
into displacement but dispose them into ambivalence space where the cultures and identities are constructed by the colonizers.
Naipaul‟s literary work, Magic Seeds, shows his own voice, where he focuses on his diasporic movement and different ways of seeing toward
neighborhood. Magic Seeds begins when Willie has travelled from India to be a student in London, and published a book of stories. Later on he marries a woman
of mixed Portuguese and African ancestry and lives in her Portuguese African colony for 18 years, and at the point of the colonys independence, leaves to join
his sister in Berlin. Willies sister Sarojini, criticizes of his passivity and lack of commitment toward the war. Willie is supported to involve revolution group.
Willie agrees to go back to India to join guerrilla war. Actually, he joins wrong group and undergoes a long period of aimless marching, murder and hiding out in
the forest. Later, he escapes from revolution group. He is captured and imprisoned. His sister, however, recruits Roger, an English lawyer and publisher
who has known Willie during his student life. In a short while he is on a plane to London, where Roger finds him a rich patron and a job on a trade journal. The
story ends with Willie reflecting on his life and on Britains new multi-racial identity.
The novel depicts wonderful experiences of the author with all the strange imaginations and ways of seeing toward surroundings. In order to
understand deeper, the readers have to read the story carefully. The diasporic
experiences of the author attract the writer to analyze it. In this thesis, the writer would like to analyze the diasporic movements
of Naipaul‟s protagonist, Willie. The writer sees the strong correlation between diasporic movements and the
struggle of the main character to find his identity.
B. Problem Formulations
1. How are Willie‟s perceptions on postcolonial issues in the different
geographical locations depicted in the novel? 2.
How do diasporic movements reflect Willie‟s postcolonial identity negotiation?
C. Objectives of the Study
This thesis is aimed to reveal how diasporic movements reflect Willie‟s
postcolonial identity negotiation. To get better understanding about that objective, two problem formulations are made. First objective focuses on the
Willie‟s perspectives on the three different geographical locations. Second objective is
how diasporic mo vements reflect Willie‟s postcolonial identity negotiation.
D. Definitions of Terms
In order to avoid miss understanding and give clear meaning, it is important for the writer to define some terms. The terms are significant to
comprehend the problems discussed in this undergraduate thesis. In their book Post-Colonial Studies: The Key Concepts 2007: 61, Ashcroft, Griffiths, and
Tiffin explain that the word “diaspora” is taken from Greek meaning “to
disperse”. Diasporas, the voluntary or forcible movement of peoples from their homelands into new regions, is a central historical fact of colonization. According
to Brah 1996: 178-179 the word derives from the Greek —dia, “through”, and
speirein , “to scatter”. According to Webster‟s Dictionary in the United States,
diaspora refers to a “dispersion from”. Hence the word embodies a notion of a centre, a locus, a „home‟ from where the dispersion occurs. It invokes images of
multiple journeys. At the heart of the notion of diaspora is the image of a journey. Yet not every journey can be understood as diaspora. Diasporas are clearly not the
same as casual travel. Nor do they normatively refer to temporary sojourns. Diasporic movement is the act of moving of people from their homeland to
another place where they settling down, about putting roots “elsewhere”.
The writer also uses another terminology. It is negotiating. According to International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences negotiating is an act of
interaction through which individuals, organization, or governments explicitly try to arrange a new combination of some of their conflicting interests International
Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences vol 11, 117. Identity negotiation is the way how someone consults his identity with another people in order to get the
agreement. Besides, the terminology of postcolonial identity is also used in this
study. Stuart Hall defines postcolonial identities are never unified and, in late modern times, increasingly fragmented and fractured; never singular but multiply
constructed across different, often intersecting and antagonistic, discourses,
practices, and positions. They are subject to a radical historicization, and are constantly in the process of change and transformation Hall, 1996: 4. It means
that identity is not stable. In the contemporary era, identity is always constituted. Subsequently, the terminology of colonization must be explained in this
research. Marc Ferro in his book, Colonization: A Global History 1997: 1, defines that colonization is associated with the occupation of a foreign land, with
is being brought under cultivation, with the settlement of colonists. He explained that colonization is refers to” power” of a people to “reproduce” itself in different
spaces. Thus, colonization is related to the endeavor of the colonizers to grab new territory. They spread their ideology, cultures and so on.
According to Slemon, “postcolonial” and “resistance” are positively shimmering as objects of desire and self privilege and so easily appropriated to
competing, and in fact hostile, modes of critical and literary practice Slemon, 1995: 104
. Subsequently, Slemon cites Cudjoe and Harlow‟s work, resistance is an act or sets of acts, that is designed to rid a people of its oppressors, and it so
thoroughly infuses the experience of living under oppression that it becomes an almost autonomous aesthetic principle 1995: 107. Thus, postcolonial resistance
is related to the unfriendly competition between oppressed and oppressors in modes of critical and literary practice. It is because the oppressed is living under
oppression. Ashcroft, Griffiths, and Tiffin also associate the term “postcolonial” with
the cultural relations between the oppressors and the oppressed from the colonization up to the present day Ashcroft, Griffiths, and Tiffin, 2002: 2.
